What is telemarketing

Telemarketing is a form of direct marketing that involves promoting, selling and advertising various products through phone calls. This method excludes any intermediaries.

In Russia, it is popular and brings considerable income, but at the same time, not the most positive associations are associated with it.

How to apply telemarketing

The main goal of telemarketing is to simplify communication with the audience. More specifically, it can be used to:

• sell goods and services remotely,
• identify true needs and collect other information about the audience,
• conduct surveys and questionnaires,
• inform clients about important changes or promotions,
• collect the necessary data,
• organize service through call centers.

Properly organized telemarketing will be the best sales channel. This is due to the maximum involvement of the potential client in the decision-making process. The operator does not just talk about the product, but asks questions and finds out the preferences and interests of the person.

Telemarketing is most commonly used by online retailers, insurance companies, banks, and service providers.

Pros of telemarketing

Telemarketing has many benefits. He gives:

• direct contact with the consumer,
• clear definition of the target audience,
• the expansion of the customer base,
• quick feedback,
• stimulating repeat sales,
• saving time,
• control of operators, namely, recording of conversations with a special program,
• the ability to track the results as accurately as possible.

Cons of telemarketing

Unfortunately, this method has a lot of disadvantages. Usually they are related to the competence of the personnel and the current situation in Russia. Have you come across calls from scammers? It is for this reason that the reputation of such an effective method suffers greatly. By the way, here are some other disadvantages:

• insufficient motivation of operators,
• little experience and lack of professionalism of the staff on the call,
• unwillingness of customers to communicate (high rejection rate),
• complaints and negative comments from customers,
• limitation of information transmission by one voice only.

Types of telemarketing

There are only two types of telemarketing – inbound and outbound.

Inbound telemarketing Is a procedure for receiving calls from potential or existing customers. This type corresponds to a hotline, as well as the provision of advice or reference information regarding the company s products. This corresponds to the picture when the buyer himself addresses the seller.

Outbound telemarketing – this is when operators themselves recruit customers and offer them services. Calls of this type can be “cold”, “warm” and “hot”. In the first case, the specialist calls people who were not previously interested in the product. They are not always ready to listen, so in most cases the person either hangs up or answers rudely. The second type, that is, “warm” calls, involves communication with people who are interested in the services of your company, but have not expressed their intentions to purchase the product. With regards to “hot” calls – this is when calls are made to people interested in buying or cooperation.

Telemarketing principles

For telemarketing to work well, you need to hire a telemarketer with a lot of experience. Despite the existing knowledge, such an employee must constantly learn new techniques. To achieve the intended goals in this area, it is worth adhering to the following principles:

• Use sales scripts or scripts… These are such cheat sheets, which describe the standard and non-standard moves of the upcoming conversation, preferred answers to some questions, and so on. They usually consist of a short welcome, a company presentation, and a list of questions to ask the prospect.
• Exclude templates… Try to formulate the proposal in such a way that it does not contain stereotyped phrases or stationery. Otherwise, the client simply won t listen to you to the end.
• Know and use sales techniques… If the conversation is still outside the script or script, the employee can use some of the existing sales techniques.
• Exude confidence and be competent… The employee s speech should be perfect – no trembling or quiet voices, unanswered questions, etc. The employee must know all the nuances of the product and be able to describe it in such a way that the person at the other end wants to buy.
• Don t be intrusive… Do not put pressure on the person, talk to him calmly. Yes, you need to convince, but as discreetly as possible, and it is desirable to operate with facts. The ideal way to attract the attention of the client is to talk about himself, his preferences or problems, that the offered product or service will be the best solution.
• Don t have empty talk… Appreciate the time of the person you are calling. Try to express your thoughts clearly and concisely, without indulging in philosophical rantings. It s a good idea to first ask if you have some time to talk and then ask for it for you.
• Do not lay out all the trump cards at once… Provide the information you need, but in a way that intrigues the client. It is important not to overdo it so that your speech does not sound like hiding some important data. Use magic words like “promotion” or “free”.
• Use CRM systems… With their help, you can structure information, quickly create databases, segment them and compose a sales funnel based on them. Some systems can even generate reports and record conversations.

Conclusion

How effective is telemarketing? This technique has a lot of advantages, although there are enough disadvantages. There are also plenty of companies that use this technique incorrectly or cheat people with it. To be honest, I myself, having run into scammers a couple of times, no longer answer calls from unfamiliar numbers. Although this situation is fixable if employees follow these principles and use a creative approach in their work.