Telemarketing: How to Optimize Lost Opportunities

In B2B marketing, you can never refuse the ability of traditional inbound techniques, most especially telemarketing.

If anything, telemarketing continues to be a preferable channel for many decision makers. It is seen as an effective way in fostering nascent business relationships. At least 28% of decision makers say that telemarketing makes them feel valued, based on a slideshow by SCI Sales. On top of that, the ROI it delivers is unmatched by that of any other B2B platform.

But however one sees it, the main issue is more of application. It matters if the company that is handling effective telemarketing operations for B2B lead generation and appointment setting. In many cases, not many marketers are that skilled or lucky enough to maximize their telemarketing opportunities. More often than not, opportunities to set a sales appointment are lost along the way, entailing a waste of time and resources.

No doubt rejections are a fact of life this side of the B2B world. But this shouldn’t hamper you from realizing short-term and long-term company goals.

There are concrete ways to turn rejections into better opportunities, and here’s how:

Re-assess along the way

Your telemarketing strategies need revamping from time to time. And it is necessary for a business to perceive subtle trends in its campaign’s progress. Key metrics such as conversions and ROI should be taken note. Knowing such trends can help in revising your present telemarketing strategies.

Improve your led nurturing via email

On the first contact, it is likely that a prospect defers his or her decision to set an appointment. They will rather reserve their decision for subsequent contacts. In between contacts, your marketing program should send out personalized emails that touch on topics that weren’t discussed during previous engagements. Moreover, emails allow you to control and influence a decision maker’s willingness to buy.

When rejected, move on

Much to your chagrin, you simply cannot do anything about sales prospects who are simply not interested in buying your products. In such a case, it would be best to leave it at that. You can always depend on your B2B lead generation campaign to prospect for decision makers that are sure to partner up with you. It’s tough choice, but with a little persistence in generating B2B leads, you might just improve your sales performance.

Telemarketing is not that easy. It’s not just about calling someone to make a sale. It is more about influencing others and solving pressing issues, tasks that an independent and highly competent outsourcing firm can live up to.

The Anatomy of a Top Notch B2B Telemarketer

One could collect hundreds of small of advice on how to be the best telemarketer in the world, but looking at the bigger picture, it all boils down to being natural and being in action. As long as you do your part, everything else – including all those little, nevertheless significant details – will follow.

Most of the time, aside from maximizing your special individual traits, it’s only a matter of doing the necessary things to achieve your goals.

It's good to know if you possess the required skills and attitude to be the best telemarketer and if you lack one, you could work it out to improve what's lacking.

How Content Marketing Can Push Your B2B Telemarketing Campaigns

You have to admit that prospecting and generating B2B leads is not a joke. There are just too many of you in the business that it becomes too difficult to stand out and attract the attention of business prospects. This is the reality that you have to face in every B2B telemarketing campaign that you have to organize. Aside from dealing with a lot of stress, there is also the high rate of rejection in the course of your B2B lead generation efforts. To be honest, a lesser marketer might have given up already. But if you have faith in your business and in what you offer, then you will push through with it.

It is all about choosing the right communication tools and the people for the job. Still, that point, by itself, raises some problems. We have heard a lot of flak for letting telemarketers stay in the marketing game, but we do have entrepreneurs and other business managers who believe that this method still works. If your concern is on how to make telemarketing work better, then you will need to use other appointment setting tools as an augmentation. There are a lot of mediums to choose from, but one of the most common would be content marketing. It is a simple, yet effective, means to generate more sales leads.

Content marketing is, simply put, a form of marketing where you provide relevant, interesting, and updated information to your business prospects.

It can take on many forms, like social media and email. But you need to know which of these mediums will best reach your business prospects best. As I have previously mentioned, you need to ensure that you are providing the best information available, and in the most interesting manner. Yes, you should be informative, since your reputation is at stake here, but it does not hurt to make your content easier to the eyes. It does make your content marketing efforts easier.

In this case, what kind of content should you be creating? For starters, there are articles to write about. These days, people put value on articles that are thought-provoking and interesting. The thing about snackable content? Yes, you can use that, but longer articles that really add value to the discussion are a real gold-mine. You can also use blogs, where you can freely discuss industry issues and the like. Newsletters, case studies, and white papers come right down the list. Attach with these papers your business number or a response letter. When they reply or give you a call, there, you have a greater chance of generating good B2B leads.

Just remember, content marketing should not be pulled-off solo. This must always be partnered with other marketing tools, in this case, telemarketing. Yes, we all have heard how outdated calling business prospects are, but if you want a sure-fire way to get a response, then hiring telemarketers is the way to go. All you need now is to plan your campaign carefully.

B2B Telemarketing: It’s not what you say, but how you say it

One of the challenges in B2B telemarketing as a means for lead generation is how telemarketers are able to let prospects “grasp” the sales pitch. Despite of the flawlessness of the script and the amount of substance and information it contains, some still find it difficult to make listeners appreciate it.

During these cases, it would be logical for telemarketers to improve the approach, not the script.

How we say things is just as important – if not more important – than what we say. That is one of the reasons why businesses choose to outsource their telemarketing. Outsourced lead generation services companies may not be 100% well-versed with product knowledge, but they have expert skills in delivery of information.

Here’s how you improve the how instead of the what:

Don't give them everything

An overdose of information about your products and services will only confuse a prospect. In fact, you only need to tell them pertinent stuff, which means you need to break away from your typical marketing recital and choose only what’s necessary. You would want to go for the most persuasive parcels of information to convey to your prospect. That way, they will only be absorbing what they ought to, and it rids the chances of getting perplexed with insignificant details.

Highlight results, not figures

The business world is a numbers game, and that’s a fact. However you would try to sugarcoat it, a business’s success will always be measured by numbers: revenue, clientele base, manpower, number of branches, or number of years in the industry. But talking to a prospect about a potential business deal is not a numbers game. Sure, figures impress. But results matter more. Don't saturate your prospect with percent-rates and dollar signs. Instead, give him a picture of how you can help them grow.

Put things in proper context

Your script should not be generic. You have to make sure that whenever you're describing your products or services, your prospect would be able to ‘apply’ the scenario into their own current situation. For instance, if you're talking to someone from the IT products and services industry, you wouldn’t want to tell him stories of success from the federal or manufacturing world. Putting things in context makes them understand your pitch better, because they are able to see themselves in your offer.

You might also like: 5 Mistakes to avoid when working with Outsourced Telemarketing Companies

5 Mistakes to avoid when working with Outsourced Telemarketing Companies

The inclination towards outsourcing a business’s telemarketing operations is catching on, mainly because they can save precious human and financial resources in the process. However, the benefits are not without a price to pay. Sometimes, the relationship between the employer and the outsourced firm becomes dysfunctional, causing a campaign to deteriorate. Making the transition from in-house operation to outsourced call center has its growing pains. But the mistakes businesses make should at least be new ones, and not the ones others have made in the past. Without learning, there’s no point in moving on.

Here are 5 mistakes to avoid, particularly in the strategic planning stage:

1. Outsourcing to the wrong vendor

When a partnership fails, it’s either one of the parties didn’t do its part, or the partnership itself was a mistake. Businesses should use the expert knowledge to their advantage when choosing a vendor. There are a lot of ways to verify the credibility of a service provider before hiring it. Better yet, go for someone who’s highly recommended by peers.

2. Not embracing analytics by heart

A business that’s looking into outsourcing telemarketing operations should make sure they have the means and tools in analyzing that data to find opportunities for improvement – for both itself and the vendor it’s looking to hire. Some businesses even have departments solely devoted to managing and interpreting call center data.

3. Disregarding the importance of CRM

Customer Relationship Management (CRM) is more than an industry buzzword – it’s the tool that bridges the gap between a business and its outsourced telemarketing firm. CRM has become more and more relevant on the heels of new social network technologies that feature user-generated content (UGC).

4. A lousy approach or script strategy

Work with agencies in coming up with a natural, conversation-oriented rapport that includes pertinent sales information without sounding stuffed. Again, this boils down to how meticulous a business is in investigating the reputation of an agency prior to making a deal.

5. Who executes the follow-up process (if there is one)?

Ask your vendor: Is a follow-up mechanism included in the contract? Or does the responsibility end as soon as leads are submitted? Up to what extent are leads nurtured and followed-up on? What’s the standard process for sub-quality leads, and those which did not translate into anything positive? Without knowing how this entire process works, a vendor may end up leaving a business hanging.