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The New Way of Doing Cold Outreach in 2024

The Limitations of Traditional Cold Outreach

Cold sales outreach is a challenging and often frustrating endeavor for many businesses. The traditional approach typically involves a combination of cold calling, cold emailing, and attending in-person events and conferences. However, this sequential, non-digital approach is simply not scalable or effective in today’s fast-paced, digital-first business landscape. Let’s take a closer look at the limitations of the traditional cold outreach methods:
  • Cold Calling: The statistics are grim – for every 100 cold calls made, a business may only secure 1.5 meetings, and that’s in the best-case scenario. For businesses selling more complex products, the conversion rate is even lower.
  • Cold Emailing: While slightly better than cold calling, the conversion rate for cold emails is still only around 2%. Sending thousands of unsolicited emails is not only time-consuming but can also damage a company’s reputation and deliverability.
  • In-Person Events and Conferences: Attending these events can be valuable for networking and building relationships, but they are not scalable. A business can only attend so many events per week or month, limiting their reach and impact.
The traditional cold outreach approach is often characterized by a focus on the business and its products, rather than on the needs and pain points of the prospective customer. This self-centered approach is a major turnoff for modern buyers, who are increasingly savvy and demand value-driven, personalized interactions.

The New Digital-First Approach to Cold Outreach

To overcome the limitations of traditional cold outreach, businesses need to adopt a more modern, digital-first approach. This new way of doing cold outreach is centered around building relationships, providing value, and leveraging the power of digital channels to scale your efforts. Here’s a step-by-step breakdown of the new digital-first cold outreach strategy:

1. Connect with Your Audience

The first step in the new cold outreach approach is to connect with your target audience. This means building a list of prospects on platforms like LinkedIn and engaging with them regularly. By connecting with your prospects, you’ll ensure that your content and messages are visible to them for the next few weeks.

2. Provide Value Through Content

Once you’ve connected with your audience, the next step is to provide them with valuable content that addresses their pain points and challenges. This could take the form of blog posts, videos, or other educational resources that demonstrate your expertise and position you as a trusted advisor. The key here is to focus on the problem, not the sale. By addressing your prospects’ concerns and offering solutions, you’ll build trust and establish yourself as a valuable resource, rather than just another salesperson trying to make a quick buck.

3. Personalized Outreach

After providing value through your content, you can then move on to more personalized outreach. This could involve sending a direct message to a prospect, offering to schedule a call or meeting, or even sending a personalized email with a relevant piece of content. The key to successful personalized outreach is to time it right. If you’ve done a good job of providing value and building trust, your prospects will be more receptive to your outreach efforts. They’ll see you as a helpful resource, rather than just another salesperson trying to make a quick sale.

The Benefits of the New Digital-First Cold Outreach Approach

By adopting this new digital-first approach to cold outreach, businesses can enjoy a range of benefits, including:

1. Increased Scalability

The traditional cold outreach methods are inherently limited in their scalability. You can only make so many cold calls or attend so many events in a given time period. However, by leveraging digital channels and creating valuable content, you can scale your outreach efforts much more effectively. For example, a single piece of content that you create can be shared and repurposed across multiple digital platforms, reaching a much wider audience than a single cold call or email.

2. Improved Targeting and Personalization

Digital channels like LinkedIn and social media allow you to precisely target your ideal customers and tailor your outreach efforts to their specific needs and pain points. By understanding your audience and creating personalized content, you can significantly improve the relevance and effectiveness of your cold outreach.

3. Increased Trust and Credibility

By providing value and positioning yourself as a trusted advisor, you can build stronger relationships with your prospects and increase your credibility in their eyes. This, in turn, can lead to more successful sales conversations and a higher conversion rate.

4. Better Tracking and Measurement

Digital channels also offer more robust tracking and measurement capabilities, allowing you to better understand the effectiveness of your cold outreach efforts. You can track metrics like engagement, click-through rates, and conversion rates, and use this data to continuously optimize your strategy.

Implementing the New Digital-First Cold Outreach Approach

Now that you understand the benefits of the new digital-first cold outreach approach, let’s dive into the practical steps you can take to implement it in your business:

1. Identify Your Target Audience

The first step is to clearly define your target audience. Who are the ideal customers for your products or services? What are their pain points, challenges, and needs? Thoroughly research your target market and create detailed buyer personas to guide your outreach efforts.

2. Build Your Digital Presence

Next, focus on building a strong digital presence on the platforms where your target audience is most active. This could include LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, or even your own company blog or podcast. Consistently create and share valuable, educational content that addresses your prospects’ pain points. This could include blog posts, videos, webinars, or even social media posts. The key is to position yourself as a trusted expert and resource, rather than just another salesperson.

3. Connect and Engage with Your Audience

Once you’ve built your digital presence, start connecting and engaging with your target audience. On LinkedIn, for example, you can search for and connect with relevant prospects, then regularly engage with their content and share your own. The goal here is to build relationships and establish yourself as a valuable resource in the eyes of your prospects. By consistently providing value and engaging with your audience, you’ll increase the likelihood of them reaching out to you when they’re ready to make a purchase.

4. Personalize Your Outreach

When the time is right, you can begin reaching out to your prospects with more personalized outreach. This could involve sending a direct message, offering to schedule a call or meeting, or even sending a personalized email with a relevant piece of content. The key is to time your outreach correctly, based on the level of engagement and trust you’ve already built with your prospects. If you’ve done a good job of providing value and building relationships, your prospects will be much more receptive to your outreach efforts.

5. Measure and Optimize

Finally, be sure to track and measure the effectiveness of your digital-first cold outreach efforts. Monitor metrics like engagement, click-through rates, and conversion rates, and use this data to continuously optimize your strategy. Don’t be afraid to experiment with different content formats, messaging, and outreach approaches. The key is to stay agile and responsive to the needs and behaviors of your target audience.

Conclusion

In today’s fast-paced, digital-first business landscape, the traditional approach to cold outreach is simply no longer effective. By adopting a new digital-first strategy that focuses on building relationships, providing value, and leveraging the power of digital channels, businesses can significantly improve the scalability, targeting, and effectiveness of their cold outreach efforts. By implementing the steps outlined in this blog post, you can position your business as a trusted advisor, build stronger relationships with your prospects, and ultimately drive more successful sales conversations and conversions. So why not start embracing the new way of doing cold outreach today? For more resources and insights on sales and marketing, be sure to check out Michael Humblet’s website and subscribe to his YouTube channel.
Michael Humblet

Michael Humblet

Michael Humblet is obsessed with designing, building, training and scaling sales machines and founder of  Chaomatic and School of Sales , focused on accelerating revenue growth. Michael is the author of Nobody Knows You. The book that explains how to fix the most basic issue to scale your growth. He is also the host of The Sales Acceleration Show, a sales and marketing focused Q&A show on how to accelerate your business.