Healthcare · Cold Call
Healthcare Cold Call Script: Getting a CMIO or VP of Clinical Operations to Give You 20 Minutes
You just dialled a CMIO who is three tabs deep in an after-hours EHR time report, or a VP of Clinical Operations walking from a capacity huddle to a denials review. They did not download anything. They have a physician in Dermatology threatening to go part-time and a Medicaid-heavy behavioral health clinic running an 18% no-show rate, and neither of those problems has your name on it. You get about eight seconds to prove you're a human, another thirty to prove you understand what a Tuesday looks like inside their medical group.
The thing that separates a healthcare cold call script that books meetings from one that gets a polite "send me something" is relevance density. Clinical leaders are pitched constantly, and almost every pitch opens with a company story. Yours should open with a number they already pull: 90-plus minutes of pajama time per provider per day against a 30-minute target, chart closure inside 72 hours, third-next-available creeping past three weeks in Ortho. If your first two sentences could have been said to a logistics company, you've lost. If they could only have been said to someone running 340 providers on Epic, you've earned another thirty seconds.
This playbook assumes you know one thing before you dial: whether they're an Epic, Cerner/Oracle Health, athenahealth, or eCW shop. That single fact changes the integration conversation, the governance path, and the objection you'll hear at second forty. Everything below is written to be said out loud, at a slower pace than feels natural, to someone who is mid-something-else.
The cold call script
Say it in your own words. The structure is the part that matters.
- 1
90-second prep — do not dial without these four answers
Say each of these out loud before you touch the phone: 1. WHO: "Dr. Alan Reyes, CMIO at Brightline Medical Group, in seat 14 months, owns clinical informatics and the EHR governance committee. Not the budget holder — the veto holder." 2. EHR: "Epic, single instance, community connect for two affiliated groups." (If you don't know, say so on the call rather than guessing wrong. Guessing wrong on Epic vs. Cerner ends the call.) 3. TRIGGER: new CMIO seat, three family medicine job postings live, a new value-based contract announced, a clinic acquisition, an Ortho service line launch, or — if there's no trigger — the segment itself: "every multi-specialty group between 200 and 500 providers we talk to is dealing with the same in-basket problem." 4. THE ASK: "Twenty minutes, Thursday 7:45am before clinic or Tuesday at 4:30. Not a demo." Have the follow-up email drafted in a window before you dial. You'll send it while they're still on the line.
- 2
The opener — name, honest frame, permission, pause
"Dr. Reyes — it's Maya Okonkwo at Solace. We haven't spoken, this is a cold call. Can I have thirty seconds to tell you why I rang, and then you can tell me to get lost?" [Two full seconds of silence. Do not fill it. Downward inflection on 'get lost' — it's a statement, not a plea.] Variants: Pattern interrupt: "Dr. Reyes — Maya, Solace. You don't know me. Bad time?" Trigger-led: "Dr. Reyes, Maya from Solace. I saw you've got three family medicine postings open in the north market and a new CMIO seat — that's actually why I called. Got a minute?" Never say: "How are you today?", "Did I catch you at a bad time?", "I'll be brief," or "I wanted to introduce myself and our platform."
- 3
The reason — problem, not product (two sentences, then a check-in)
For a CMIO or Chief Medical Officer: "We work with about a dozen multi-specialty groups on Epic, roughly your size. The thing that keeps coming up with CMIOs is that when they pull the audit logs, they're seeing 90-plus minutes of after-hours EHR time per provider per day against a 30-minute target — and they can name the four docs closest to walking because of it. Is that anywhere near your world, or have you got that under control?" For a VP of Clinical Operations or Practice Administrator: "We work with a handful of medical groups running Medicaid-heavy primary care and behavioral health. What ops leaders tell us is that they're sitting at a 15 to 20% no-show rate with a fully staffed pod — paying the MA, the front desk and the rent on an empty exam room — and they've already run text reminders, overbooking and waitlist backfill, and each one created a new problem. Is that a live thing for you, or solved?" For a Director of Revenue Cycle Management: "We work with revenue cycle directors at multi-site groups. The pattern is that prior-auth denials and downcoded E&M levels both trace back to the same thing — a rushed note the referring provider never finished — and revenue cycle owns the denial while the CMIO owns the note. Does that split show up in your denial mix, or is yours mostly eligibility?" No product name yet. None.
- 4
Earning the next 60 seconds — two narrow questions, maximum
Narrow and factual only. Pick two: - "Are you measuring after-hours time out of the Epic Signal data, or is it anecdotal right now?" - "What's your chart closure rate inside 72 hours — roughly?" - "Is that all specialties or is it concentrated in a couple of service lines?" - "How are you handling it today — is that scribes, a template rebuild, or just physicians absorbing it?" - "What's your third-next-available look like in the worst service line?" - "Is that on someone's roadmap this fiscal year, or is it just being lived with?" Do NOT ask on a cold call: "What are your top three priorities?", "Walk me through your current documentation workflow," "What's the budget process?", or "Are you the right person for this?" Listen for the admission — "yeah, it's a mess," "we've been meaning to look at that," "Ortho is a disaster." The moment you hear it, stop asking and close.
- 5
The ask — small, specific, two times, with an exit
"Here's what I'd suggest. Twenty minutes, not a demo, no deck. I'll show you what the after-hours time and chart-closure numbers look like at two groups your size on Epic, and how long it took them to move it. You tell me on the call if it's not relevant and I'll leave you alone. I've got Thursday at 7:45 before clinic, or Tuesday at 4:30. Which is less bad?" Upgrade if you've got a CMIO on the line: "One ask — if your VP of Clinical Ops or whoever owns the front-end revenue cycle can sit in, do that. This lands in two budgets, and I'd rather you hear it once with both of you than twice." Then: "Sending the invite now while we're talking — can you confirm it landed?" Do not hang up before they confirm.
- 6
The soft no — extract a date and one fact
"No problem. Last thing and I'll let you go — is this a timing thing or a 'this isn't a priority' thing?" [Listen.] "Got it. When does your capital and operating budget get set — is that a spring cycle or does it follow the fiscal year?" "And does anything clinical-workflow have to clear the EHR governance committee before it gets funded, or does that come after?" "Perfect. I'll come back to you in August, ahead of that cycle. I'll send one email so my name's in your inbox." A cold call that produces a dated callback and a named governance path is a win. A cold call that produces "send me an email" and nothing else is a polite hang-up.
- 7
Voicemail — under 20 seconds, no ask
"Dr. Reyes, Maya Okonkwo at Solace — you don't know me. Calling about after-hours EHR time; it's the number every CMIO I talk to at 300-plus providers is trying to get under thirty minutes. I'll try you again Thursday morning. 555-0148." No value prop, no meeting request, no 'looking forward to connecting.' The voicemail's only job is name recognition for the next dial and the email.
- 8
Gatekeeper / medical staff office screen
"It's about after-hours documentation time for the medical group — Maya Okonkwo at Solace. She won't know me, I'm a cold call." Short, calm, specific. Don't claim a prior relationship, don't say "it's personal," don't say "she's expecting my call." If they ask you to email the office inbox: "I will — is Dr. Reyes better early morning or late afternoon? I'd rather not waste her time with a badly-timed dial."
- 9
Immediately after — five minutes, no exceptions
- Send the follow-up inside five minutes. Subject: "Our call just now — after-hours EHR time." Three lines: the number they gave you, one comparable system on their EHR, the calendar hold. - Write down their exact words. If they said "Ortho is where it's ugly" or "we lost two family med docs last year," those phrases go in the email and open the discovery call. - Log the disposition honestly. "Interested" is not a disposition. "Booked Tues 4:30, CMIO + VP Clin Ops, Epic, wants Ortho data" is. "Callback August, budget cycle, governance meets first Wednesday" is.
How the call actually sounds
Prospect on the left, the rep on the right.
Rep
Dr. Reyes — it's Maya Okonkwo at Solace. We haven't spoken, this is a cold call. Can I have thirty seconds to tell you why I rang, and then you can tell me to get lost?
Buyer
I'm between meetings and I've got a P&L open. Thirty seconds, and I mean thirty.
Rep
Understood. We work with about a dozen multi-specialty groups on Epic, roughly your size. What CMIOs keep telling us is that when they pull the Signal data, they're seeing 90-plus minutes of after-hours EHR time per provider per day against a 30-minute target — and they can name the three or four docs closest to walking because of it. Is that anywhere near your world, or have you got it handled?
Buyer
It's real, but honestly you're the fourth ambient documentation call I've taken this quarter and Epic's telling us they've got something native coming next year. So I'm not sure what you want me to do with this.
Rep
They do have it coming, and it'll probably be fine for the average primary care note. The question I'd want answered if I were you is what your physicians are doing for the next eighteen months while it's in early adopter release — and whether it covers Ortho and behavioral health, because native tools tend to launch strong in primary care and thin everywhere else. Do you know which of your sites is actually on their roadmap, and when?
Buyer
Nobody knows. Our TS says it's two or three releases out. Look — we tried a scribe vendor two years ago. Half the docs stopped using it inside a month. My medical staff has an institutional memory about this stuff and they'll bury me if I bring another one.
Rep
That's the most useful thing you've said. What killed it — turnaround time, note quality, specialty coverage, or was it optional?
Buyer
Turnaround. Notes came back the next morning and by then the doc had already written it themselves. So they were doing double work.
Rep
Right, so it never actually moved chart closure, it just added a step. Quick one — where does your chart closure inside 72 hours sit today, roughly? And is the after-hours time spread across everyone or concentrated?
Buyer
Closure's somewhere in the low eighties. The after-hours time is ugly in family medicine and it's worse in Ortho, which is also where I lost two providers last year. But I'll tell you the real problem — we're at a 1.8% operating margin. There is no budget line for anything that isn't billing or compliance.
Rep
Then let's not pretend it's a software purchase. Two levers actually work on your P&L: physician retention — you just told me you lost two in Ortho, and you know better than I do what recruiting plus twelve to eighteen months of ramp costs you per head — and throughput, because if a provider gets forty-five minutes a day back that's one or two more encounters. How many providers are in the Ortho and family medicine lines, and what's your contribution margin per encounter?
Buyer
About ninety across those two. I'm not giving you our contribution margin on a cold call. And anything touching clinical workflow goes to our EHR governance committee, which meets monthly and has already rejected two things this year.
Rep
Fair on the margin — I want you doing that arithmetic with your own numbers, not mine. On governance, I'd rather go through it than around it. What did they reject, and who's the skeptic on that committee? Because the deals that die there die because the sponsor showed up alone with a vendor's slides.
Buyer
Usually it's our CNIO and one of the family med section chiefs. They kill anything that adds a login or a toggle. If it doesn't live inside the chart, my clinicians will not touch it in a fifteen-minute visit.
Rep
Agreed — anything that adds a login is a dead product. We launch through SMART on FHIR inside the encounter, and I'd rather your informatics analyst pressure-test the build than have me argue it with you on the phone. Here's what I'd suggest: twenty minutes, not a demo. I'll bring the after-hours and chart closure numbers from two Epic groups your size, including their Ortho line specifically, and what their day-60 utilisation was. You tell me on the call if it's not relevant and I'll go away. Thursday at 7:45 before clinic, or Tuesday at 4:30?
Buyer
Tuesday. Bring the Ortho data or don't bother. And if this goes anywhere, legal will need a BAA and you're going through a full third-party risk review.
Rep
Of course — we sign BAAs as standard and I'll send our SOC 2 Type II with the invite so your risk team can start looking now rather than after. Who owns third-party risk there, and how long did your last clinical vendor take to clear it? I'd rather run that in parallel than find out in month three.
Buyer
Ninety days, roughly. It's Priya in supply chain risk.
Rep
Then I'll assume ninety and plan backwards. Sending the Tuesday invite now while we're on — can you confirm it landed? And if your VP of Clinical Operations can sit in, bring her. This lands in two budgets.
Objections you will hear
What they say, and what you say back.
| Objection | How to answer it |
|---|---|
| “"If it doesn't live inside our EHR, clinicians won't touch it. They're not toggling to another window in a 15-minute visit."” | Agree immediately — anything that adds a login is a dead product. Then be specific enough that they can check you: name the mechanism (SMART on FHIR launch inside the encounter, sidebar embed, SSO through their identity provider), name two health systems on their EHR where you're live in production, and offer to put your solutions engineer in front of their informatics analyst rather than debating architecture with a CMIO on a cold call. Then flip it: "What's the last third-party tool that actually got adopted inside the chart there, and what made that one stick?" Their answer tells you the real bar, which is almost always cultural rather than technical. |
| “"We tried a scribe vendor two years ago. Half the docs stopped using it after a month."” | Ask which of four things killed it — turnaround time, note quality, specialty coverage, or that it was optional. It's nearly always one of those and the answer is diagnostic for the whole deal. Then make adoption something you own with them, out loud: name a utilisation threshold, propose measuring active use weekly through the pilot, and offer the exit before they ask for it — "if we're under X% active use at day 60, we pull it out, no invoice." Physicians and CMIOs trust a vendor who volunteers an exit far more than one who promises success. |
| “"Our margin is under two percent. There's no budget for anything that isn't billing or compliance."” | Stop selling software and point at a P&L line they already carry. Two levers: physician and APP retention — one avoided departure in a specialty line often covers a multi-clinic contract once you count recruiting plus 12–18 months of panel ramp — and throughput, because 45 minutes recovered per provider per day is one to two more encounters. Then make them do the arithmetic in their own handwriting: "How many providers in the two worst service lines, and what's your contribution margin per encounter?" Don't push if they won't give you the number on a cold call; ask them to bring it to the meeting. |
| “"Our EHR vendor says they're releasing something like this natively next year."” | Don't get defensive, it reads as fear. "They will, and it'll be fine for the average note. The question is what your physicians are doing for the next eighteen months while it's in early adopter release." Then two questions that usually collapse the objection: which of their sites is actually on the vendor's roadmap and in which release — nobody ever knows — and what the specialty coverage looks like, because native tools launch strong in primary care and thin in ortho, derm and behavioral health, which is exactly where the charting pain concentrates. |
| “"Anything touching clinical workflow has to go through our EHR governance committee, and they meet monthly."” | Never route around it. Get on the agenda and get your sponsor co-presenting. On the call, ask three things: what governance has approved and rejected in the last two cycles and why, what has to be in the submission packet, and who on the committee is the skeptic — usually the CNIO or a section chief. Then arm your champion with a one-pager and a reference call from a peer system on the same EHR before the meeting. Deals die in governance because the sponsor walked in alone holding a vendor deck. |
| “"Patient data — legal will need a BAA and you'll have to clear a full security review."” | This is a qualification signal, not a stall, so never resist it. "Of course — we sign BAAs as standard, here's our SOC 2 Type II and our HITRUST status, and here's the completed vendor security questionnaire we've already submitted to two systems on your EHR." Then ask the question that actually moves the close date: "Who owns third-party risk review there, and how long did your last clinical vendor take to get through it?" If the answer is 90 days, you now know your timeline and can run the review in parallel with the pilot conversation instead of after it. |
| “"We'd need patient consent to record, and we're a two-party consent state."” | Have this answer loaded before you dial, because fumbling it costs you the credibility you just built. Know the standard consent language other systems use, whether it's handled verbally at rooming or as a line in the intake packet, and exactly what your product does when a patient declines. Offer to share how two or three comparable systems operationalised it — most added one line to the existing consent-to-treat and the front desk barely noticed. It's a legal reflex more than a blocker, but only if you answer it in ten seconds flat. |
| “"Send me some information."” | "Happy to, but if I send the generic deck you'll bin it and we'll both have wasted the effort. Give me two things — which EHR you're on and whether after-hours time is being tracked or just felt — and I'll send you something that's actually about your group." If they still won't engage, trade for a date: "Is this a timing thing or a not-a-priority thing? When does budget get set?" An email with no information and no callback date is a polite hang-up, not a win. |
Questions reps ask about this call
- What should the first line of a healthcare cold call script be?
Name, company, and an honest admission that they don't know you: "Dr. Reyes — Maya Okonkwo at Solace. We haven't spoken, this is a cold call. Thirty seconds?" Naming it as a cold call collapses the suspicion loop so they stop trying to place you and start listening. Skip "How are you today?" and "Did I catch you at a bad time?" — the first outs you as a script-reader, the second hands a busy CMIO a scripted exit.
- How do I open differently for a CMIO versus a VP of Clinical Operations or a Director of Revenue Cycle Management?
Lead with the metric that sits on their scorecard. A CMIO or Chief Medical Officer owns after-hours EHR time and physician turnover, so open there. A VP of Clinical Operations or Practice Administrator owns no-show rate, slot fill, third-next-available and visits per provider per day. A Director of Revenue Cycle Management owns denial rate, first-pass clean claim rate and days in A/R — for them, frame documentation as a downcoding and prior-auth denial problem, not a burnout problem. A CNO's world is census, staffing gaps and travel nurse premium, which is a different call entirely.
- How much do I need to know about their EHR before I dial?
Whether they're an Epic, Cerner/Oracle Health, athenahealth or eCW shop, at minimum. It changes the integration objection, the governance path, and which reference customers land. If you guess wrong on the call, you're finished — so if you genuinely don't know, ask it as your first narrow question rather than assuming. Being able to say SMART on FHIR, HL7 and SSO correctly, and knowing which of those actually applies to your product, is the price of entry with anyone in clinical informatics.
- Should I run discovery on a healthcare cold call?
No. Two narrow, factual questions maximum — something like "Are you pulling after-hours time out of the audit logs or is it anecdotal?" and "Is that all specialties or concentrated in a couple of service lines?" Deep questions about priorities, current-state workflow and budget process belong in the 20-minute meeting you're trying to book. Ask them now and you'll get shallow answers and burn the reason to hold the next call.
- How do I handle a prospect who says their EHR vendor is building this natively?
Concede the point and reframe the timeline. "They will, and it'll be fine for the average note — the question is what your physicians are doing for the next eighteen months while it's in early adopter release." Then ask which of their sites is on the roadmap and in which release, and what the specialty coverage looks like. Native tools typically ship strong in primary care and thin in ortho, derm and behavioral health, which is where the charting burden is heaviest and where physician departures usually start.
- What counts as a successful healthcare cold call if they won't book a meeting?
A dated reason to call back plus one piece of real intelligence. That means knowing their EHR, when budget gets set, whether the EHR governance committee has to clear it, who owns third-party risk review and how long that review historically takes. If a security review runs 90 days, you've just learned your realistic close date. "Send me an email" with nothing attached to it is not a success — it's an unopened message and no pipeline.
- How do I practise this without burning real prospects?
Run the call out loud against a difficult buyer before you dial a live one. The healthcare-specific failure modes — fumbling the two-party consent question, getting defensive about the EHR vendor's roadmap, arguing integration architecture with a CMIO instead of offering the informatics call — are all things you only fix by hearing yourself do them. Roleplay the interruption at second twelve and the "we tried a scribe vendor" objection until your response to resistance is to slow down and drop your tone rather than speed up.