Telemarketing

Telemarketing is a powerful direct marketing tool to reach the prospective customers directly and to communicate to them about our product or service. We all get a lot of calls from companies trying to sell us credit cards, loans, holidays, insurance, mobile phone connections etc. But, most of the telemarketing irritates the receiver and turns negative for the company because of some execution errors which must be avoided.

Some reasons why most of the telemarketing calls annoy the receiver and result into negative marketing for the company are:

• Their untimely arrival, interrupting the receiver at inconvenient times.
• The apathetic or mechanical tone of the caller.
• The lifeless and dull way of speaking, lacking enthusiasm.
• The rudeness of the caller.

Guidelines for an Effective Telemarketing Campaign

Relevance of the Prospects Database

• Telemarketing can be effective only if it is done to the relevant prospects.
• Sometimes, companies start telemarketing to prospective customers whose names are found from some databases, directories etc. Most of these people may not be the right target for our product or service.
• Telemarketing to random people, the database of which is obtained from various agencies, irritates the receivers. This turns counterproductive, causing more damage than benefit.
• We should choose the telemarketing database very carefully for its relevance. The target must be right.

The Script

• Whatever message that we wish to give to the customer through our telemarketing call, we must prepare it as a written script first. All telemarketing executives must follow this script.
• If there are some questions in the script and the rest of the conversation depends upon the receiver’s answers to these questions, then the executives must be trained in suitably altering the script as per the probable answers. But, the basic flow, tone and content of the call must be same.
• The script must include the greeting, introducing self clearly and quickly, asking if it is suitable time to speak and then speaking the message if agreed by the receiver. The script must also include how the executives will handle the conversation if the receiver is not free to talk.
• The executives must be trained thoroughly with the script.
• We must never leave it to them to decide what or how will they speak on phone on our behalf. Never.

Timing and Duration of the Call

• The timing of our call must be as per the assumed suitability of the receiver, not ours.
• Our call must go only during office hours. We must never call during odd, non-office hours.
• If the database contains some numbers of households, we must not call them during afternoon also.
• The duration of a typical call must not be more than 2 to 5 minutes.

The Speed, Tone, Language and Volume of the Caller

• Sometimes we receive telemarketing calls in which the caller speaks too fast or in too low volume which we can barely hear or in a language or accent we can’t understand.
• Some companies don’t realize that their highly polished English language callers’ accent is just not understood by the receivers. The receivers are just put off and they disconnect.
• The executives may sound smart and polished but they are not effective, because the purpose of the call is not to impress or confuse the receiver, but to convey a marketing message.
• Our tele-callers must take care of such pitfalls. They must speak at the right speed, at the right volume, in the appropriate tone and language which is understood by the caller.
• Remember, the call should be to express our marketing message, not to impress people by our spoken language skills.

Telephone Manners

• Some untrained callers are very rude to the receivers. They themselves get irritated by some unexpected response from a receiver. This harms the company’s telemarketing efforts.
• Remember, by answering back or speaking rudely to a prospect, our tele-caller may feel satisfied of giving it back to the angry receiver, but it will damage our brand reputation forever in addition to wasting our money.
• Yes, cold calling is stressful to the caller because the receivers behave unexpectedly, sometimes strangely and unpredictably, which can upset many tele-callers. They must be given training to keep their cool while calling people. They must be specially trained in remaining calm and not losing temper even when the receiver shouts or gets angry.
• In addition to this, our tele-callers must be given basic training in telephone manners which should include:

• Asking if the receiver can talk for a few minutes
• Greeting the receiver as per the time of the day
• Being polite, very polite
• Ensuring that the receiver understands what they are saying by seeking some response as a feedback
• Thanking them in the end

Technical Knowledge

• The tele-callers must be familiar with the necessary technical details of the product or service for which they are calling people. If not, they will be confused as soon as a receiver asks some basic cross question for more information.
• If those questions are not answered satisfactorily, the receiver will not have a good experience about that interaction. It hurts our tele-marketing objectives.
• The basic technical knowledge must be imparted to the callers with an advice to transfer the call to another in-house expert in case there is some specific query which they can’t answer themselves.

Rehearsal and Monitoring

• The tele-callers must be given repeated rehearsals in making the call.
• Such practice improves their performance, increases their confidence and ensures the right quality of the call.

Regularly, these calls must be monitored either directly when they are happening or through listening to some real, recorded conversations.

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