I have had some experience calling strangers to enlist their help in the political arena. However, although these people were strangers to me, they had shown some kind of interest in the particular party by having attended a meeting, or putting their contact details somewhere. Yet despite their seeming interest, it is extremely difficult to motivate people over the phone and I would think that to use a telephone directory instead of a list of leads, would be even harder.
People do not like to be interrupted by unsolicited phone calls from strangers. It is an invasion of the sanctity of their home and private family time. And a phone call is more confronting to someone than an email which can be deleted or marked as spam, or a leaflet which can be simply thrown in the bin.
Apart from the inconvenience and annoyance caused to the receiver of the call, this method would also be totally inefficient as a tool for prospecting as you have no idea who may be interested, when someone will be at home, or when they may have time to talk. You could spend hours and hours with no leads at all and run up an enormous phone bill with no results.
If you want to prospect using the phone, I think you would be better off spending your time driving around the neighbourhood putting up advertising leaflets with your phone number attached, and allowing interested people to call you instead.
That is my experience of cold calling even with a list of people who were apparently interested. In my opinion, it is a last resort.
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I have had some experience calling strangers to enlist their help in the political arena. However, although these people were strangers to me, they had shown some kind of interest in the particular party by having attended a meeting, or putting their contact details somewhere. Yet despite their seeming interest, it is extremely difficult to motivate people over the phone and I would think that to use a telephone directory instead of a list of leads, would be even harder.
People do not
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