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Did AI make prospecting better or just faster?
Sellers rank cold calling as the second most effective way to reach a new buyer, six times ahead of an AI-written email. Leaders rank their teams dead last at doing it.
Cutting Through the Noise, a 2026 study of 153 sales leaders and reps from ValueSelling Associates and Selling Power, explains how both things are true at once and what it is costing you in pipeline.
Cold call or email in 2026?
ValueSelling and Selling Power asked these questions once before, in 2018, before generative AI entered the outbound playbook.
Client referrals topped the list then at 77% and top it now at 74%. Cold calling sat second then at 46% and sits second now at 47%. What did move is the buyer.
In 2018, the most common answer was 1 to 5 touches to land a meeting, but in 2026 it is 6 to 10, and the share of sellers needing 11 or more has nearly doubled.
What the 2026 data shows
- Buyers doubled the work: It took 1 to 5 touches to land a meeting in 2018. Today it's 6 to 10, and 18% of reps need 11 or more.
- Best channel, worst execution: Cold calling ranks second at 47%, yet only 19% of leaders rate their reps "Excellent" or "Very Good" at it, and 50% say "Fair/Poor".
- Six times better than AI email: The phone beats an AI-written personalized email 47% to 8%. Cold calls with live AI call guidance land last at 3%.
- Training nobody remembers: 80% of leaders say they provide skills training. 50% of reps agree.
- New stack, same playbook: Referrals and cold calls led in 2018 and lead again in 2026. The winners are still winning on confidence and executive conversation.
What you’ll discover
Why only 19% of leaders rate their reps "Excellent" or "Very Good" at consistently making cold calls, the weakest score of any skill measured, while 43% of reps award themselves that same grade.
Where AI actually shows up in the workflow, from drafting prospecting emails (55%) to building call-prep notes (43%), and the one use case ranked 11th out of 11 that could fix the study's biggest problem.
What 35% of sellers using live AI call guidance say the technology helps with most. It is not scripts, objection handling, product information or competitive intel.
30 points of daylight on training. 80% of leaders say they provide it, 50% of reps say they receive it, and frequency turns out not to be the problem.
Why cold calling is 6x more effective than AI-assisted personalized email at reaching new prospects in 2026, and why sellers also name it the channel slipping fastest.
Why 77% of sellers name finding and accessing the right decision-maker as their top challenge, nearly double any other answer, even though researching prospects is one of the two things they already use AI for most.
The AI paradox in two numbers: 3 out of 4 respondents say AI has improved their prospecting effectiveness, yet nearly 1 in 2 reps use no AI coaching tool at all.
The barrier 46% of leaders put first when asked why cold calling isn't landing, and why it has nothing to do with data, tooling or targeting.
The single skill out of eleven where reps rate themselves below their managers, and what that reversal says about who is really getting value from the tools.
Get your copy now
Cutting Through the Noise is a free 18-page report built on 2026 survey responses from 153 sales leaders and reps, set directly against the same questions ValueSelling and Selling Power asked in 2018. It shows you which prospecting tactics still earn a meeting, which AI use cases produce polish rather than pipeline, and where your own team is likely to be measuring the wrong thing. Download it before you set next quarter's outbound targets.
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