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How to Get a Cold Call List?

A cold call list is nothing more than a list of people you are going to cold call, with their contact details and extra relevant information if necessary.

Some providers offer pre-made cold calling lists for sale. But if you're tired of hit-or-miss cold call lists, build custom lists through a B2B platform like Cognism Prospector. It has a global B2B database, including mobile numbers, direct dials, and email addresses.

Reps can run searches and filter down results depending on who you want to call (e.g., include or exclude job titles, seniority, departments, etc.). There’s no need to worry about data compliance because Cognism B2B cold calling data is CCPA and GDPR-compliant.

Take our platform for a spin and see how you can build a targeted cold-calling list in seconds. 👇

If you don’t have access to a sales prospecting platform, you can build cold cal lists manually. But this alternative method is time-consuming, frustrating for the sales team, and prone to errors. It involves cross-checking the lead data in multiple sources—or cold calling company numbers to try to get in touch with your prospect.

What are the benefits of building cold call lists with prospecting tools?

With a well-crafted cold call list, you can reach your best prospects and get your message across quickly—with a human touch you don’t get with other communication channels. But many companies slip up by not getting accurate data for the list.

Prospecting software uses advanced technology and implements manual reviews to ensure the highest-quality data. It brings many benefits to your sales team, especially compared to buying unverified or non-compliant cold-calling lists online:

  • Cold call lists save time – the hard work of digging up contact details is done for you.
  • A well-targeted list maximizes your chances of success.
  • Lists help salespeople create momentum. They can progress through the list quickly, improving their technique as they go.
  • If your list is well-targeted, you can compose a cold call script that is likely to hit home with everyone on it.
  • You can revisit your list and enrich the data to make sure it’s always up-to-date.

How to get the right phone numbers for cold calling outreach?

Cognism is a sales intelligence platform that provides multiple options to create targeted cold-calling lists in the EMEA, NAM, and APAC markets. It offers a CCPA and GDPR-compliant cold calling database, including prospects' cell phone numbers, manually verified cell phone numbers dataset, and direct dials.

Seamless integrations with sales tools and CRMs allow customers to integrate contact data lists into their existing systems and workflows. 

Best features

  • 2x more cell phone numbers than other providers.
  • 47 million cell phones in the US alone.
  • Phone-verified mobiles to connect with 87% of your list.
  • Phone number verification service on demand.
  • Coverage in NAM, EMEA and APAC.
  • CCPA & GDPR compliance with broad DNC lists scrubbing in multiple territories and notified emails.
  • Intent data, firmographics, and sales triggers.
  • Seamless integrations: including two-way integration with Salesforce.
  • Easy setup and fast adoption.
  • Unrestricted access to viewing and page-level exporting global data in all packages (within fair use policy).
  • Support for list building and exporting workflows.
Book a call and get your cold call list 

Better results with fewer calls

Build cold call lists using our accurate mobile data asset—Diamond Data®. Our data team calls cell phone numbers to verify they are correct and belong to the right prospect.

As a result, you can:

  • Connect 9 out of 10 times.
  • Increase connect rate by 3x.
  • Connect with 87% of your cold call list.

Compliant data at scale

Does your organization take compliance seriously when cold calling? We do, too! Cognism is committed to ensuring compliance with privacy laws to mitigate legal risks for your business.

  • When generating a cold call list with Cognism, you can hide contacts that are on do-not-call lists.
  • If a number in our database is marked as TPS or DNC, the user has opted out from receiving unsolicited phone calls by applying to the national do-not-call registry. 
  • Cognism checks all mobile numbers against DNC lists in the UK, USA, Canada, Australia and European countries, including Germany, France, Spain, Ireland, Belgium, Croatia, Portugal and Sweden.

Making unlawful marketing calls to businesses signed up with the do-not-call registers may result in hefty fines.

compliance graphic

What are the steps for building cold call lists?

The most effective cold call lists are full of the names of people with a problem your product can solve. These people are more likely to be receptive to what you have to say. 

As a result, your list doesn’t have to be long, but it has to be targeted and include good-fit prospects.

Developing your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) is a great place to start. When you have a clear picture of the kind of person you want to target, it’s much easier to go out and find them. Here’s how you develop your ICP:

  • Analyze your existing customer base and look for common features between your highest-spending users.
  • Look at the industries they operate in. Consider company size, locations, job titles. If you excel at selling to one category of company, you can find others that fit into that category.
  • Talk to your best customers about the challenges they face and how your product helps to resolve them.

Once you have a picture of your dream customer, you can start to search for others just like them in B2B databases.

What data should a good cold call list include?

How much data will be on your cold calling list is up to you, but the minimum information you need is:

It’s often helpful to have their email address and LinkedIn details as well to develop a winning sales cadence.

The more you know about your lead before you call them, the more likely you’ll make a connection. You’ll find it easier to address what you say to the prospect’s situation. You can enrich your cold calling list with additional data points, like:

  • Buying intent signals.
  • Sales events triggers.
  • Technographic data.

Thanks to intent data, you can gauge the level of prospect’s interest in what you’re selling and their company’s need for it. It’s beneficial if you’re running account-based marketing campaigns. Intent data providers can capture prospects’ web searches and the content they consume to indicate their level of interest in a product or service. 

Sales triggers help you prioritize contacts on your list. For example, if the prospect has just been promoted, they may want to make a mark with a new purchase. Another useful sales trigger is if the company has just received a new round of funding; this shows that they have an influx of new budgets available and may be looking to spend.

More questions about cold calling prospects?

We’ve collated our best and most entertaining resources for SDRs and sales leaders to access on-demand:

  • Cadences.
  • Cold calling examples.
  • Scripts.
  • On-demand training.

SDR Zone features tactical sales content and an original video series that will help you book more meetings, build a better pipeline and take your mind off the day job. 👉

Cold call lists: key takeaways

  • Building a targeted cold call list allows you to reach prospects who are most likely to convert.
  • It's important to have accurate contact data for the list to ensure you reach the right people.
  • Intent data and sales triggers help you prioritize contacts on your cold calling list.
  • If you want to buy a cold call list online, bear in mind it can be outdated, incompliant, or inefficient.
  • Over 1800 sales teams worldwide trust Cognism’s compliant B2B data.
  • Our cell phone numbers database helps reduce the time spent on building cold call lists and hitting revenue goals.
  • Cognism Prospector works well with the other sales tools you already have and makes the outbound sales job a lot easier and more efficient.

See why outbound teams choose Cognism

The sales managers used to make 100-150 calls per day. Now they can achieve their targets by making 30 calls per day because they are calling prospects who actually pick up the phone. That’s more results, less calls.
Ultima
George Mckenna, Head of Cloud Sales
8
saw ROI in 8 weeks
70%
achieved target with 70% fewer calls
Read Full Case Study
You don’t need to be tech-savvy to use the platform and it seamlessly integrates into the tools you’re using already. Best of all, it delivers fast results. Once you’ve signed up, you’ll wonder how you ever managed without it
GWI
Joshua Silvera, Director of Sales Development
90%
reduction in lead list generation time
Read Full Case Study
I generate the data in the WebApp on behalf of the BDMs using the staffing and RPO intent topics. In the search, I can see what topics are surging alongside the surge number. Once I've refined the contacts according to their surge number, I sync the lists into our Bullhorn CRM and assign the contacts from each vertical to an individual BDM. The BDM will then contact the desired prospects within the surging accounts with a personalised message.
Kelly Services
UK Sales Enablement Lead
28K
contacts generated with intent data
Read Full Case Study
As a sales rep, I don’t have to worry about the quality of data affecting my ability to hit quota. This saves a huge amount of time and enables me to book 80% of my meetings through Cognism.
SaaSLeads
Jack Vesztrocy, Sales Development Representative
80%
of demos booked with Cognism leads
£0.8 million
Cognism-influenced revenue
Read Full Case Study
Given the rapidity of the onboarding, I could confidently show our CFO that Cognism has demonstrated high usage and product adoption across the sales organisation in the initial 30 days
Drift
Michael Iannuzzi, Director of Marketing & Sales Development
ROI
in 30 days
5X
faster prospecting
Read Full Case Study