Purpose

Cold calling being one of the most preferred modes of sales strategies in the past, with all digital platforms setting in, is it still the best option a B2B service firm has? To seek answer to this interesting question is the purpose of this paper. The study seeks to understand the contributions of both the sales force and the digital marketing team towards lead conversion. The paper also aims to derive a sense-making model for lead conversion based on a few propositions of the study.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors have adopted mixed method approach. The authors have chosen a small enterprise offering B2B services to understand the sales process. The past one-year cold calling data were analyzed. In addition, 15 in-depth interviews were conducted among the managers and the executives of the firm. The study adopts the AIDA model of customer response and the stages of selling process to better map the sales process of the firm. Based on the analysis, a new model is proposed to aid lead conversions.

Findings

The findings suggest that cold calling is not an effective mode of sales strategies in this case as the firm experienced a very low conversion rate. However, with the integration of digital marketing efforts with sales process, the sales team could achieve higher conversion rate.

Originality/value

Very few studies in the literature examines the effectiveness of cold calling strategy integrated with digital marketing efforts. This is one of the few studies examining cold calling strategy in B2B service firm in India.

中文翻译：

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印度初创 B2B 服务公司通过冷电话进行潜在客户转换的模型：一种有意义的推导

目的

冷电话是过去最受欢迎的销售策略之一，所有数字平台都在设置，它仍然是 B2B 服务公司的最佳选择吗？寻求这个有趣问题的答案是本文的目的。该研究旨在了解销售人员和数字营销团队对潜在客户转化的贡献。本文还旨在根据研究的一些命题推导出一个用于潜在客户转换的意义构建模型。

设计/方法/方法

The authors have adopted mixed method approach. The authors have chosen a small enterprise offering B2B services to understand the sales process. The past one-year cold calling data were analyzed. In addition, 15 in-depth interviews were conducted among the managers and the executives of the firm. The study adopts the AIDA model of customer response and the stages of selling process to better map the sales process of the firm. Based on the analysis, a new model is proposed to aid lead conversions.

Findings

The findings suggest that cold calling is not an effective mode of sales strategies in this case as the firm experienced a very low conversion rate. However, with the integration of digital marketing efforts with sales process, the sales team could achieve higher conversion rate.

Originality/value

文献中很少有研究检验与数字营销工作相结合的冷呼叫策略的有效性。这是为数不多的研究印度 B2B 服务公司冷呼叫策略的研究之一。