The correct answer is; The best day is THURSDAY!
Dr. James Oldroyd from the Kellogg School of Management recently examined the electronic logs of more than a million cold calls, made by thousands of sales professionals inside around 50 companies. He then applied statistical measurements to extract patterns of success and failure.He discovered that Thursday is the best day to contact a lead in order to qualify that lead. In fact, it is almost 20 percent better than Friday, which is the worst day. All the other days fall somewhere in betwereNext question; WHAT IS THE BEST TIME OF DAY TO CALL?Just as some days are better than others, when it comes to cold-calling success, some hours of the day are better. Obviously, calling during lunch hour is a bad idea, simply because you’ll probably not reach the prospect. But beyond that, do you know which time of day is best?In fact, by statistics, the most effective time is Early Morning (8-9am) followed closely by Late Afternoon (4-5pm).Oldroyd’s study revealed that the absolute worst time to call is right after lunch. In fact, an early morning cold call is 164 percent more likely to qualify a lead than one made from 1-2pm.OK, now that you’re calling at the right time and day and next we look at the one rule that trumps everything else. How quickly should we respond to a hot lead before it goes cold?A special rule applies when you’re gathering your leads in “real time.” This usually happens online, when a potential customer visits your website, although it can happen when a customer responds to an ad or direct mail by giving your firm a call.Obviously, you’re more likely to qualify the lead if you get back to the prospect quickly. But how quickly is quickly enough?For most B2B markets, the correct answer is one hour, after which the lead is no longer “hot.” It’s still a lead, but it’s no better than any old lead taken from a list.Oldroyd’s study revealed that, in B2B selling environments, the best odds of qualifying a lead happen within 20 minutes after interest is shown. However, calling within 5 minutes is 21 times more likely to result in a qualified prospect than if you wait half an hour.Some industries aren’t quite so time-sensitive. In financial services, for example, as long as you call a hot lead within 24 hours, you still have a chance to qualify the lead and move it into your pipeline.But that’s the exception rather than the rule, and calling quickly is ALWAYS massively more effective.To recap what we covered in the previous three newsletters, statistics show that the best time of day to call is early morning, the best day to call is Thursday, and it is most effective to follow up a lead is as close to immediately as possible.So how do we bring all this together?Easy. Here’s exactly what you do:- STEP 1: Reschedule. Schedule your cold calling sessions early morning or late afternoon, preferably on Thursday, but avoiding Friday, especially Friday afternoon. Don’t make the mistake of thinking you can only call people between 10 and three or whatever.
- STEP 2: Prioritize. Make your cold call selection based upon how “hot” the leads are. If they’re streaming in from your web site ALWAYS make those calls first. For other leads on your list, call the most recently-harvested ones first.
- STEP 3: Adapt. Get focused on being effective when you cold call. It’s not just a matter of calling and reading a script.
- STEP 4: Measure. Keep a record of your success rate. You may find that your industry, or your region, is slightly different from the averages we’ve discussed. For example, if you’re a “night person” rather than a “morning person” you’ll likely get a better response calling late afternoon than early morning.
And one last point; the one really big mistake you can make in calling people, is just not doing it! So pick up the phone and start talking to people.
