Cold Calling Tips From 80,000 Calls

By Jimmy Smith, Co-founder of STAOS · Sep 3, 2026 · 7 min read

I have made more than 80,000 cold calls across 12 years and coached hundreds of reps through the same seat. Almost everything that improved my numbers was unglamorous, and almost everything that felt clever was a waste of time.

What should you say in the first ten seconds?

The reflex you are fighting in the first three seconds is not hostility, it is pattern recognition. They have heard the confident-friendly-stranger opening a thousand times and have a script of their own for ending it. Naming the thing breaks the pattern.

What that sounds like in practice: "Hi Sarah, it's Jimmy calling from STAOS. This is a cold call, do you want to hang up or give me twenty seconds?" Most people give you the twenty seconds, because you were honest and because you gave them the choice.

Then the reason has to be specific to them. "I saw you're hiring two AEs" works. "We help agencies grow" does not, because it is true of everyone who has ever called them.

Should you use a script?

The structure worth keeping: opener, reason for the call, permission to ask a couple of questions, two qualifying questions, one rebuttal you have prepared, and a specific ask. Six parts. Everything else is conversation.

If you want the structure generated for your offer, the cold call script generator builds all six parts and takes about a minute. Take the structure, then make the words yours.

How do you handle the brush-off?

One rebuttal, not three. Pushing past a second genuine no costs you a future conversation and it is the thing that gives cold calling its reputation. The goal is a real conversation later, not a cornered person now.

What should you actually measure?

• Connect rate. Reached a human divided by dials. Low means the list or the timing is wrong.
• Conversation rate. Got past the opener divided by connects. Low means the opener is wrong.
• Meetings booked. Divided by conversations. Low means the ask or the qualification is wrong.
• Meetings held. The only one that counts. A booked meeting that no-shows helped nobody.

That chain tells you exactly which part is broken, which is far more useful than a dial count. A rep making 80 dials a day at a 4% connect rate does not need 120 dials, they need a better list. The remote cell dialer tracks dispositions as you go so this data exists without extra admin.

What should you stop doing?

The habits that cost the most, in order.

1. Changing the opener every week. You will never learn whether any version works. Run one for 200 calls, then judge it on the conversation rate.
2. Pitching in the first thirty seconds. Nobody buys from the opener. The opener buys you the questions, the questions buy you the meeting.
3. Talking through the objection. Silence after a rebuttal does more work than another sentence. Most reps cannot tolerate two seconds of it.
4. Calling without a list strategy. Batch by similarity so you get better within a session. 20 calls to the same kind of company beats 20 calls to 20 different kinds.
5. Skipping the confirm. Send the calendar invite while they are still on the phone. Show rate roughly doubles versus sending it later, in my experience running these teams.
6. Treating a no-show as their fault. Sometimes it is. Usually the value was not clear enough to beat whatever came up at 2pm.

Does cold calling still work?

The honest caveat: it works if the list is right and the offer is relevant. Cold calling a bad list is not a channel problem, it is a targeting problem, and no opener rescues it. Build the list properly first.

It also works considerably better as one channel among several. The call that lands after they have seen your name twice is a different call. Pair it with a sequence from the cold email generator, and if you are calling agencies, the Google Ads checker tells you which prospects are actively running paid ads before you dial, which is a specific reason to call and a much better opener than most people have.

The full outbound prompt set is at prompts for sales reps, and everything else on the phone side is in tools for sales reps. If you are figuring out whether the setter seat is right for you, SDR vs BDR covers what each role actually does.

Frequently asked questions

Do cold calls still work in 2026?

Yes, and arguably better than five years ago, because fewer people do it well while email and social volume has risen. It works when the list is right and the offer is relevant. No opener rescues a bad list.

What is the best cold call opener?

Say who you are, admit it is a cold call, and give one specific reason you called this person rather than anyone else. Naming it breaks the pattern that triggers an automatic hang-up.

How many cold calls should a rep make a day?

Track connects rather than dials. If the connect rate is low, more dials will not fix it. List quality and call timing are usually the constraint, not activity volume.

How do you handle the not interested objection?

Expect it before they have processed anything you said. Acknowledge it, ask one question, and let go if the second no is genuine. One rebuttal, not three.

Should sales reps use a cold call script?

Yes, as a structure rather than sentences to recite: opener, reason for the call, permission, two qualifying questions, one prepared rebuttal, and a specific ask. Reps who refuse scripts have one anyway, they just cannot improve it because it is not written down.