Who doesn’t want new customers? Everyone does, right? One of the most convenient way to reach prospective clients is either through cold call or through Email.  Both methods are equally advantageous. The method of outreach sales executives use for their first contact makes a significant difference in their response rates.  Most people prefer to email a prospect rather than calling, because email is often considered more comfortable and can help you with your fear of being rejected. The same happened to Ajoft sales team, which when given a task for software marketing they started mailing their prospects without proper planning.

Before making up your mind to call or email, your decision should weigh all the benefits of each option and should only choose an option which you think will provide maximum responses. Both options have their own advantages and disadvantages which you should weigh before deciding.

Email, on one hand, is considered the perfect medium for business communication. You can contact anyone, anywhere very easily but since email is very easy to send, so it’s also easy to avoid.   Cold calling, on the other hand, is not so easy and is generally avoided. The success rate is so low that everyone hates it, then also its very popular. Why? Because there is an intangible trust that comes with human interaction that email simply cannot provide – no matter how many words you use.

Benefits of Cold Calling:

• Builds relationships: Phoning colleagues, partners, suppliers,  and contacts can prove much more effective in terms of relationship building, networking, and maintaining quality communication streams between all parties
• Less Misunderstandings: Another key reason why a phone call is better than an email is that key information and content can remain in context, whereas misunderstandings can often occur in emails.
• Immediate responses: One of the main reasons why picking up the phone and calling someone is better than sending an email, is the fact that any issues can be dealt with faster and more efficiently.
• Handle Objections: With call you have chances of hearing your prospects objections and handle their objections smartly.

However, there are few disadvantages also which comes along with cold calls  like it demands immediate responses which does not provide enough time to prospects to make a decision.  Anything spoken over phone becomes  commitment and becomes a part of work overload. Often times when we receive cold calls we are either in middle of something and heading for something. Thus, cold calls also kills productivity and work flow. It has also quite known that many times we cannot hear or understand the person who is speaking. More over, you cannot keep records of a phone call.

The Keller Center for Research of Baylor University conducted a study where 50 cold callers – experienced sales professionals – made a total of 6,264 cold calls over the course of two weeks. The results aren’t going to surprise you: 17% were non-working numbers, 55% of the calls went unanswered, and 27% were not interested or refused additional information. The study reveals that for every 330 calls made, one appointment was set. Out of those 6,000+ calls, only 19 appointments were made. That puts the success rate of cold calling at 0.3% – not an encouraging number.

Even if the numbers are not encouraging, cold calls, when done correctly, are by far a more effective way of selling your company and your product. Fit your pitch to every individual and company that you call, and you’ll notice a significant difference in your success rate. The personal touch that a phone call provides may be enough to give you the extra edge in your selling.

 Benefits of Emailing

• Email are easier & quicker: Getting an email address is very easy and sending and  communicating via email is quite easy and very quick.
• Email can be tracked: Email is an electronic form of communication which gets stored in your email program which can later be tracked at any point of time.
• Email Can be descriptive: While its not very efficient to have a long technical explanations over phone, but with email things can  be very different. We can send entire documentations and explanations over email.

Although  emails are easier and faster, prospects generally doesn’t reply if their mail box is already flooded with hundreds of email. Emails are quite easy to get deleted also. Moreover people generally don’t open emails if it looks like a sales pitch. If you think that to get someone to open your email, it’s all about the subject line with which you can trick the prospect into opening  the email. Unfortunately, that’s not the case. An unsolicited email needs three elements to get a response. You need to have the right research, the right prospects, and the right message.

In my opinion, pitching should be done with a combination of both emails and calls. The beginning of  sales  engagement should be done with calling. Then in between emails can be used for doubts clearances and  discussions. Then deal should be closed again with phone calls. It’s interesting to note that most salespeople take the opposite approach — they ask buyers for meetings through emails and reserve simple questions for calls. Why? Because they’re afraid of being rejected on a strong ask over the phone.

CEO of Kwittken Company, Aaron Kwittken, gave a standard rule for emailing and calling in an interview. he asserted that, “[Anything] you have to think twice about, anything you think might be sensitive, anything that you think requires your relationship skills, you need to call in your relationship, [and] absolutely you should pick up the phone.

That being said , go pick up the phone and start calling & emailing.