A lot of people never get into sales because the pure thought of cold calling is terrifying.
Even when you do become a sales rep. A lot of reps avoid cold calling like it's the plague because you have no idea what's gonna happen when you pick up the phone.
Whether it's someone chewing you out, telling you to get a different job, or someone saying, "send me an email just to never reply again" – cold calling is really, really hard.
So if it was hard enough to cold call on your own.
It's even harder to submit a cold call for us to tear down in front of the entire world.
But one gal on our newsletter submitted a cold call and it was one of the best we’ve ever heard. Today we’re breaking it down.
Today you'll see the real transcript broken into 4 parts:
- The Opener
- The Reverse Pitch
- The Discovery
- The Meeting + Close
For context, this rep sells an HR platform that helps you manage everything from HR to payroll to IT to finance in one place.
The call comes straight from our latest video with Jason Bay where he tore down 3 real cold calls live (submitted by you all).
Want to hear Jason break down all 3 calls live?
1. The Opener
Rep (PBO): "Hey, this is [name] calling. You are gonna hate me. This is a cold call, but I was hoping I could just get a minute or two to explain why I was reaching out."
Prospect: "Yeah. With who? Sorry."
Rep (Heard The Name Tossed Around): "Oh no worries, I'm calling with [Company]. Have you heard us kicked around at all?"
The rep didn't ask how their day was going. Didn't apologize for calling.
Just got straight to it with a permission based opener that got the prospect to laugh.
She earned the opt-in within 10 seconds.
From there she used the Heard The Name Tossed Around Opener to establish familiarity before the pitch. That’s next.
(2) The Reverse Pitch
Rep (Relevance): "I was reaching out because we actually met with [previous contact]. I believe he's left the company since. But back in 2024, there were some reporting issues you guys were having.
(What’s Changed) Since then, I noticed you guys have downsized a little bit. I know with global operations that kind of onboarding can be a pretty heavy lift, especially if reporting gaps are already there.
(Ask) So I wanted to circle back and see if that's still prevalent for you guys today."
Prospect: "We added a bit of AI in, so we're actually in a good spot now."
The rep never once mentioned what the product does. Instead, they led with what they knew about the prospect and pitched the problem instead.
This is what Jason calls the reverse pitch. Instead of leading with features or a product description, you lead with a problem a similar customer was experiencing and ask if it resonates.
The universal language between you and the buyer is their problems, their priorities, things they care about, things they're measured on, things they're stressed about (not your product).
Even when the prospect pushed back with "we're actually in a good spot," the call had enough momentum to keep going because the rep had already earned credibility by showing they understood the buyer's world.
3. The Discovery
The rep asked multiple discovery questions including:
Q1: "Okay, glad to hear it. When you say system upgrading, what does that look like?"
Q2: “That sounds like a manual process. How long does that overall onboarding take you?”
Q3: “What else is sort of included in your day to day through your guys' HR system?”
Q4: “Have you guys ever considered looking into a system that would consolidate that single point for employee data with the functions you're using through picker.”
What She Learned:
A: Their off-boarding was split across HR, finance, and IT. No single system owning it
B: The manual steps weren't taking that long which means the prospect wasn't feeling the pain acutely
C: She wasn't the decision maker: finance owned the payroll side, which is why the rep multithreaded on the spot
Jason's overall take: It was solid discovery, but ran a little deep into the weeds without stopping to check if this was actually a problem worth solving.
The rep spent several minutes asking open-ended questions about the off-boarding process, how many systems were involved, which teams touched what, and where the manual handoffs were happening.
Instead, Jason likes to ask this question as a shortcut to the problem:
Jason: "It sounds like you're really happy with what you're using right now, but if there's one thing it needed to do better, what comes to mind?"
Instead of trying to map their entire situation, just tell them you assume it’s going well to remove the pressure of the sale. Then ask for one thing that might not be going well.
Either way, the rep was able to get the prospect to agree that their process was manual through her questions. And that setup the close.
4. The Meeting + Pre-Close
Rep: "I would love to set up 30 minutes just to dive a little bit deeper into that — given you guys do have two systems at play and a little bit of a manual process. Do you have any time, say tomorrow or the next day?"
Jason’s only thought: she might’ve actually been able to ask for the meeting earlier because the prospect was opening up so much throughout the call.
The prospect didn't push back and agreed to the meeting. She just had one ask:
Prospect: "I'd like to get the person I work with in payroll included, she's the primary on that side."
Rep (Multithreading): "Absolutely. and if you wanted to include someone from your IT team, we cover that side as well."
Once the prospect confirmed, the rep already had the instinct to multithread even more.
Jason called out that the more we can do to get the right folks to show up earlier in the sales process, the higher the likelihood of winning the business.
Then there was a phenomenal line the rep snuck in before hanging up:
Rep (Timeline Test): "No pressure at all, but if everything went well and it turned out to be a great fit, is there any kind of timeline you guys would be looking at?"
Prospect: "Probably something we'd look at in Q1 of next year."
Jason called this the pre-close: a low-pressure way to surface buying intent before you hang up.
It doesn't work as well at enterprise, but at SMB it's really good because deals tend to move quickly.
The meeting got booked. Jason's grade: 8.4.
The Takeaway
Three things this rep did that most reps don't:
- Earned the opt-in fast: With a permission based opener into a HTNTA opener
- Started in the buyer's world: Led with a problem instead of a product
- Multithreaded on the spot: Got the right people looped in before the call even ended
And it’s not just what she said that got the meeting.
Listen to how she said it in this video (and the other 3 calls that Jason broke down):
