# Cold Calls, Sales and Startup Founders

Canonical page: https://siddarth2810.github.io/blogs/cold_calls_sales_and_startup/

Siddarth Gundu - Jun 1, 2026 · 3 min read

Siddarth Gundu reflects on cold calling, sales, and meeting startup founders through AIESEC, from market research to organizing The Startup Summit.

I am primarily a software engineer, but during my undergrad, I spent a lot of time in communities and also did some non-tech work. Today feels like a good day to jot down some thoughts about that time.

## Sophomore year

It started when one of my college mates showed me a video of group of folks dancing to a song, followed by a few videos of conferences they hosted. We both thought they were _cool_.

Apparently, they were an international youth organisation called [AIESEC](<https://www.aiesec.in/>). It’s a non-profit youth org, where they do a lot things blah blah blah.

After giving a few interviews, we ended up joining them, primarily with the motive of ~getting an internship letter~.

They have quite a few groups and I ended up in one called **Incoming Global Volunteer**. Our work is to talk to companies and create internship opportunities for international students to come down and work here for a few months.

So it began!

## MR and frenzy Cold Calling

You first start with data collection, which was called _Market Research_. You basically fill a excel sheet full of companies, and details of a Point of Contact: their number, email and Linkedin.

![Market Research](<https://siddarth2810.github.io/_astro/MR.Bs5e8Xgs_1fIDhd.webp>)

So far, Not bad.

Then came cold calling. We had to cold call these people and pitch them about AIESEC, the program, blah blah blah. After a few unsuccessful attempts, I found myself becoming more confident in dialing up people and pitching.

Some people were kind, some were rude and some really hated it when they had already spoken to an _AISECER_ before.

Since then, I started being really polite to promotional callers after experiencing what’s its like to be in their shoes :)

## Business Meeting

So, after a successfull cold call you basically setup a meeting with founder or whoever responsible for these kind of initiatives.

You walk them through a **PPT** answer any questions they have, and if everything goes well, voila! You closed a deal.

This went on a month or two. Later I went into another department called Business Development

## Walk-ins

Here, our goal was to conduct an event called **The Startup Summit**. It was a 2-day event for startup founders and students.

![Market Research](<https://siddarth2810.github.io/_astro/tss.6nNEezN6_Zbzc97.webp>)

The process was same, **MR -> Cold Calls -> Meetings, repeat.**

This time, we had to invite speakers and get companies to sponsor money for the event. But this process took up a lot of time and was painful.

Begin Walk-ins !

You basically dress up nicely, make a list of companies, and just **_walk into their offices asking for an appointment_**.

I found that founders are super cool and are usually willing to talk. If everything goes well, the deal is closed right there !

> Fun fact: I got my first gig while walking into a 3D model manufacturing startup and pitching for the event. The founder liked the way I talked and asked me to work for him.

## Pre-event

There would be no point raising money, calling in founders without no audience. So now, it was **selling tickets to students** !

And AGAIN, a LOT of cold calls. I remember doing like 100+ cold calls in a week!

## Conclusion

This might be a usual undergrad experience if you are part of college clubs, but yeah, this was mine.

It was fun meeting founders and cool people in the startup space.

That said, I still have to improve a LOT in communicating clearly.