Short version: the best cold call opening line tells the other person who you are and why you are calling them, then asks a question they can answer in a word. Everything else can wait until they have decided to stay on the line.
The one job of the first sentence
The first sentence of a call has one job: tell the other person who you are and why you’re calling them, before they decide you’re a stranger to get off the phone with. That is the whole brief for a cold call opening line. It is not there to be charming, and it is not there to warm anyone up.
Most opening lines spend that moment on something else.
Three openers that spend it badly
- “How are you today?”
- “Did I catch you at a bad time?”
- “I’ll only take a minute.”
They sound polite, and each one asks the other person for something — an answer, a favour — before they know who’s asking. A stranger who has to do work before they know who you are will usually do the easiest thing available: end the call.
A better first sentence
A better first sentence does three things, in this order:
- Your name, and the one detail they’d recognise you by
Not a pitch, not your job title. The single thing that makes your name mean something to them.
- Why you’re calling them, specifically
Not everyone on the list. If your reason would be equally true of every number you dial, it is not a reason yet.
- A question they can answer in a word
Yes, no, or Thursday. Keep the effort of replying close to zero.
Put together, it looks like this:
“Hi {name}, it’s {you} from {company}. You asked about {the thing} in the spring, and {why now}. Have you got two minutes, or is Thursday better?”
Notice what the question does. “Have you got two minutes, or is Thursday better?” is a favour too — but it arrives after they know who you are and why you rang, and it offers a way to say yes to a later time instead of a flat no.
Everything after that is earned
Nothing before that sentence is. Pleasantries, apologies and reassurances all come first in the usual script, which is exactly why they land badly: the person on the other end has not yet been given a reason to care how you are or how long you will take.
The detail in step one and the reason in step two have to come from somewhere. That is a list question, not a phrasing question. If your notes say where each person came from and what they asked about, the opening writes itself. If they do not, you will fall back on the generic opener, because there is nothing else to say. Our guide to managing your contacts covers keeping that context beside each name.
Try it on your next list
Write your own version of the sentence above for the first three names on your list, filling in the real detail and the real reason for each. If you cannot fill in the blanks for someone, that is worth knowing before you dial rather than during the call.
So — what’s the first sentence you actually use?
If you work through a list one person at a time, DialRidge is calling software for exactly that; here is what a dialing session looks like.