Call Center Events

B2B lead generation via social media

2011-11-29T01:35:00.000-08:00

Social media marketing, particularly the social networking sites have opened up new arenas for B2B lead generation. The BPOs make use of different strategies to make the most out of these social networking sites.

There are different tools that a call center service provider can make use of. What are they?

• Social Networking on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc
• Review sites like Yelp and TripAdvisor
• Social News on Reddit and Digg
• Social Bookmarking on Google and Delicious
• Collaboration and Social Answer sites like Wikipedia and Yahoo Answers
The strategies that BPO agents use for the task:

• The first and foremost step in lead generation is to identify the target audience. Generating leads is almost impossible without identifying the target.
• The social networking sites prove to be of real help as far as creating a positive brand identity is concerned. A positive brand identity attracts new customers and retains the old ones.
• These social networking sites are the ideal place for building networks and in business no one can ignore the importance of networks.

With social media marketing adding to the number of tools at the disposal of call centers, lead generation activity is all set to experience a real boom.

Chat Support Made Easy with the Right Software

2011-11-28T01:34:00.001-08:00

Every business makes efforts to add real time social chat to their websites for increasing web traffic and visitor engagement. Answering service call centers are hired by businesses to ensure that support is offered to customers over chat when customers want information on products and services, or have issues related to the clients’ products. Outsourcing chat support call centers use advanced software and technologies to make sure that all the replies offered to the queries of customers are prompt.

The outsourcing chat support call center uses the software for driving direct response, and also helps to maximize the reach of the audience. The campaign should also be optimized with real time data, and the software used by the answering service should have engagement metrics for enabling you to understand, improve as well as assess the interactive chat sessions.

The chat software used by answering services also helps the businesses to create a platform that helps to control a campaign, which is customized to meet the needs of the audience and the brand. The chat support software used comes with advanced security as well as permission controls, which are fine-grained, but easy to use. The chat support used by the outsourcing chat support agents enable the customers to chat without requiring them to sign in.

The software must be able to scale up and down without compromising the audience experience. There should not be any service interruptions or slow down in service.

Software for Tracking and Managing Leads

2011-11-24T22:32:00.000-08:00

A business always look for ways to increase their sales, customer base and return on investment (ROI); for this to happen, it is crucial to integrate the efforts that go into lead generation. The businesses hire call centers for generating qualified leads in good numbers, and the lead generation contact centers in turn use advanced software to help them do this. The software helps to drive a huge number of visitors to the client’s website, land page submissions, as well as gain leads to through emails and other efforts.

The lead management software used by the outbound call centers track the sales leads all through the sales cycle from lead generation all the way to closing the sales. The software helps the businesses understand what efforts are working, and which kind of customers are usually buying with a click of the mouse.

The software can also be used by the call centers for automating the lead management procedure, and for this the task management and workflow automation activities work greatly. The right software for tracking and managing leads helps a company make a lot of sales to a huge number of people in a short time. The software enables to capture leads, track them and also follow them up, helping the sales and profits of the businesses boost up. The online lead tracking and lead management software has to be one that is user-friendly, so that the agents do not take a long time in learning how it has to be used.

Lead Generation Software for Gathering Hot Leads

2011-11-23T21:24:00.000-08:00

Outbound contact centers offer lead generation as a service to businesses in order to help them gain more customers and increase sales in the process. Getting new customers attracted to the products and services is not a matter of joke and the right call center business companies know how to go about gaining fresh leads for the businesses. The right software for generating leads must have a user friendly platform so that it is not a headache for the call center business companies to get them trained in using the software; much time and expenses are not to be used for the training process.

Advanced lead generation software helps businesses to identify, capture as well as convert the online leads into good opportunities for sales through the provision of unique lead intelligence. Lead intelligence is the way the software gains insight into the buying intent as well as the purchasing process of the prospects. The software for generating leads used in contact centers also help to recognize anonymous visitors to the client’s website, analyze their purchasing intent and their interests for paving the path for targeted sales response.

The software analyzes the sophisticated behavior of the consumers online and then finds out where the prospects are in the purchasing process. The software helps contact center agents concentrate on the lead nurturing programs, shortening the sales cycle, closing deals faster, and improvement of the all round marketing as well as sales productivity.

Using the Workflow CRM Software for Organized and Effective Services

2011-11-22T21:08:00.001-08:00

The workflow customer relationship management (CRM) software is used by call center services for helping businesses automate the responses made to inquiries and complaints from customers. When a customer makes contact with the numbers provided by the businesses, the customer call center logs the contact into the computer system; this will include the date as well as the time for all the information on the contacts as well as relevant details. The workflow CRM software helps to monitor the responses of the customer call center agents and the communications; this is done in a bid to ensure that customers get the right responses at the right time.

Inbound call center services find use for the workflow CRM software in updating customers on crucial information. The software is also effective in tracking information like warranty information and other details on the purchased products. The software enables the customer call center companies get in touch with customers automatically regarding the scheduled service appointments, product recalls, and extended warranty purchases.

The software is also used by call center services to let customers know that the company or the business will pay for claims on product replacements or for free service on products that are no longer covered by the warranty period. The workflow CRM software enhances the relation among the businesses and the prospects or customers.

Purchasing a Hosted Predictive Dialer

2011-11-16T21:41:00.001-08:00

Before the outbound call centers think of buying a hosted predictive dialer system, there are several factors that must be noted. You must get a hosted predictive dialer that is the most suitable for your outsourcing call center and fits the work ambience. You must have all the relevant information pertaining to any technology or predictive dialers, when you want to adopt that particular technology or system for your outsourcing call center.

The outbound call centers have to first find out what the solution is going to cost them and also if the contact center has control over the accumulating costs. The managers and supervisors at the outbound call centers must also find out for what they will be charged and how they will be charged. Find out what the charges of the calls on a minute basis are and if the customer call that ends quickly will be charged as a full minute even if the agents and the customer has spoken for just half a minute.

All the vendors offering the predictive dialer system to the contact centers will try to make it appear as they are the industry leaders and their solutions are the best. The managers and supervisors should be able to judge and do their research well, even if the vendors make the deal sound too good. The managers must find out the shortest billing period, which is offered by the vendors and must also know the consequent billing duration of the vendor. This will enable the contact center to assess the total cost of ownership easily.

What are the usefulness of Email Marketing?

2011-11-10T02:11:00.001-08:00

In the modern day generation the use of emailing is one of the most important ways of communication. This is a fast world and people are busy. Hence to promote products through emails can come out to be one of the most beneficial acts. To develop your business through email marketing through a renowned BPO can make your product meet with the right target audience as far as possible. For the busy target audience, it is always not possible for them to answer the calls even if they are interested. The emails can later on be read by them and can make them informed with the product documents as send by the BPO customer care service team.

But it is always a matter of concern that whether the mail has landed exactly in the inbox of the consumer rather, if the mail went into the Spam folder the work of sending the mail is going to be a complete waste. Later on it also gives a negative feedback of the company from the consumer’s corner. Email marketing helps a lot to develop your business where the clients are not able to answer the 24 hour answering service. This venture of email marketing is also helpful in doing the eminent B2B business. Emailing is sometimes much more effective rather than the cold calls of the call center services. Sometimes a professionally written emails help to impress big business heads and this provides some positive effects later on. An email with proper information and product guidance can make your product’s marketing effectively and that matters a lot in improving your business.

Workforce Management software Outdoes Spreadsheet Scheduling

2011-11-03T21:18:00.001-07:00

For small and medium sized call centers in India, utilizing workforce management software is often prohibitively expensive. Frequently, this means that call centers are forced to use cheaper alternatives like spreadsheets in their scheduling strategy. While the cost of using spreadsheets may appear at the surface level to be beneficial for call centers in India, it has become apparent that this outdated and inefficient method is in reality costing you more than you may realize.
Workforce management suites provide a number of advantages to this method obsolete, not only have the powerful benefit that your employees enjoy, but will save you money in the long term. Without a workforce management solution, it is impossible to consider the behavior of your India call center agents, for example, to track the schedule of compliance is almost impossible. Schedule of compliance failures can cost a lot of money call centers each year, as every minute of your India call center agents are directly translated to the time the client cannot be helped.

Planning skills is also much more difficult to draw with the method of the spreadsheet, adding another point of ineffectiveness. Workforce management programs to ensure that officers write to the scene at the right time and take account of someone with the right skills to keep the conversation on the phone at any time.

Perhaps more importantly, the current solutions WFM shave hours from the time a manager spends a week to schedule, monitor agent performance, creating reports and process scheduling conflict. With the hosted model in call centers in India, they are very quick, easy and affordable to implement.

Staffing is the most expensive resource in the budget of the call center 80 percent complete. Therefore, even a 1 percent increase in productivity significantly impacts the bottom line. The software management staff instead of a computer center responsible for the strategy of Appeal may quickly identify problems with staff and proactive to stop the entire customer service better.

How a lead generation company works

2011-06-20T05:11:00.001-07:00

More and more generation of leads are the basic target of every lead generation companies. In order to understand the concept o lead gene we must get though the term “lead”. What are leads any way and how does it works. A lead may be any kind of prospect which may results in profit maximization of a company. In more easy words, any individual or group if gets interested in a companies product or services, that particular group or individual is called a lead.

Now the point is how does the procedure of lead generation works and how does the lead generation companies perform. In a lead generation company, a lead gets generated though interaction with common people. What a lead generation company does is they form a big man power and collect the phone numbers of common people from any of the database and dial up them directly. The professionals inform them about the company's product and services they are working for. These part of work is called outbound calling.

In any of the call if the person gets interested up on the product or the services, the call transform into a lead. This lead is then transferred to another department where the highly professional people try their level best to make it a sale and earn revenue for the company. This is how a lead generation company works actually.

Diversify through Call Center Services

2011-06-09T23:49:00.000-07:00

Business firms have to continuously expand their domain in order to prevent stagnation. Expanding business areas would mean that they need to carry out additional areas of work. For example, a consumer-oriented firm will be able to broaden their consumer base through the help of the Internet. In other words, they need call center services to help them out. A business firm cannot add infrastructure and skill sets overnight to handle the extra work load. A call center can step in and take over the work.

The most common form of diversification is to graduate from telemarketing services to online lead generation. Business firms have found out that the use of telemarketing calls is not a good option because of the restrictions clamped by telecom watchdogs like the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The switch to online sales lead generation will help them bypass the restrictions and promote their products/services to a wider base of consumers.

Diversification also helps brands conduct market surveys for better product placement and branding. For a business firm, these are aspects that need professional help. Hiring a call center is the best option for these business firms.

Answering Services in Call Centers

2011-02-07T23:49:00.000-08:00

Business owners are now hiring call center services for offering them answering services round the clock. The customer service representative at the call center is provided with the right training for offering business seeking assistance over telephone.

The call center provides the client a telephone number where the client can forward their phone lines; the call center agency then receives the call that is made to the company and answers customers on the company’s behalf. The well trained staff at call centers takes the message and delivers it to you through your chosen channel.

The call center agents should be polite and patient when dealing with customers and clients for a company. The image of your company will depend a lot on the way an agent talks and answers to customer queries.

The answering services offered by call centers include alert monitoring and notifications, customer support, appointment scheduling and confirmation, and even emergency dispatch. Other answering services on offer include order entry, event registration, survey, remote receptionist, voicemail and other services.

Call center agents talk to customers on a friendly tone and try building a rapport with your customers and client. This in turn helps your business expand. It is also true that availing the services of a call center can be very cost effective and save your time to be engaged in core activities.

Workforce Management in Call Centers

2011-02-02T00:50:00.001-08:00

There are several things to consider when selecting a workforce management solution for a call center of any size.

The workforce management solution should discuss different shift patterns, skill levels required in different job profiles, inclusion of agent exceptions into schedule, and production of performance management reports as part of the key capabilities in a call center.

Time and resources also need to be implemented well to determine how long it takes to benefit from workforce management solution. It must also be decided how many people are required for implementing the solution.

It is also important to have a clear idea of the total costs of purchasing, functioning and maintaining the workforce management solution. This includes cost of software, hardware, monthly or annual costs of maintenance, subscription costs, upgrade fees, as well as other costs.
The workforce management solution should be easy for non-IT people to use, this way a call center can get the most out of it. Remember every workforce management solution comes with a risk in a given work environment; call center companies should evaluate that risk. Remember the workforce management solution should be such that if it does not work for your call center, you can turn it off without causing your company any financial risk.

The workforce management solution should help a call center reduce operational costs and in also help business expansion.

Training Does Have an Impact on Call Center Employees

2011-01-26T02:51:00.000-08:00

The success of a BPO and efficiency of call center employees mostly depend on the training they have been provided.

It is important to assess the needs of a call center before training is imparted to the employees. It is important to check the telecommunications systems and find out if there are enough working phone lines to handle the many incoming calls, else even proper training can do no good to the organization.

Training is considered to be successful if it supports the call center’s business objectives. Note that training benefits can be increased with follow-up or ongoing coaching. Many call centers think that after training is provided, the employees will show remarkable improvement in performance, but that’s not how it works. There is no magic. This is where following up and ongoing coaching come into play, since learning that is not reinforced with the first 2 months tend to drop by 80%.

Training is actually an investment in the business, and should be holistic, integrated and reflect long-term planning. Once training has been provided, the call center should measure the results; it’s necessary to find out if employees are improving on their work.

Pull Up Call Center Quality

2011-01-11T01:51:00.000-08:00

No matter what the geographical location of your call center is, you cannot surge ahead in terms of revenue unless you are improving your quality. The benchmark of call center services is measured in terms of quality. This trend is fast catching up for call centers across the world, especially in the third world countries. The general perception is that the telemarketing services of these countries are inferior because of the cheap labor that they employ. That may work for the cost models, but modern business is not cost-only endeavors. There is the question of sustaining the brand reputation. Unless you pull up the services that you provide, there is little that you can do to survive in the market.

Quality in call center services can be fixed overnight. You have to work closely with the managers and supervisors of the BPO unit to make changes. Start off with the manpower. Conduct an evaluation that will separate the better performers from the others. Assign them to the top priority projects and deploy the best agents on the peak times of customer services. Ensure that your technology is updated and in sync with the best practices. You will need to spend more time in the training room with your employees so that they may learn more about the work that they do before stepping on the call center floor.

Better Customer Service through Updates

2010-12-16T01:09:00.000-08:00

Updates and alerts about the progress of problem solving at the customer service desk increase the loyalty of the consumers. When a caller calls up with some problem that needs to be fixed over a period of time, the call center must provide the caller with regular updates. It may be that the BPO is not wasting a moment in working towards a possible solution, but unless you inform the caller about your progress, the caller will think that you are sitting on it without doing anything. This will increase the caller’s impatience and invite more calls to the inbound call center desk. That way, you are handling a higher call volume without any productive purpose.

The BPO unit must put together a framework to update the customers and callers. A call from the outbound call center desk would be ideal. An email would be adequate as well. Callers feel paranoid when you are completely out of touch. The problem may be one of many that your call center handles in a day. But for the caller, the problem is one that occupies the mind every waking moment. The caller cannot be at peace unless the issue is resolved. Hearing from your end assures them that they are in good hands.

Cloud Call Center Services

2010-12-13T03:01:00.000-08:00

Cloud call center services serve some very basic functions. One of them is the reduction in costs. When call center services are being conducted by agents from their personal spaces, there is very little overhead cost involved. The BPO company need not pay for the office space or the infrastructure costs. They can work with the employees by an online method of synchronization. The reports for telemarketing services can also be prepared and updated through web-enabled means. Clients can also take a look at the progress report whenever they want to. It brings about a much-needed transparency in telemarketing projects.

The cloud call center services help to get better quality manpower onboard. Experienced agents often like to work from home because of flexibility in work timings. Call centers cannot employ them because they don’t like rigid timings, or the commuting to the office. When BPO companies employ them in the cloud system, they are able to devote more time and energy. They also put in additional amount of work because they have the time on their hands. This form of customer service works well, too. Business firms having a global clientele often have to work at different time zones. An inbound call center working on the cloud mode is able to tackle these calls round the clock, across time zones, if the managers can schedule their shifts accordingly.

Role of Emails in B2B Lead Generation

2010-11-15T01:22:00.000-08:00

Emails are effective ways of communicating for B2B lead generation. Emails become necessary in this context because the call center is contacting with busy professionals. Telemarketing calls may not do the trick as you may never get them on the phone. You will have to email your call center services offer and other details. This email is just the opener. You will have to make follow-up calls, preferably on the same day that you send the email. Delays will make way for the email to be buried under piles of emails that they receive on a daily basis.

The emails that you draft for lead generation in B2B projects have to be well-written. The design, the template and the copy have to be professional. It’s the brochure that can get the call center sector the project. Make sure you personalize the email for the contact. Keep special attention to the kind of message that you are drafting. It must be written in a way that can grab and keep the attention of the reader. To make the email more authentic, include links to credible sources. You must pack the email with information that is relevant to the needs of the project. Include easy-to-find contact numbers so that they can easily get back to your inbound call center agents.

Websites for Lead Generation

2010-11-12T02:27:00.000-08:00

Websites can be really useful as lead generation beds. But are the BPO units getting the most out of them? Seems that the answer is no! Let’s take a quick look at the ways in which call center units can work towards better sales lead generation through websites. To begin with, get the content right. Content drives not just traffic into the website, but also makes it possible for you to get repeat viewers. When the users like what they see on the website, both in terms of writing and designing, they will come back to know more. Keep adding fresh content every other day to keep the interest soaring.

Other ways to get lead generation going on the websites is to check up on what other features you can support. You can get online chat facilities that pop up on the website’s more popular pages. Your BPO agents need to be vigilant at all times to answer the chat enquiries that come in. Pack your website with action words like ‘Download Now’ and ‘Free Trial’. These help sales lead generation in that they call the user to action. You can also upload white papers and case studies of work that you have done in the telemarketing services chapter. These case studies are often the main reasons why a company would hire your call center services.

Tracking Metrics for BPO

2010-11-11T01:49:00.000-08:00

The BPO industry has to develop flexible metrics for tracking their progress. For the traditional call center services like lead generation and telemarketing, they can continue to use the tried and tested formula. But for the new additions to the kitty, like online sales lead generation and customer service satisfaction, they have to work out different metrics. For example, you cannot measure customer satisfaction by checking out how many calls were received at the inbound call center desk. To estimate that, you will need to check for the number of first-call resolutions and hold time, etc. In other words, you will have to look at fresh perspectives to old processes.

As the case is, online lead generation is another area where the BPO units are not using their usual stringent tracking. It could be because the call centers are not comfortable with using the tracking tools like Google Analytics. However, the fact remains that much of the traffic coming into the websites is not being tapped to their potential. Similarly, the sales lead generation team is also losing out on more leads because they are not responding to the trends that work. It could be that there is a pattern that can get them more users, but the pattern lies in the wilderness because no one is keeping track of it.

Call Center Services on Different Channels

2010-11-10T01:01:00.000-08:00

There are different channels on which call center services function these days. It’s not about the voice calls anymore. Telemarketing is now just a division of the call center. It’s not everything about the business process outsourcing. Non-voice methods like online lead generation and marketing through websites and emails are also prevalent. These new methods are taking BPO service towards fresh new territories. Clients want this multi-prong approach because that brings down the rate of failure. If they cannot tap the customer on one medium, they always have a second and third chance.

The ideal way to conduct call center services across the different media is to bring them all on a single platform. Make the different media complementary to each other. If you are making telemarketing calls for lead generation, back it up with the use of websites and emails. Similarly, when you are using websites and search engine optimization (SEO), you can direct the calls of the customers towards the inbound call center. When all of these different divisions are working in tandem, you have a better chance of generating rich revenues for the firm.

BPO Question Keeps Popping Up

2010-11-09T01:46:00.000-08:00

The question of America’s attitude towards offshore BPO outsourcing kept popping up during President Barack Obama’s visit to India. The Indian contingent was much interested in knowing what the President had in mind about offshore call centers in India. If you rewind the clock back, Obama was primarily vocal about banning any form of telemarketing outsourcing to offshore destinations like India or the Philippines. He was compelled to take such a step because he wanted to bring back jobs to the American shores. The unemployment percentage is now just under 10% after alarming riding over that panic button.

During the President’s visit, the Indian call center delegates were much interested in knowing how things are going to change. The protectionist measures of Obama were severely criticized by the Indian businessmen because they thought that the telemarketing services sector would be hit hard by such measures. In the coming months, the BPO sector across the world is looking forward to the developments in USA. The primary reason for their concern is that the American market is the single largest provider of telemarketing and customer service projects. The European sector has provided only sporadic work over the years and is always regarded as a sort of bonus. The bulk provider being USA, these measures set off alarm bells for call centers across the globe.

Call Center Trends for 2011

2010-11-08T06:06:00.000-08:00

Call center trends keep changing with the times. This is one industry that has never stagnated, nor ever will. The BPO sector has changed its approach towards similar goals with the times. For 2011, the hot trend in the telemarketing services is to invest in technology. The coming days will see some improvements in the technology that these units are using now. As the lead generation sector moves towards online methods, they will be investing in quality manpower. Generating leads online will mean that the call centers hire professionals that don’t really belong to the telemarketing sector. They will be other professionals like web designers and even writers.

Manpower is the prerequisite for the new-age call center. With the right kind of equipment, BPO units can do what the clients demand off them these days. Web 2.0 is in and for that the call centers would need software and other investments. In the context of outbound call center agents who will work on the projects, they have to be suitably trained. It’s a different ball game altogether on the online scenario. Agents have to be responsible and restrained when conducted sales lead generation online. If you go by the current trends, you will find that there is a conscious shift towards more quality call center services.

Security Concerns: Virtual Call Center Agents

2010-11-04T04:29:00.000-07:00

Call center agents working from home can become security concerns for the BPO unit hiring them. In case they are hiring freelancers, the risks of danger can be quite high. To avoid getting into sticky situations, the call centers must take care to conduct checks and verifications before hiring anyone. Criminal records must be looked into as well. You can never rule out the chances of a scam hitting home when you are working with employees that don’t show up in the office. You read about telemarketing agents duping people all the time. You wouldn’t want that to happen when your brand name is associated with the matter.

Call center recruiting managers have a role to play here. When you are planning to hire someone, check out on the professional references. Make calls to previous BPO units that this prospect has worked in. Talk to the managers who hired them on previous occasions. Once you have established that they have clean records in telemarketing services, you can go ahead and hire them. Even then, you must take care always to monitor them. There is no certainty that telemarketing scams won’t happen or your data will not misused. In this context, call centers have to be vigilant because their reputation depends on this as well.

Special Customer Service

2010-11-03T03:28:00.000-07:00

Customer service doesn’t always mean getting billing information or other enquiry details. Sometimes people call the answering service department to resolve serious issues that need a thorough knowledge on the part of the call center agent. For example, if the BPO is handling a tech support project, the agents have to be aware of the domain. They have to know the innards of a CPU well. Since general telemarketing agents will not know such technical matters, call centers hire technicians that double up as agents. They receive calls and resolve the issues of the callers on the first call itself.

There is a simple business sense in recruiting technical professionals for these projects. When the calls made at the answering desk are passed around to get someone capable to answer the call, the callers get frustrated. Their time is valued and the BPO unit has to respect that. That is exactly what happens when you hire technicians as customer service personnel. They resolve the issue immediately, making the caller realize that your phone answering desk is efficient and capable of attending to complicated issues. Clients want this sort of a professional behavior at the inbound call center desk. Call center units, on their part, pay a higher salary to these technicians and get them onboard.

Customer Services through Twitter

2010-11-02T03:15:00.000-07:00

Twitter is one website that offers multiple opportunities on multiple fronts. Just when call centers were thinking that this micro-blogging site could be the ideal launch pad for online lead generation, experts have found out a way to use it for customer service. When you are creating a Twitter page for your client or the brand, you will have customers on the list of followers. When they have certain issues with their purchase, they can leave tweets on your page. The proactive BPO team can source out these tweets and act on them instantly. A simple phone call would make a lot of difference to the disgruntled customer. Once you have made the connection, try to resolve the issue as soon as possible.

Such methods of customer service do a world of good to the brand loyalty of your customers. They know that you are around to help them whenever they need you. Call centers have to work hard to establish this bond of trust. That comes from action rather than just promotional material written by your BPO writers. To make the right kind of brand loyalty, you will have to be there for the customers. Twitter is just another way to do it. If you have the intent of doing so, you can source more ways.

Wanted Telemarketing Calls!

2010-11-01T07:26:00.000-07:00

Most know telemarketing calls to be something that you avoid and sometimes learn to tolerate as you would accept nightmares! What if the customers actually wanted those lead generation calls? Then the BPO agents would have more ground to make a sales pitch. They would also have better listeners on the other end of the receiver. But can that really happen? If you can create the right buzz through call center services and brand promotion, it is possible. You have to find out what makes the customers curious. You can go online and create something of a positive impact through social media channels and discussion boards. When you are popular among the netizens, you will be noted and the aura around your brand will attract them.

The cardinal rule of marketing is that when you push something under the nose of people, they tend to reject it. However, when call center services tease the users into believing that your brand can actually provide them something unique, they will surely come to you. They will call your customer service department and ask questions. They will write emails and leave comments on your client’s website. It will be a different ball game when you will be leading the way. The impact will be more significant and the consumers you are telemarketing too will be willing participants in the loop.

Email Lead Generation Debacle

2010-10-29T02:50:00.000-07:00

Lead generation can be quite a disaster if you are depending on purchased email lists. When call centers are buying email databases from sources, they are making a mistake. It’s true that the BPO agents will get some email ids to write to, but writing to them won’t be of much value. These email ids have been subjected to several marketing campaigns conducted by call center units over time. They are now saturated with these newsletters and offers. They are done with the whole system! They will sooner than later reach out for the ‘Mark Spam’ button. If you are looking to do some quality sales lead generation through emails, you will have to try a different track.

Call centers can track the users visiting the client’s website and pick up email ids from there. It makes more sense to lead generation if you are writing to people who actually care about your products/services and your brand than rank strangers who know nothing about you. BPO agents can track these users and try to convert their curiosity into sales. You can direct your newsletters and other promotional material to these email ids. Come to think of it, the outbound call center agents can use these emails as reference as well. It makes the telemarketing calls more justified when they are preceded by emails.

The Recovery of BPO

2010-10-28T00:31:00.000-07:00

The BPO sector of the third world countries are expected to recover from the recession faster than their counterparts in USA or Europe. The reason is simple: the cost factor. Business firms in USA, the prime revenue generator for the business process outsourcing industry, are looking at ways to cut costs. They will not be able to hire the expensive call center services offered by the domestic call centers. No matter what the government says about bringing back jobs to the American shores, that will never be a reality unless the cost factor comes down to the same page. Offshore destinations of outsourcing have this advantage that will never be undermined by shrewd businessmen.

The government may be worried about the political compulsions of having to deal with a two-digit unemployment rate. But that does not worry the business firms wanting to get some call center onboard. Their only criteria to decide the BPO unit they will hire is the bottom line of their business. Tax burden will not be a factor when the business firm sees that even with taxes the option of using offshore call centers is still economically viable. In this sort of a scenario, the Obama administration can do little to hinder the recovery of business process outsourcing organization working out of the third world countries.

Offbeat Call Center Services

2010-10-26T03:09:00.000-07:00

Call center services doesn’t always mean that it has to be voice calls or customer service. There are other call center processes and departments that are making themselves felt. For example, the lead generation team is increasingly depending on online methods for their leads. The various telecom authorities have pulled the plug on telemarketing calls in a big way. They are getting more leverage out of search engine optimization and social media marketing. Though social media is a far tougher nut to crack than search engine algorithms, BPO units are now doing it the right way. The promotion and branding of products/services on sites like Facebook and Twitter is fast catching on.

Offbeat call center services are the order of the day. Clients want these new methods to be used to promote and market their products/services. They are requesting BPO units to try out Web 2.0 tools for their lead generation online. The shrinking telemarketing database has a lot to do with these fresh inroads into offbeat tracks. However, these new approaches will be crucial for greater innovations in the future. Call centers have to find out these paths so that they can go on to do something fresh, something different from what their competitors are doing.

Analyzing Customer Service

2010-10-25T02:55:00.000-07:00

It is important for the call centers to analyze their customer service. The reason is simple. Most consumers complain about the kind of after-sales service that they receive. Many of them turn to other brands because they are not happy with the answering service department. The clients need every consumer on their database now, what with getting them onboard getting increasingly more difficult. Analyzing this department is not easy. You have to take various aspects into consideration. For example, if you follow the speech pattern of the customers, you can find how just how satisfied they are with the call center services. If you find that they are not responding to your service favorably, it’s time to ask questions.

Where do you think your customer service is not performing? Is it because your call center agents are not being able to solve their problems on the very first call that they make? Or is it because the caller is being transferred around too many times? When you get the answer to your question, it’s time to resolve those issues. Check with your inbound call center team if they are aware of these issues. Ask your team leads and supervisors to get your agents and work on these weak links. It takes a while to fix an issue on the BPO front, but it’s necessary that you make the effort. Once you are done, keep analyzing to check if things are running well.

BPO between USA and India

2010-10-22T03:42:00.000-07:00

The thorn in the bilateral talks between USA and India is the issue on the offshore BPO outsourcing. The President of America, Barack Obama, will be visiting India next month. The call center industry is gearing up to meet and find out what the President has to say about the offshore outsourcing business. The American shores are politically active about the question of using offshore call centers for their projects. The Obama administration has already banned the use of such centers to get government work done. The President has categorically stated that he is not keen on allowing the taxpayer’s money to be spent in generating jobs in other countries.

However, this protectionist measure of the President does not have the support of a clear majority. The Senate voted down the anti-offshore BPO bill. Because of some hard lobbying from the Republicans and the business owners who have high stakes in the offshore call centers, the bill couldn’t get the majority that it was looking for. When the President comes to the bedrock of offshore telemarketing services, that is India, he will be faced with some uncomfortable questions, that’s for sure. It remains to be seen what the President has to say about the issue when he walks to business persons holding considerable revenue coming from the USA.

Profit-making Call Centers

2010-10-21T03:08:00.000-07:00

Call centers are no longer considered to be just service centers. They are actively trying to making profits. Making profits is important for any business firm, just not for a BPO unit. Call center units are paid by clients for the services that they render. There is very little chance of the telemarketing unit to make money out of these projects. The cost of call center services has to be kept down to be on par with the international standards. However, the price of getting technology and manpower is rising higher than ever. Inflation is taking the cost of production higher and competition is bringing down the bill that is paid by the clients.

Burning the candle at both ends is proving to be a bother for the call centers. But they realize that they have to make profits to sustain themselves. The technology and processes used in call center services is changing form every day. They have to keep pace with the times and obsolete methods and processes have no place in BPO service. Moreover, they will need money to expand their range of telemarketing services. They may have to divert their resources to online methods as well. Money is a very important contributor to change. Unless the call center makes profit, they cannot make any significant changes.

Striking BPO Deals

2010-10-20T03:20:00.000-07:00

There’s some sort of process and method that is followed when your BPO strikes a deal with a client. The representatives of the call center would like to hard sell their call center services. The problem is that when they try to do that, they often tend to go overboard. They give off this impression that they can achieve more than they actually can. This spurs the client into thinking that they can expect some major hauls in their business because of telemarketing services. While this is true, in the short term parlance, it’s quite impossible to attain. When clients find that out through practical experience, there is a growing mistrust between the business partners, something that is not ideal for growth and progress.

The ideal way to negotiate BPO deals is to keep things straight. Talk it out with your client and set realistic targets on telemarketing services. When you spell it out how the project is going to phase out, clients are grounded about their expectations. The lead generation department needs to be careful about their targets as well. It is advisable to set targets according to the technology you have on board and the manpower at your disposal. Bite off only what you can chew. If clients come out of the partnership bitter and disillusioned, it’s bad for your call center.

Healthcare Bloom for BPO

2010-10-19T01:40:00.000-07:00

President Barack Obama’s healthcare reforms can spell good revenue for the BPO sector. That is the buzz from the healthcare sector at present. It learnt that the volume of business in this sector will shoot up sharply when Obama extends his healthcare facilities to about 2 million Americans. However, the call centers that are vying for the job have to careful about the licenses and certifications that they will need from the health department. A call center cannot just barge in and demand a healthcare project! You need to have expertise, training and permission from concerned authorities.

Healthcare is tricky domain, too. Call centers have to extremely careful about the kind of agents that they have on board. Your BPO agents have to skilled in medical matters if they want to work on such projects. The call center has to be vigilant about their data because people are generally paranoid about their medical details. They flip the moment they come to know that some answering service unit outside the country is working on their medical data. Libels and trust issues are not uncommon. But the main thrust area is the expertise. Agents cannot transcribe nor do other kinds of work unless they are well-versed in the medical aspects of the job. Extensive training is needed and the BPO service providers have to ensure that first.

Training Costs: Justifiable in BPO?

2010-10-18T05:33:00.000-07:00

This is one question that the BPO units often ask themselves: how justifiable is the amount of resources that they spend in training? The answer is simple. It depends on how efficient you want your call center services to be. If you want your telemarketing agents to go for the jugular right from Day 1, you have to train them well. Agents have to be acclimatized with the project, and they have to know exactly what their role is going to be. To make them conversant with that, call centers need to impart training. Training modules have to be extensive and all encompassing. You cannot curtail the days of training because you want those agents to start working on the floor. The time spent in the training room will be beneficial in saving resources on the floor.

In the present day, you cannot afford to send your call center agents to training sessions and conferences that often. There are travel and other expenses to be borne. That is why more call centers are relying on in-house training facilities to help them get equipped with what is expected of them. Training modules can be project-specific or just call center services in general. When you hire fresh grads, you will need to put them under some generalized BPO training to bring them to the industry standards. No matter what kind of education they have received, working on a regular call center floor is a different experience altogether.

Telemarketing Agents’ Safety

2010-10-13T03:28:00.000-07:00

The safety of the telemarketing agent is function of the BPO unit’s responsibility. Though you cannot directly take the call center to task for safety lapses, the firm has to be accountable for the issues related to getting the agent back home. Keeping this need in mind, several call centers have beefed up their security regime in the recent past. Countries like India are a cauldron for nefarious activities when it comes to travelling at night. For women telemarketing agents, it is a nightmare unless there are some stringent actions taken. Sensing this dire need, BPO units have boosted up their security cordon.

Some simple steps taken by the call center can eradicate several niggling concerns. To begin with, the BPO units are arming the drivers of the pool cars with GPS cards. These cards will help the call centers to monitor the movement of the cars at all times. They can immediately wave a red flag when they find that the car has changed routes. Telemarketing agents are also provided with plastic cards that they can swipe with the driver. This will allow the security experts to find out when the agent was dropped off. Many BPO service firms also advise their agents to call up the phone answering desk and report when they reach home. Such steps doesn’t just ensure safety, they also make the agent feel good about working in the company.

Virtual Call Centers Add Value to Workforce

2010-10-12T04:55:00.000-07:00

Virtual call centers have relieved the baggage of an office, a desk and the long hours of commuting. In short, it has eradicated the aspects of BPO work that do not add value to the work that is done. On the other hand, virtual call center units have brought back a lot of value to the workforce because it is getting the telemarketing talents back in the business. Many of these experienced call center agents quit working because the projects were erratic and there was either no job or if there were, they were not stable. With the BPO service sector coming in to its own yet again, they are willing to come back into the work pool, fueled by the flexibility that work-from-home offers.

There are certain advantages when it comes to call centers that employ agents working from home. The telemarketing agents can devote more time to the process because they are stationed at home. They have little pressure on themselves because they are working in isolation. They are willing to put in an extra effort because they know their little steps are being monitored by the call center supervisors. Finally, they benefit telemarketing services because they are generally more experienced that regular agents are. They add value to call center services in a way others cannot.

Lead Generation Both Ways

2010-10-11T03:14:00.000-07:00

As the ways of doing business changes, the onus of generating sales sometimes lie with the consumers! Yes, the consumers are the ones who often initiate the lead generation process. This is true for the call center units that rely on online methods to generate leads. The BPO units have the task of putting up content on the websites or on other promotional websites and directories. They don’t have the active role of contacting the users. The initiative lies with the user to call the phone answering service and ask for additional information or ask about purchasing the product/service. When they make the call, the lead is generated. So, in a way, the BPO service only plays a passive role in this cycle.

The same can be said about certain call center services, like finance or insurance. There are lots of customers out there who want to think over the offer made by the call center agent. They may wish to speak to some friends or experts that they know. In such cases, the BPO agents have to give them the due time. This is a sort of passive sales lead generation, too. If the customer is not interested in the offer that you have made, then they are not going to call back or encourage follow-up calls. On the other hand, should they call back, the sales cycle is complete.

Business Swelling in BPO

2010-10-01T02:30:00.000-07:00

The BPO business is comfortably hitting the high marks of success. The Republicans in the Senate shot down the bill to roll back tax evasions and other benefits that the American firms receive for outsourcing their work to offshore BPO units. The Obama administration has dubbed it as a move to destabilize the economic prosperity of the country. The bill was primarily prepared with the intention of brining back telemarketing jobs to the American shores.

However, the experts of the business process outsourcing in the third world countries feel that the swelling telemarketing services business would not be hurt even if the bill was passed.

These call center experts have their reasons. To begin with, the telemarketing projects can still get done with less amount of money if the business firms outsource them to the offshore BPO destinations. The American business houses are recovering from the dampening effect of the recession. They are cash rich today, but not enough to pay for the overpriced call center services that the domestic call centers offer. The delegates of offshore telemarketing services have lobbied hard against this bill. And now they have tasted success. This deals a heavy jolt to the Obama administration. At the same time, it’s good news for business process outsourcing.

Telemarketing Expression Matters

2010-09-30T02:17:00.000-07:00

Communication skills are important for telemarketing. This fact was always known to the call center agents and to those who hired them. But surveys have revealed that it’s not just the communication skills that make a difference in telemarketing services. The agents have to be clear in their expression when they are talking to the customers residing in the USA and Europe. As it is the agents working out of call centers in countries like India and the Philippines have a problem with the accent. That makes it difficult for the customers to hear what they are being instructed. Without clarity of expression, call center agents have no chance of making a sale or even getting the customers to understand what they are saying.

The BPO units have to be careful about the training of these agents. It’s important for the call centers to offer voice modulation and speech training. The telemarketing agents have to get their voice intonation right so that they can speak to the customers in the language that they understand. It makes no sense in trying to fake the American twang! That is not the solution to the problem of the answering service. Experts also feel that the phone answering agents have to be careful about being relaxed. If they are worked up about pulling off the sale, they will only sound grave and desperate. Smiling is one aspect of telemarketing services that cannot be seen, but makes a mean difference.

Banned: Telemarketing SMS

2010-09-29T02:07:00.000-07:00

After pesky calls, it’s now time for the telemarketing text messages to be banned by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The landslide of text messages on the cell phones of users registered on the national Do Not Call (DNC) lists has prompted the FTC to get strict with the call centers. Despite several warnings to stop the mass texting of marketing messages to users who don’t want to receive them, the BPO units working on projects to promote and sell are doing just that. They have ignored the laws and bypassed the restrictions. It’s payback time now for these BPO service units. They have to curb their habit of interfering with the privacy of the citizens before they come under the scanner.

The FTC has decided to penalize the faulty call centers in landmark judgments. However, the problem is that most of these guilty call center units are based offshore. They are technically beyond the rule of the land because they belong to foreign shores. So, the penalties are shrugged off easily. Even when they are imposed, the lack of a proper governing body with real powers has stalled the cases. The fines imposed on errant BPO units were never realized and there are thousands of dollars that the FTC is entitled to receive. The BPO service firms get away because the laws are not strict about extracting the payment.

Revised Telemarketing Debt Laws

2010-09-28T05:20:00.000-07:00

The debt consolidation laws that were grossly misused by telemarketing firms have been revised. The governing authority, the Federal Trade Commission, has tweaked the laws a little to make the call centers more accountable. Henceforth, the call center agents have to more transparent in their dealings. They have to clearly give out how they are going to consolidate the debt and how much the customers have to pay. There are times when the customers keep paying a sum every month but it does nothing to improve their debt consolidation. Let alone work towards paying off the principal, the money is not enough to even see off the monthly recurring interest!

Customers are unaware of the situation and the ground reality. This allows the BPO units to make some money through shady deals. The FTC wants to put a stop to it. With the new rules in place, the call center agent has to declare just how much money the customer needs to pay every month and for what duration. More often than not, customers are not aware of how their debt consolidation will reflect poorly on their credit records. The BPO service agents have to inform the customers about it. In the same vein, the customers have to be informed about the ‘dedicated accounts’ that call centers often use to consolidate the debt.

Rise of Virtual Call Centers

2010-09-27T03:43:00.000-07:00

As many other industries, the concept of the office is about to be relegated to the sidelines in the call center sector. Thanks to the rising costs of holding an establishment, several BPO units in USA are going for virtual call centers. This idea is one that can cut down on costs comfortably. You can bring down the overhead costs by a huge margin if you are able to run your call center services without having a designated office space for that. All the telemarketing agents on your team works out of their personal spheres and so do you. You can appoint team leaders and supervisors to check up on reports. Have online reporting structures and keep them integrated on a solitary platform.

Working from a virtual call center has its advantages, other than the cost saving factor. The agents who work from home don’t have to commute long distances against a killing traffic. They save up on a lot of time that way. This can be utilized in doing something productive. They can get to their telemarketing jobs without getting distracted because of coworkers and peers. The practice of working with other agents in tandem often brings about a tension-laden atmosphere that has to be overcome so that they can hit the targets. Moreover, they also feel more responsible about their work because they know that their work is being monitored and tracked by supervisors.

Picking the Right BPO

2010-09-24T04:36:00.000-07:00

Picking the right BPO is often a challenge for the clients. These days, a lot is riding on the decision about which call center you pick as your business partner. Services like answering service and telemarketing can make or break a business. If you are a small business firm, these tie-ups matter a lot in the long run. This also involves a lot of money. For small business firms, assimilating the funds for this meet can be really a daunting task. That raises the concerns even higher. If they are picking the wrong call center services provider, they are wasting their money at a time when they should be using the same to consolidate their position in the market.

Let’s take a quick look at what you need to keep in mind while picking the right BPO. First up, check up for the body of telemarketing work they have done. If they have worked in diverse categories and domains, they will be able to provide variety in the call center services that they offer. In a similar vein, if the call center has been around for some time, they will have the required stability and market expertise. The financial aspect of the BPO service provider should be under the scanner as well. Without finances in the kitty, the telemarketing services provider cannot buy the required technology and manpower.

Converting Leads in Lead Generation

2010-09-22T03:47:00.000-07:00

Leads can be helpful in building up a business. But if those leads are not converting into sales and adding to the revenue, the lead generation process isn’t working for you. Call centers are hired on the basis of number of leads that they can provide. In their haste to hit those numbers, the outbound call center agents often pack in half-baked leads into the kitty. These are not qualified leads and there are no verifications done on them. So, the in-house sales team of the clients may be in for a nasty shock when they call these leads to ink the deal! BPO units have to take care that they provide only qualified leads to the clients. Otherwise it reflects poorly on the call center services that are being done.

The percentage of conversion of leads is important to calculate the returns on investment in the lead generation procedure. Clients are not willing to spend anything unless they find some validation of their investment. Call center services don’t come cheap and they wouldn’t like to find out at the end of the sales lead generation campaign that the leads they got amount to nothing. A dismally poor conversion rate would mean the failure of the campaign. The call centers have to verify and follow-up on leads to ensure they stay warm. You can use a variety of media like emails, text messages and phone calls to check up on your leads.

Stability of BPO Market

2010-09-21T02:42:00.000-07:00

Ohio has suddenly become the hotbed of interest for the telemarketing sector. It’s here that President Barack Obama declared that he will do what he can to curb the outsourcing of telemarketing services to offshore call centers. The BPO service experts in countries like India and the Philippines, along with some African and Latin American countries, are worried about the aftermath of this declaration. The Governor of Ohio has backed up this declaration with the announcement that they will not be outsourcing any projects to offshore call center services. While the twin blows may not be that serious for the business process outsourcing sector right now, one cannot drive away the speculation that they may have long-term consequences.

At the same time, the BPO experts are confident that these measures will not harm the prospects of the business in the long term. The call centers are aware that if the business firms in the USA decide to curtail the outsourcing to offshore destinations, the economies in these countries will dip dangerously. However, at the same time they are aware that the business firms are too deep into the business process outsourcing pie to pull back. The availability of the option to get their call center services done at a far lower cost is definitely something that they cannot refuse.

Graduates Unemployable in Call Centers

2010-09-20T03:29:00.000-07:00

Graduates passing out of reputed marketing courses are not employable in the call centers. That is the ground reality in many of the call center units in the developing countries. The condition is an alarming state of affairs, especially at a time when the BPO units all over these regions are in dire need of quality manpower. The absence of that is harming their prospects of providing quality call center services to a global market. The standard has been lifted with such precision and continuity, these BPO service units are finding themselves at a strict loss for something that they can do. They want to have a fresh influx of talent but find themselves tied because of the lack of quality in what they are digging up.

Some factors are responsible for the sad state of affairs. Finishing schools of marketing are mushrooming at street corners of these countries. But they teach little about telemarketing or call center services. Many institutions claiming to equip the young students with BPO technology and make them industry-ready are nowhere near the mark. They have no equipment or gadgets that the students can practice on. They have no trainer who is on par with what the BPO service industry requires. One could go on. But the problem remains there: lack of quality professionals is not a good sign and it’s time for change.

SEO for BPO: The Leak

2010-09-17T02:34:00.000-07:00

SEO efforts conducted by BPO units have not always borne fruits. There are several reasons why the online lead generation pie doesn’t really offer rich dividends to call centers. There are these times when the amount of traffic coming in to the client’s website because of SEO don’t turn into that much of leads. The amount of resources spent in conducted SEO operations to get higher rankings on the search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing, do not translate into successful sales lead generation. Call center managers would be doing a mistake if they assume that the online traffic is all they need to get better leads. A study of website statistics like Google Analytics or Stat Counter will show that users are coming to the website, but not sticking to it.

That’s when the call center needs to review their websites. Check for the content and the website design. Many BPO units often tend to clutter their website with too much on the head banner. White space is important for emphasis. Users may be repelled by the look of the website. Similarly, a lengthy lead generation form is another turn off! Online users pay for their internet time. They have no patience to fill up a form with information that has nothing to do with what they want. Make the forms crisp and the website navigation smooth. And keep studying the user trends to find out what work you need to do in the weaker areas.

Better Social Media for Call Center

2010-09-16T03:36:00.000-07:00

Social media is now a distinct part of the call center. Almost every BPO unit now has a social media department handling profiles on Facebook and Twitter. Every client wants a pie of the social media pie. However, not every call center service can conduct successful social media marketing. There are reasons varying from lack of expertise to lack of experience. But the primary lack is that of interaction. Creating a profile on Facebook and Twitter and adding some random people on the page isn’t social media marketing. That’s more like spamming. To get leads or to promote the brand you are working for, you need to do more than just adding up people. You have to interact.

Social media networks are where people hang out. Users log in to Facebook and Twitter, for some fun activity that can keep them occupied. No one wants to read the literature that your call center puts up on the Wall or on the discussion forums. BPO firms need to promote their brands online. They have to speak for themselves. Similarly, users are not going to take a discussion forward unless the brand participates. Call center experts need to have social media personnel who can talk to these people online. You have to monitor other brands to see what they are doing. Organizing events and webinars is also a great idea to promote and market.

Climate Decides Call Center Location

2010-09-08T05:06:00.000-07:00

An unlikely factor is deciding the location of call center units these days! It’s the climate! Because of the dominance of hurricanes and hailstorms, BPO firms are ruling out several locations for their call centers. For example, Verizon was really concerned about their upcoming answering service unit in Wilmington because of the weather concerns. The weather plays an important role because the working of a telemarketing unit involves a lot of infrastructure and they have to function at the top of their game every day. If they do not work on a single day because of inclement weather, they will stand to lose quite a bit of money. In case of hurricanes and other natural calamities, they will end up losing a lot of working hours. They may even have to reconstruct things.

Modern business leaves nothing to chance. Setting up a call center is the question of a lot of money. And money is more valuable these days because of the recession and the inflation. BPO investors are not keen on investing money where they will have to be at the mercy of the weather to do their call center services. The way things are, places where the weather is not really supportive of business growth, will miss out on call centers and other answering service units because of the weather. When they have to no choice about the location, they take extra precautions and make stronger constructions to stand the vagaries of nature.

Call Center Coaching

2010-09-07T04:12:00.000-07:00

When the experts say that the location of the call center has got nothing to do with their call center services, they are probably more correct than they intended to be. The quality of work done by a BPO unit is measured not by the latitudes and longitudes, but rather by the amount of training that the agents receive. Training in the art of telemarketing and lead generation makes more of a difference to the productivity of the unit than any other investment. You may argue that technology is more important for BPO service but the fact remains that without training in that technology, the agents cannot really exploit its benefits.

But the sad reality is that many call centers shy away from conducting proper training sessions. They curtail the training days to the bare minimum so that they can get the BPO agents to start work. This does not cut down costs by any means. Rather this sort of an approach puts more on the call center agent’s plate that you intend to. Lack of training leads to mistakes and also stress for the telemarketing executive. The BPO service managers find themselves hand-holding agents because they are not being to cope with what is expected from them. Finally you find that your project is racing against an impossible deadline!

Voice Broadcasting for Lead Generation

2010-09-06T04:05:00.000-07:00

The voice broadcasting scenario for lead generation companies holds a lot of hope and promise. Many call center units are not aware of using this procedure while some others are prejudiced against using this. They are wary that they will end up rubbing the telecom authorities the wrong way if they use voice broadcasts from the outbound call center desk. But that fear is not valid. Telecom authorities are not going after you if you leave the Do Not Call list aside. Make sure that the BPO agents are not sending out the broadcast to the registered numbers. That’s the only precaution that you have to take. If you can get that sorted out, this method can be a clincher for your sales lead generation method.

Voice broadcasting is the method by which you can send out a pre-recorded telemarketing message to thousands of prospective consumers at one go! It’s like a direct marketing ad spot for radio or TV, only that this is meant for telephones. The convenience of this lead generation tool is that you can reach out to a number of people at one shot. That’s something that saves time and also goes easy on the resources. When the interested consumers call your inbound call center desk, you can take the sales lead generation forward.

Canadians Brace for Telemarketing Surveys!

2010-09-03T02:45:00.000-07:00

The Canadian citizens are preparing themselves to wage another battle with telemarketing calls in the coming year. The Canadian government is conducting the census as per their rule of having one every five years. But they have not made the survey mandatory! The citizens have to answer call center calls asking for their basic information like name, address, age and sex. But they are not liable to answer BPO agents asking for their education, ethnicity and other personal details. The Canadian government is likely to fine citizens who don’t answer the basic information calls. However, the ground is set for the telemarketing services centers to tap the citizens for information that is not related to the census.

That is the fear on the minds of the citizens. They are wary of call centers tapping them for information to build up their database. This sort of a mass survey will be extremely beneficial for BPO units who want to add some more columns to their database. The government is taking steps to ensure that fraudulent call centers don’t use the guise of the census to gather information for their business profits. The survey will be conducted across 4.5 million Canadian homes and the whole logistical arrangement will be nightmare for the government. It remains to be seen how the call center units hired by the government do their job.

Optimizing Websites for Lead Generation

2010-09-02T02:13:00.000-07:00

It’s true that business firms need a website to give a shape to their online lead generation efforts. But the website has to be designed in a way that is conducive for sales lead generation. A hastily put up website will not serve any purpose for the call center team. No matter how much the outbound call center tries to promote the website, if the users don’t find much of value in the content or if the design is not attractive to the eye, the conversion of the traffic into sales will not happen. BPO web designers have to keep in mind certain aspects of the online marketing process when they are designing websites.

Let me give you an example. Call center units often design websites with flash introductions. That is a regressive step, especially in the context of lead generation. Users don’t like the long time that flash introductions take to upload on their screens. They don’t like the bandwidth that it consumes. When they find flash designs, they quickly close the tab down. So the BPO unit cannot utilize the traffic that they got through tough sales lead generation. Similarly, when the BPO service web designers use heavy images on the website, it slows down the website. That is another turn off for the users. Call centers have to keep these aspects in mind when they are designing websites to market and promote products/services.

Back to School Delays Answering Service!

2010-09-01T02:58:00.000-07:00

The children are getting back to school in USA and thanks to frenetic calls from parents the emergency answering service desks got blocked. Authorities manning the phone answering desks in the 911 call center units of different parts of the country faced the heat. The call volume shot up rapidly because of the parents trying to call the inbound call center to make enquiries about the long serpentine lines to pick their children up. Some are calling up because parents parked their car on private driveways to run and drop their children off to school. Though the state governments have separate call center services for the traffic cases, people still prefer to call 911.

The supervisors of the 911 call centers are appealing to the citizens to leave the emergency answering service free. Because of the call volumes generated at the inbound call center desk, callers who need the emergency phone answering agents cannot get through. There is an elongated hold time for the agents. And that is very dangerous if the phone number happens to be an emergency contact line. The authorities in charge are now requesting parents to call a different number for their needs related to schools. These cases again highlight the importance of the inbound call center teams in the context of smooth running of any system.

International Conference on Call Center

2010-08-31T02:06:00.000-07:00

The International Contact Center Conference & Expo was held in the Philippines recently. The conference was one of the many steps that the country has taken in the recent months to promote themselves as the epicenter of call center activity. The conference was scheduled to help the country and the participating BPO companies to fight the challenges that the business process outsourcing community was facing in the recent times. With the rise of the profit line in the country, it was time for the call center services units to brace themselves for greater profits in the second quarter of the year. The emergence of new technology in the BPO service was another point of discussion.

Such conferences that bring the telemarketing business firms together are very important in chalking something out for the future. The Philippines was the ideal destination for such a call center seminar because the country is finally in the running to beat other destinations as the hub of BPO activity. This was an opportunity for the delegates of business process outsourcing units all over the world to gather and discuss their business on the sidelines. Such conferences are also ideal for lead generation for BPO service firms. They can contact business heads and clients and show them what sort of telemarketing services projects they are capable of handling.

BPO Business Booms in Philippines

2010-08-30T02:49:00.000-07:00

The BPO business in the Philippines is seeing some great days now. After successfully challenging the growth percentage of the BPO giant India and beating their growth rate convincingly, the call center industry in this country can only get better. The support of the government and the constant faith of them in the capabilities of their telemarketing manpower to generate enough business are the pillars of their progress. The telemarketing services of the country see their delegations as part of every major business process outsourcing conference. They like to place themselves in the thick of things. These representatives are also not wary of taking on the political legislations of a country like USA.

For those not in the loop, the BPO experts of the Philippines were in USA a couple of months back to protest against the anti-offshore call center outsourcing bill of New York Senator Charles E. Schumer. The delegates told the Senator that they expected better steps from an economic super power like USA because such legislations affected the economies of countries like theirs. Their argument was to allow telemarketing outsourcing to their country as usual. If there was something to be done, they requested for higher tax cuts. It remains to be seen if their efforts actually stalls the bill, but not every government would go to that extent to nurture the business process outsourcing industry.

Call Center for Overseas Workers

2010-08-27T03:34:00.000-07:00

The Indonesian government has set up a call center to tend to the needs of the overseas workers. Indonesia, especially Jakarta, is a preferred destination for many overseas workers. Some of them also look for employment in the BPO sector. They rely on dubious sources for their information about the country and the employment scenario. The call center services will be able to guide them get through to the right employment pockets. Countries across the world are relying on these answering service units to bail them out of issues that need a knowledge sharing process. Such cases are best handled by the phone answering units. That is why governments build up an inbound call center desk or simply outsource the work to a BPO service unit.

This initiative will address a serious issue that prevalent among the overseas workers in the country. It is also a move that will make the country more suited to attract quality manpower. The BPO sector in the country is still in its nascent stages. They still have a long way to go in call center work before they can match up to The Philippines. The infrastructure and other facilities may not be looking good at the present for the country to do some world-class work, but if they can push their efforts, they can be right up there.

Auto Dialers Save Lead Generation Resources

2010-08-26T02:40:00.000-07:00

Despite the amount of flak that the robotic lead generation calls have received in the recent times, there is a steady demand for call centers that take to auto dialers with enthusiasm. Auto dialers help the outbound call center teams in a big way. With the help of this software, a high number of numbers can be dialed automatically. The call center agents need not sit at their desk and spend time dialing the numbers. The software dials the numbers of their behalf and also keeps a close tab on the agents who are busy on calls and those that are free. The calls are passed to the free agents as soon as the receiver receives the call. The receivers cannot make out that they have been auto-dialed. So they don’t complain about this sales lead generation process.

Auto dialing methods save time at the lead generation campaign. Because the whole process of dialing numbers is done by the software, a lot of time is saved in the process. The outbound call center agents have a tighter schedule as well. There is no problem of checking the numbers and then dialing them. Moreover, the auto dials are able to check the availability of the receivers. If the receiving doesn’t take the call, the call center agent need not attend on it. There are no false alarms as such and agents are only put on calls that have found a voice at the other end.

Call Center for Entrepreneurs

2010-08-25T03:55:00.000-07:00

Sensing that India continues to be the trusted choice of entrepreneurs when it comes to hiring call center services, the Ministry has decided to do something about it. The Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) board has decided to kick-start a BPO service that goes by the name ‘Udyami Helpline’. The purpose of this initiative is to provide entrepreneurs with an option to choose from the registered call centers across India. This will be a toll free answering service that the business heads can use at their convenience. They can compare and avail BPO service without having to scourge around for a suitable phone answering network. Such initiatives help the business process outsourcing sector as a whole. The country has to make certain allowances to woo investors into investing in the industries of the country.

The Udyami Helpline is the first of many initiatives that related ministries will take to bolster the BPO sector in the country. It would be no surprise if they have been inspired by the government back-up that the call center sector receives in countries like The Philippines. Though India has a long way to go when it comes to government initiatives to promote a particular industry, BPO or otherwise, the country continues to grab those cherry telemarketing projects. The Helpline is a good step forward. Entrepreneurs will be interested only if they find convenience. And such answering service can only mean that investors will know the ground reality of BPO service in India.

Politicians Not Telemarketing Agents!

2010-08-24T06:33:00.000-07:00

Politicians in the USA are entitled to call numbers registered on the Do Not Call (DNC) list. These calls do not come under the violation of the telemarketing laws. The laws restrict the calls made by call center agents who are selling some product/service. Politicians and charity institutions do not fall under this law. Several citizens in the USA are pestered by the BPO agents who call to convince the citizens to vote for one candidate or the other. Generally hardcore supporters of one party issue complaints against the other for breach of privacy. But there are no laws to condemn the call centers making these calls. Insiders are happy that it is so, or fake complaints would have flooded the guardian body, Federal Trade Commission (FTC).

Very recently, the FTC had slotted advisors and counselors under the telemarketing laws. If they call their clients at times of the day when the telemarketing services law prohibits them, they will be fined. Moreover, the FTC also made it clear that call center agents cannot ask the customers to pay for services that they have not rendered. This is particularly true for the debt recovery BPO agents. They demand payment even before the customer has been relieved of his debt. Their fake call center services add to the debt of the customer instead of relieving him! The question about the politicians calling for votes has been part of the American electoral process for decades.

Using LinkedIn for Lead Generation

2010-08-23T05:08:00.000-07:00

B2B lead generation is different from the other processes in this genre. Here the call centers have to deal with the business heads of firms that your client wants to do business with. A new way to approach them is through professional networks like LinkedIn. Creating a profile and interacting with the entrepreneurs through such networks builds up a professional attitude. BPO firms that have quality B2B projects are sizing up their option more than ever. Let’s find out how call center agents can do a good job on LinkedIn. Step 1 would be to create a profile. Experts suggest that you spend considerable time on this. Key in authentic information and try to cover all the fields. Your profile is going to be a sort of a CV for your business. Do it with the due diligence.

Call centers need to take care in providing easily accessible means of contacting the inbound call center desk. Provide phone numbers, IMs, blog and website links. If the call center agents are using emails to communicate, make sure they have the right signature line with the same information. No entrepreneur has the time to hunt out a contact address or email id from the website. The BPO agents have to ensure that they have access to contact data at their finger-tips. Finally, try to talk to the entrepreneurs through emails and LinkedIn mails. Unless you network actively, you are not going to achieve much.

Advertisers Come Under Lead Generation Law

2010-08-20T04:12:00.000-07:00

Advertisers who make calls to customers will come under the lead generation laws, according to a new directive from the Canadian telecom authority. The rules mention that advertisers making telemarketing calls have to register themselves with the government as telemarketers and they will be legally subjected to the same laws as a telemarketing services firm. The new rule was necessary because many advertisers was making use of this loophole to contact prospective customers as call center agents are more likely to do. Their violations of the laws were being held against the BPO sector.

As a matter of fact, several call centers have been fined by the Canadian government for violating the telemarketing laws. However, because of any teeth in the law, the authorities were not able to realize any payment. The BPO units are still withholding the fines that they are supposed to pay. Insiders of the business process outsourcing industry feel that it’s important for the authorities to ensure that the guilty firms pay the fine. Without a proper procedure to get these fines extracted, the telemarketing services sector will not pay heed to the laws. That, in turn, would harm other BPO service units in their drive to offer only industry-recommended lead generation procedures.

Advantages of Cross Selling in Lead Generation

2010-08-19T03:57:00.000-07:00

The lead generation processes of many call centers revolve around cross selling. This is the procedure of offering the existing consumers some related products/services. This sales lead generation process has numerous advantages, both for the call center as well as for the consumer. To begin with, the telemarketing agents can sell products/services to existing customers. This is like tapping the same consumer base and coming up with a fresh set of revenue earnings. Cross selling works particularly well in the retail sector. Telemarketing services receive a considerable boost when the BPO unit tries out the process of cross selling.

From the perspective of the consumer, cross selling works well because the lead generation agents tap into their latent demands. They may not be aware of certain products/services that can make life easier. It’s the job of the telemarketing agent to poke at that demand and offer them something that they need but didn’t realize that. Sales lead generation, in this case, acts in favor of the consumer as well. Clients, who have a chain of products, often ask BPO units to help them out with cross selling. It’s a nice way to have revenues coming in from your existing group of customers. There is a little risk as well. If the new product doesn’t live up to what the consumer expects, it reflects badly on the brand identity of the client.

Call Center Employees Go Cheap

2010-08-18T02:52:00.000-07:00

Call center employees in the USA are ready to work at slashed pays. The percentage of unemployment is so high that the BPO agents who have been given the pink slip during the recession sees no other option but to take up a job with whatever pay they get. Call centers in the country cannot afford to pay them high wages because they have to contend with the BPO service units of the developing countries. If the domestic telemarketing units cannot keep their prices low, they will lose their projects to the offshore business process outsourcing destinations. They have to keep their prices at par with the global rate. Hitting that rate despite being in an expensive economy is not working out for them, yet they have no choice.

The situation is not too bleak as well. There are high chances that the domestic call centers will gain from the model of cutting down on prices. Call center units in developing countries brought down their prices to get more projects. It worked for them. Business firms, just out of recession, decided to try cheaper BPO units because they couldn’t afford the expensive ones. The quality of these call center services has become infinitely better because of all the training and quality control that is being done these days. The pay cuts of the employees are just a fall-out of their attempt to bring down the cost of production so that they meet the price tags that are globally accepted.

Call Center Monitoring

2010-08-17T03:08:00.000-07:00

Call center firms are guarded in their approach these days. Reports and online alerts keep telling us about incidents involving data theft and other malpractices in the BPO firms. That makes you be careful about your agents and the processes at all times. You must have an integrated monitoring system that keeps a close tab on your call center services, your telemarketing agents who make and receive calls and also on the use of resources. The monitoring system isn’t something that makes the employees claustrophobic or keeps things too tight. It’s just that you must have it in place to prevent any misuse of your call centers. You have a reputation to protect in the business process outsourcing sector.

In your answering service department, you must have some monitoring going on as well. You need to have technology to keep track on all the calls that are being made or received in the call center. Sometimes you can have BPO supervisors listening on the calls while they are in progress. If the floor agent is not getting something right, the supervisor can whisper in some words of advice. It’s entirely on how you take the call center services monitoring. If you take a positive view of it, there’s nothing better. And if you feel that it chokes innovation, then it will only be a fallacy in thinking so.

Converting Online Traffic to Lead Generation

2010-08-16T01:40:00.000-07:00

Many call centers are now relying on websites for lead generation. Web 2.0 tools are great to get some quality leads into the kitty. However, you have to be careful about converting the traffic that comes to the client websites into leads that make money. Search engine optimization (SEO) methods can get you the traffic. But to convert them into sales lead generation, you need more than a website. The BPO web designers have to build up a website that has easy navigation and also makes the flow of traffic easier from the home page to the internal pages. The easier it is for the users to use the website, the better chances you have of making a sale.

Another way to boost lead generation through websites is to keep the information form easy and simple. Users don’t like it when you hold out a form that requires inane data and is unusually long. Sales lead generation cannot work out if the users get turned off by the forms that you have on the website. A good idea would be to keep other options for the users to sign up. Users may want to contact you through email or leave a comment. The inbound call center agents can process those emails and see if they can use them for telemarketing. There must always be this synergy between the telemarketing services team and the web marketing department. That’s how the BPO firm can have the best of both worlds.

Holiday Incentive for Telemarketing Agents

2010-08-12T02:47:00.000-07:00

Motivation is a prime mover for any employee, be it from the call center or elsewhere. The BPO units these days are offering holiday packages to its employees who do exceedingly well. Many call centers have adopted this model of rewarding the best telemarketing agent or employee with an all expenses paid trip to a holiday destination of their choice. No wonder then that there is some serious competition on the telemarketing services floor! It’s good for the firm in a number of ways. They have a dedicated and now motivated team of BPO service agents and that’s something that is must-have for progress.

However, it’s a challenge for the call center to keep the focus on healthy competition. When the incentives are this rewarding, it’s obvious that the BPO agents would just about do anything to grab the opportunity. To keep the focus on work and not on the incentive, the employers of the call centers have to maintain a transparent policy to select the winner. Arbitrary decisions can do a lot of harm to the morale of the employees and ruin the work environment. As a matter of fact, the whole purpose of providing this incentive can backfire on the telemarketing company. Even then, it’s definitely a move that will push for better telemarketing services in the future.

Basic Skills for Telemarketing

2010-08-10T04:28:00.000-07:00

The telemarketing sector doesn’t need any high-octane qualifications to see you through. All you need are some basic skills to make it good at the telemarketing services desk. The call center units are recruiting agents who are good at the practical aspects of the job rather than someone who knows the protocol and the practices well but weak in application. To be a successful BPO agent, all you need to do is the love for communicating with people and the persuasive skills of a good salesperson. If you are good at talking to people and convincing them about your point of view, you have earned yourself the degree that is most needed in BPO service! You don’t need to back it up with a fancy college degree.

The telemarketing sector has employed many from other industries even when they had no prior experience of working in a telemarketing services unit. And these new call center recruits could work well and adapt themselves quickly because the work is not complicated. Call center services need a sharp mind and plenty of common sense. Any new recruit having these basic skills can do well in the BPO service unit. The training provided by the business process outsourcing units is also a major reason why the new recruits are able to adapt themselves quickly and settle down with the job on hand.

Payment Discrimination in BPO

2010-08-10T02:46:00.000-07:00

Payment discriminations have dotted the history of industrialization. It began with racial issues and shifted to gender bias. No matter what the industry experts tell us, there still exists a disparity in the income of the man and the woman. However, things are refreshingly different in a BPO. Here, the women have an equal opportunity not just in matters of pay, but also in terms of progress and promotion in a call center. The doors of being promoted to a higher position than the current one, is as near to the woman than to the man. In fact, the woman has a better scope of working as a telemarketing professional because they are naturally inclined to be patient with customers.

In terms of pay, the women make as much money in a BPO unit. There is no separate pay slot for the women, as you may find in various other industries. The call centers are known for being the arenas of equal opportunity. The call center services also provide employment to women who cannot come to the office for various reasons. It could be that the commuting to the call center is a problem for someone. Several BPO service firms allow working from home as an option, where you get the usual pay. You can coordinate with your superiors in the office through the internet. Such convenience can only be had in the business process outsourcing sector!

Disadvantages of In-house Call Center

2010-08-06T04:37:00.000-07:00

Several business firms are considering the idea of moving their call center unit in-house. While this may seem like a convenient option for them, the convenience is only apparent. There are several advantages of hiring a BPO and not getting your in-house team to do the work. The main disadvantage is the lack of trained expertise. Call centers have trained agents carrying out lead generation, answering service and telemarketing. To set up an in-house team, you will have to hire and train employees. That will be a time-consuming effort. Moreover, before your trained employees can take the floor and start off work, you will have lost a lot of time that could have been advantageous for call center services.

Call center agents have the knowledge of the market and what BPO process will be best suited for the needs of the hour. To get the kind of knowledge base that you can have at your disposal in call centers, you will need to be in the telemarketing sector for some time. Since that is not something with these business firms, they are at a disadvantage. It is important to be adept in the art of supporting a business firm through call center services. It ensures that the business firm gets the required back-up to take giant leaps in the sales department. Blend the BPO service with the business processes and ethics of the firm you tie up with.

Rural Call Center Proves Lucrative

2010-08-05T04:44:00.000-07:00

The rural BPO units are proving themselves to be ideal locations for a call center hub. The cost factor is a huge advantage that the investors of call centers can count on. This is especially true for cities in countries like India and the Philippines. The smaller cities of India, like Mysore and Jaipur have very supportive governments to help them bag telemarketing units. The administrators help the investors with tax cuts and other rebates. The less-expensive market of the smaller cities also acts as a bonus. The telemarketing services firms can establish an office space without having to shell out a fortune.

In business process outsourcing, you need to have a minimum amount of seats to make a telemarketing project economically viable. At times, the lack of the required number of call center agents jeopardizes a project. The call volume may be too high for the answering service agents to handle. Without space enough, you are barred from recruiting more on the inbound call center team. This issue is solved in smaller cities. The costs you save in infrastructure, tax cuts and establishment can be used to make expansions and innovations in the business.

Telemarketing Scams Target Mobile Phones

2010-08-04T04:00:00.000-07:00

Phishing, that dreaded lead generation technique that is downright illegal, is now all over mobile phones. There are tons of telemarketing units out there that are using text messages to gather information about the consumers. The scam starts off with the text message that requests you to reply back with information about your personal details and often they are asking for financial ones as well. Once you reply to the text message with the required information, the telemarketing services units call you up and try to sell the product/service. The dangerous part is, sometimes there is actually nothing on them to sell! The call center agents just walk away with your money.

Such mobile phone scams have provoked the authorities to warn citizens about this telemarketing attack. The authorities have another cause for concern. Often, the call center agents use the name of a state office to collect funds! This is beneficial for the fraudulent telemarketing services agents because they are less likely to check up if the call was genuine. Moreover, they are more likely to pay because they feel they are obliged to do so as citizens. The call center scam earns rich money for those involved. Sometimes these call centers are based overseas as well, making it almost impossible for the authorities to nab them or force them into paying hefty fines.

Social Media for Call Center

2010-08-03T07:36:00.000-07:00

The marketing scenario is fast changing. The monopoly enjoyed by voice calls from call center agents is being challenged by the social media and other online marketing tools. Among them social media marketing has emerged as the most talked about marketing vehicle for BPO firms. Call center services have integrated social media into their range of services, thereby paving the way for more use of Facebook, Twitter and others. The leverage provided by the social media networks have come in handy for call centers. They have been able to drive home targeted lead generation services through audience interactions and participation.

The biggest advantage of social media is that it is a public platform. When a call center agent makes a voice call, there is only one person who receives the message. However, if the BPO agent writes something on the prospective customer’s social media profile page, many can see it. The message becomes a sort of public broadcast for the call center. This helps in reaching out to larger sections of the target demographics. Moreover, if your customer base is happy with you, they will do a positive word-of-mouth publicity for you online. That, I assure you, will be better than any amount of telemarketing that you can do!

State Work Outsourced to Overseas Call Center

2010-08-02T05:08:00.000-07:00

In a bizarre case of bureaucratic shortsightedness, the answering service work of Ohio’s appliance rebate program was found to have been outsourced to El Salvador! The rebate program is part of the stimulus package awarded to Ohio. The revelations came to the surface when someone called the program and asked the call center agent where he was located. The answer was so shocking for the caller that he registered a complaint with the Ohio state government. The Texas-based call center services unit never mentioned to the concerned department that they will be outsourcing their rebate program to an overseas BPO unit. It’s another matter that the department, on their part, never asked or clarified!

The Governor of Ohio, Ted Strickland, is livid at the way things have turned out to be. He has ordered city council members to be particular about these details. A number of Republican congressmen opined that the call center work should never have been outsourced to overseas call centers. They have decided to make it a point not to award contracts to those BPO units that will outsource the work to overseas units. According to the stimulus package of Barack Obama to Ohio, $11m came in to offer rebates to consumers buying appliances that saved energy, like water heaters and dishwashers.

Lead Generation Lacks Follow-ups

2010-07-30T03:40:00.000-07:00

Some unsuccessful lead generation companies across the world are falling short in one primary, common area: they are not following up on their telemarketing leads. As a result of this initial delay, the leads cool off and the outbound call center agents cannot reap any benefits out of these cold leads. It’s very important for the call center agent to try and keep the leads warm till they are ready to be converted into sales.

Seminars on sales lead generation have also pointed out that leads don’t really convert into sales because the agents are not willing to do the required job of backing up their own efforts. Once the lead is generated, then not following it up means undoing the good work that you did yourself.

A good way to do that is to use non-voice means of keeping lead generation warm. Send out emails to your prospective customers and clients with information about products/services, along with details of your company and business. These emails from the outbound call center desk are meant to keep the presence of your brand alive in their minds. They would like to connect with your company at any point in time. The emails can act as vehicles to bring their message to you. You can also follow up on them through telemarketing calls, if that’s what is suitable for the occasion.

Call Center Jobs Proliferate

2010-07-29T03:28:00.000-07:00

The number of jobs in the call center sector will go up in the coming months. The last quarter of 2010 will see a surge of BPO jobs out in the market. With the recession officially out of the way and the economy finding itself back on its feet, the call centers are getting better projects. To meet the demands of those projects, they will be hiring answering service and telemarketing agents.

That would mean that the business process outsourcing sector will be swelling up in terms of manpower. That is always a good sign for the industry as a whole. It means that the growth opportunities for the telemarketing services will bring in greater amount of revenue.

The number of jobs has always been higher in the call center industry than in the others. It goes on to prove that BPO firms have projects on their hands, as opposed to what the detractors are saying. There are always those who think that the answering service projects are time-bound in some way and one fine day they will disappear from the face of the earth!

Such fantastical ideas repel many young people from joining as a telemarketing agent. The growth of real jobs in the business process outsourcing industry is like a reminder to them that their gory prophecies have no base. And it’s time for the youth to think of telemarketing services as a serious, regular career option.

Learn Lead Generation Lessons

2010-07-28T04:14:00.000-07:00

Lead generation lessons are necessary for the growth of the lead generation companies. Insiders of the call center sector say that sales lead generation is one service that improves with experience. When you handle some of the telemarketing projects, you get a hang of it. Then you know what sort of an approach will be ideal for the project.

Clients are bound to come back to you if you can show them how you saved money for them and how you optimized the BPO resources you had at your command. Clients these days are looking for BPO service providers who are adept at doing something new and experimental without being too loose with the costs.

When the lead generation company has handled a project similar to the one they have at present, they can easily use that experience. In such a scenario, they know the hurdles on the way of sales lead generation. So, they can combat the obstacles on the way through superior call center planning. It also saves a lot of resources for the BPO unit.

The process that you use to carry out telemarketing services is as important as the telemarketing itself. You need to protect the brand image of the client company and also pull in results. Once you tap into your experience pool or just study the call center services of other units, you can strategize your options better.

Telemarketing Violations Continue Unperturbed

2010-07-27T03:38:00.000-07:00

Violations of the telemarketing rules are continuing without any hindrances. There is hardly any authority that can enforce the penalties that have been levied on the call centers. The Canadian companies have had it really tough. Thousands of dollars are waiting to be realized in terms of payments. Of the 22 telemarketing services units that have been fined, only 4 among them have bothered to pay up.

The USA laws are facing the same problem. The call center services that have violated the Do Not Call (DNC) list have been penalized. Because many of these BPO units are based outside the country, it is difficult for the ruling authorities to actually realize the penalties. And because of this same reason, the business outsourcing units can also get away with the violations.

Citizens who have registered with the DNC list and still been made part of telemarketing campaigns have complained to telecommunication authorities and failed to get some action done. Assurances are not going to be enough anymore. The call centers need to be forced to pay up by legal means. For every telemarketing company that is fined and made to pay, there will be many others that will learn a lesson.

When examples are set, there will be that extra caution on the part of the telemarketing services providers to quit calling those numbers listed on the DNC. Every authority across the globe needs to come up in arms to fight this gross violation of rules of privacy.

Telemarketing Drives Profit in BPO

2010-07-26T02:38:00.000-07:00

Statistics coming in from assorted studies have showed that telemarketing contributes to the major chunk of a BPO’s earnings. The telemarketing services were the most hired among the call center services. This was largely the idea of call center experts for years down the line. However, of late, web marketing and help desk services have made some significant cuts in the percentage of contribution made by the telemarketing business.

The easier conclusion is that the telemarketing company enjoys more revenues on a yearly basis than their non-voice counterparts. In fact, the findings not just validate the importance of the telemarketing calls, it also confirms something else.

Contrary to the belief that other forms of lead generation like websites and email marketing is still waiting to catch up with the good old telemarketing! But you cannot really write them off. Sales lead generation through other non-voice means have come up strongly from being relegated to the sidelines.

If you consider the fact that telemarketing calls were around for decades while the others are almost infant in terms of years of usage, you have to say that the telemarketing business has a challenge on their sleeves. It remains to be seen how long telemarketing services continues to hold fort as the highest-earning BPO service.

Future of Telemarketing

2010-07-23T01:54:00.000-07:00

It’s not enough to have the lead generation team to work for a list of qualified leads. That’s just half the job done. Converting those leads into actual sales is important, too. That is where the lead generation companies are falling short of expectations. The telemarketing calls are getting them the leads, but those are not converting into profits or sales. That is leaving the sales lead generation hopelessly in the lurch.

The conversion of the telemarketing leads into sales requires stringent monitoring and following up on those leads. More often than not, the leads are not tended to or nurtured. As a result, the leads cool off and all the efforts of the outbound call center team leads to nothing more than dead leads.

It’s a mystery why the lead generation companies don’t really follow up on the leads that they have bagged! All it takes is a phone call or an email regularly to keep the leads warm. This is a competitive field. After your sales lead generation call, the same person must have received tens of telemarketing calls, probably with better offers and rebates and bonuses.

You cannot expect the person to remember you in spite of the offers flowing thick and fast. He/she will do so, if you care to correspond regularly. This is truer for B2B lead generation. Here the outbound call center guy is dealing with a business head. The busy professional will not remember you unless you gently nudge the lead from time to time.

Sri Lanka Taking Telemarketing Seriously

2010-07-22T03:33:00.000-07:00

The Sri Lankan government is taking their call center services seriously. They are approving plans for the development of a world-class telemarketing sector that can handle telemarketing services from a global clientele. The island of Sri Lanka has the same advantages that you would expect from a developing country – they have cheap establishment costs to house many a telemarketing company, they have a strong English-speaking population to provide them with a manpower and they also have a lot of talent that can be exploited by the business process outsourcing sector.

Moreover, the island has not had many call centers. So the competition is much shallow for the newbie in the field to make an impression, not to mention the cost cuts.

Recent reports tell us that the Sri Lankan government is helping a private player set up a call center in the war-torn city of Jaffna. The idea is to inject some development in the city through the help of telemarketing services. The employment factor is a major reason why the government is ready to invest time and even money to build up a better telemarketing sector.

They want to have a share in the ample business process outsourcing pie. They want to cash in on the many advantages that they have as a business outsourcing destination and turn those into earnings for the country.

Answering Service Hires Handsomely

2010-07-21T01:40:00.000-07:00

The answering service division of Verizon will be hiring about 250 call center employees in the coming weeks. Their answering services unit in the Cedar Bluff Road will be expanding their phone answering unit at this location. The customer service call center of Verizon was recently moved from their Kingston Pike location to this area.

At present, there are 63 employees working at this venue. The office space is a sprawling establishment of 13,000 sq. feet. The Cellular Sales Director of the company assured the business outsourcing world that Verizon will be employing hundreds more so that they can take on larger projects and finish them off fast. Deadlines are a concern in the telemarketing world today.

Most telemarketing services are expected to deliver the goods well before the usual time. The clients and business firms who hire the telemarketing company generally desires that the call center put in extra efforts to ensure that projects are finished before time. The answering service operations for Verizon may be in-house, but they will still need to bow to the demands of the BPO industry.

The aim is also to make Verizon the best in terms of customer service call center. The hiring will not just take place at the phone answering desk. They will also hire supervisors, managers and customer service representatives.

Call Center Makes Bogus Calls

2010-07-20T02:55:00.000-07:00

A yet-unknown call center in Winnipeg is making fake calls using the name of the Fire Department asking for donations. The BPO agents making those calls say that they calling on behalf of the Canadian Association of Fire Chiefs. They are collecting funds for the development of certain things that do not really exist! The campaign is offering telemarketing services that are not registered with the Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service (WFPS).

The telemarketing calls are claiming that they are but actually are not. That is why the fire department has decided to use a public warning against the perpetrators. The declarations of the fire department are unambiguous: the calls having nothing to with them or the WFPS.

This is another instance when a call center is making fake calls to collect money. This is a serious issue all over the world. There are tons of telemarketing calls being made that collect money for non-registered or unverified causes. Several of them are telemarketing campaigns that claim to sell products/services that are not existent. They push forward for money deals to be made by the customers and then you don’t hear from them anymore.

Since a majority of the call centers are based overseas, legally you are at a loss to do something. The only way out of this trap is to be discreet. Be careful about the telemarketing company you are dealing with.

Indian Answering Service Challenged

2010-07-19T01:50:00.000-07:00

The Indian answering service industry looks suitable challenged. After dominating the call center market for years, the monopoly of the Indian call centers when it comes to outsourcing work is set to be seriously threatened, if not overhauled. The challengers are the BPO units in countries like the Philippines and those in Latin America. These business outsourcing destinations are offering cost cuts that India cannot.

They are also matching up to international quality these days, probably the only reason why they could not break open into the business process outsourcing scene earlier. But from the look of the statistics and how much of branded clients they have handled lately, it seems like they are serious contenders for the top slot.

The Indian answering service needs a different business model to retain their place. They need to exploit their BPO resources in a better way, optimizing them to the fullest. The purpose of business outsourcing has not strayed from its original premise. It is still cost cuts. But the Indian call centers have hit the glass ceiling when it comes to slashing their prices. A prime reason is the inflation.

Another is the salary of the call center agents. While entry-level players get the same money, the higher-ups are being overpaid. The reason is simple: there is not enough supply of capable new recruits who can handle the responsibility of working at a business process outsourcing unit.

Call Center Hub Stalled in Nairobi

2010-07-15T02:33:00.000-07:00

A call center hub was supposed to be set up at Sameer Business Park in Nairobi. However, the project got stalled due to the unavailability of funds. The government of Nairobi was expected to provide with the money for the installation of the call centers, along with infrastructural settings. The funds required were allocated but the ones who will be building it up never got the money. So the process has been stopped.

The BPO hub is important for the creation of jobs in the Nairobi market. The IT Ministry feels that the delay in the project will hurt their plans to make Nairobi a hot-bed of business process outsourcing projects. The negotiation of the IT Department with the Treasury is now at a stalemate.

The call center hub at Sameer Park in Nairobi is expected to be the house of many old and new call centers. The aim is to bring all of these segregated BPO units under one roof. It will make the industry stick together and also make it easier for facilities to be built around this hub.

The IT ministry plans to make business process outsourcing a revenue earner for Nairobi. Several African nations have reaped the benefits of a thriving call center services wing. The contracts of handling projects for developed countries always earn that all-important foreign exchange currency!

Cost Cut Challenge for Call Center

2010-07-14T03:46:00.000-07:00

Call centers are facing a strange challenge these days. The call center planners know that they need to cut down on costs. But they can’t decide which department will bear the brunt of the cost cuts. It cannot be the answering service team. You take one inbound call center agent out and you find the entire team working under pressure.

The call volume is unevenly distributed, putting the phone answering agents in a spot of bother. They were coping hard with the work pressure as it is. With downsizing, the agents have to address the issues faster than they would have liked to. This reflects badly on the customer care service that they have on offer.

It cannot be the lead generation team. That’s because the outbound call center agents do the main bulk of the telemarketing job. Shedding weight here would mean lesser revenue earners. You can talk about optimizing the BPO unit but you can do just that and nothing more.

Your primary aim would be to make sure that the call center agents are not overworked because of the cost cutting measures. Employee attrition is a rising problem and if you burnt out employees think of quitting, it won’t be long before you will be spending more than you intended to save!

Telemarketing Budget Cuts Worries Call Centers

2010-07-13T06:08:00.000-07:00

Financial crunch in most business firms means that they are cutting down on their telemarketing expenditures. This has become a cause of worry for the call center. BPO units have already sliced down their prices to grab more projects. Studies have revealed that the number of projects have gone up for the call center units since they brought down their prices.

The business outsourcing units are somehow breaking even by taking on more work and the telemarketing agents are overworked. But that does not seem to enough! Business firms just out of a depressing economy are unable to pay for the answering service that can take them to greater profits.

Business firms still think of telemarketing as a non-core business entity. That is why customer service outsourcing comes lower down on their list of expenditures. With the financial leash around their neck, the telemarketing services expenditures got displaced from their list of priorities. However, the business firms have to understand that this is not the proper way to cut down costs. They must look for other areas to save costs.

Not hiring a call center for their answering service needs would reflect disastrously on their revenue earnings. The inverse is also true. Once the BPO firms get to work, the earnings will improve not just to validate this investment, but also make provisions for the bottom-line to go up.

Awareness Drive for Government Call Centers

2010-07-12T04:05:00.000-07:00

This is a primary concern in many developing countries. The governments of these countries run many call centers to help the citizens in times of emergency, like medical aid or security. However, most citizens don’t even know that such a phone answering service exists!

Lack of publicity and awareness drives makes the answering service facilities rust unused. If there are any calls at the inbound call center desk, they are mainly undeserving of the money and resources being spent in maintaining those telephone answering numbers.

The meager number of calls does no good for the government coffers, especially in the tourism sector. Governments can earn a fortune if they can fine-tune their call centers to handle the tourism calls and offer help tourists on their way in the country. The tourism market is primarily saturated with private players. That is somewhere the government can make inroads with quality answering service.

As of now, they are busy promoting their call answering services numbers that will make it easier for the citizens to get in touch with the concerned authorities when they are in need of help. Having a state-of-the-art phone answering service reflects well on the image of the government as well. It shows that the authorities are concerned about the citizens and their well-being.

Cebu Lacks Quality BPO Manpower

2010-07-09T07:12:00.000-07:00

Cebu may just need more than what they are doing at the present to lift up their BPO division. The call center community out there is more concerned than ever. They are investing in an MBA school to train the telemarketing agents. They are helping the administrator of Cebu build a state-of-the-art infrastructure that can compete with the best in the world.

Cebu, like the other towns of Philippines, needs their business outsourcing industry to thrive and get them revenue. The Managing Director of Cebu Investments and Promotions Center (CIPC), Joel Mari S. Yu, said that despite their best efforts to pull up the quality of their telemarketing services, there was no doubt in the fact that the call centers of Cebu lacked quality manpower.

The statement of Mr. Yu clearly speaks out that all is not well with the BPO world here. There are ample scopes of training for a budding telemarketing agent. There are free courses and tutorials. The training infrastructure is so detailed and easily accessible, there can hardly be any doubt that the authorities are serious about the answering service business.

They are leaving no stone unturned to keep the business firms interested in the telemarketing services of Cebu. Whether their efforts may not be enough will be clear in the coming months. Incidentally, the recent future looks tough for the business outsourcing world on the whole.

Telemarketing Makes Comeback after Exile

2010-07-08T07:39:00.000-07:00

Telemarketing as an industry was facing an existential threat. Consumers were tired of outbound call center agents hounding them with products/services. A telemarketing company would go to great lengths to try and sell their wares without turning the eye of the telecommunication authorities onto themselves. B2B telemarketing was completely ruled out at a point because no business could be conducted over the phone, thanks to emails.

Business heads wouldn’t even come in to talk to you on the phone. In such a situation, the telemarketing call center was frantically searching for ways in which they can carry on making telemarketing calls without coming across as pesky or pushy. Finally they decided to try out targeted telemarketing services.

In targeted telemarketing, the outbound call center does not go to town calling anyone and everyone. In this approach, you know the statistical data before making telemarketing calls. Does the person fall under the income group that can purchase the product/service? Does he have an outstanding loan that he’s yet to pay?

These are answers that you can parse from the data you have. Base your telemarketing services on these data. Once the telemarketing company knows how to segment the market and then call, there will be a cork on wastage. Only relevant consumers will get calls. That would be the ideal use of telemarketing business services.

Telemarketing Firms Tap Down Under

2010-07-07T23:01:00.000-07:00

Telemarketing firms are now looking Down Under to spread out their network. Yes, I’m talking about Australia and New Zealand. These areas are a treasure-trove of answering service talent. The biggest advantage that they have is that they speak the language of the American and European customers without having to bother about the accent!

The call center units Down Under have the potential to offer quality BPO services and give their Indian and Singaporean counterparts a run for their dollar and pounds. But you cannot have an area lying untapped if there is potential for housing business outsourcing firms!

The call center bug has bit the economies of Australia and New Zealand. They are more focused than ever to build up their economies through telemarketing firms and hubs. As a matter of fact, the Malaysian BPO firms are now eyeing the markets in Australia and New Zealand. They are sending across delegations to talk to the authorities of Australia to help them build business process outsourcing hubs in the country.

The telemarketing services will definitely pull the Australian economies out of the tight spot they are in right now. As for the business outsourcing world, adding on a new horizon would definitely spice things up! The Malaysian delegates going Down Under feel that it’s time for their country to go global and this is their first stop.

Filipino Call Centers Appeal against USA Bill

2010-07-06T06:51:00.000-07:00

The call centers at Philippines have decided to stage a protest against the anti-offshore BPO legislation. The delegates of the call center association in the Philippines spoke to Senator Kristen Gillibrand, another exponent of the bill other than Senator Charles Schumer. The appeal of the call center services representatives was clear: they want the bill to be revoked or the economy of Philippines would be greatly hit.

A major chunk of money that drives the Filipino economy comes from call center outsourcing. In case the flow of projects stop, the economy will spiral out of control and the unemployment level would shoot up sharply.

The Philippines want the American legislators to bypass this anti-offshore BPO bill. The representatives want the legislators to try out something else, like tax evasions for business firms that do not outsource to a customer call center outside the country.

The Filipino representatives urged the senators to take into account the image of “Big Brother” that America has in the eyes of the developing countries. The bill, if passed, would go directly against this image. However, the decision for the senators will not be easy. It will be difficult to choose to remain a “Big Brother” when the unemployment percentage in the country is sky-rocketing relentlessly.

Exposure Matters in Call Center Business

2010-07-05T04:20:00.000-07:00

Exposure to the clients in countries like USA will work wonders for the domestic call center sector. That’s what the BPO insiders in countries like Kenya feel. They are right in their assessment. The answering service abilities of these countries need to be displayed to the clients out there. It’s only by the process of exposure and networking can they hope to be in contention when phone answering projects come up for grabs.

As of now, most call centre units in Kenya and other countries of Africa are content with help desk solutions and data entry jobs. It’s true that many of the business outsourcing firms vying for projects don’t really have what it takes to handle high-octane projects.

Making a humble start is the thing foremost on the minds of these BPO pioneers. They know they are representing the call center facilities of their respective countries. Allegations of unprofessionalism or inability to provide quality call center services will not just jeopardize their chances of bagging projects. It would also throw a shadow of doubt over call centre units functioning in these countries.

That is like too much on stake for these business outsourcing players. Come to think of it, the pressure can also make them crumble. Experts of business process outsourcing advise them to just do their job without the pressure to perform. It remains to be seen if they can keep the national flag flying high.

Tussle over BPO Calls Persist

2010-07-02T04:22:00.000-07:00

The tussle between the ruling government and the BPO units continue! Yes, the two warring parties are still locked in a struggle over the do-not-call list. The list, as many of you are aware, forbids outbound call center agents from making lead generation calls. The ones who sign up for this list have to be struck off the telemarketing list because if you call them, you are actually violating telecommunication rules.

However, because many of the call centre units are based outside the country and does not fall under the jurisdiction of the state, the law continues to be violated. Cumbersome judicial procedures stop many of these irritated targets from going to court. Several public litigations filed against many call center services have again brought up this issue for debate.

The authorities this time have a different approach to seal off pesky lead generation calls. They are planning to order a blanket ban for outbound call center on all phone numbers. Only those who sign up for a list will receive telemarketing calls and text messages. It will be a do-call list that call center agents have to abide by. They can make calls to only numbers that are on the list.

The do-not-call list did not work for the phone answering service regulators because people were not aware about how to sign up or if there is such a facility at all. Only time will tell how BPO companies combat with such a stringent regulatory method.

Telemarketing Swindle through Chimneys!

2010-07-01T04:46:00.000-07:00

If you are living in Southern Maine, you’d be careful about telemarketing agents offering to clean up your chimney! The call center agent is more likely to be working for a scam company. Can’t say about your chimney, but the job will definitely clean you off your purse! So here’s how it goes. The outbound call center agent calls you with an offer to clean your chimney for $50. You jump at the offer because you don’t really get a chimney job done at anything so less. You agree.

The fraudulent telemarketing agent sends over mechanics to do the task. Then they suggest you need a new chimney liner. It’s obvious that you are more likely to agree to the call center guy because you have a chimney but don’t really know everything about it. You give them the green signal. The work gets done and you bless your stars thinking that the outbound call center call just saved you a huge expense. That’s a delusion that lasts till you get the bill. Yes, the figure reads $2,400!

Beware of Lysco Contracting! That’s the name of the company that is asking the telemarketing callers to make those calls. They claim that because they conduct numerous chimney cleaning jobs in the same area, they can justify the paltry cost that they are charging. The law at Maine says that for any contractual job, the customer and the company have a 3-day gap to back out. Lysco dismisses it saying the law doesn’t hold for emergency cases!

Long Term Ties Work Well in BPO

2010-06-30T03:19:00.000-07:00

Long term tie-ups with BPO outfits work well for business firms. There are a flood of reasons why. For starters, the call center firm that you work with for long will know your way of doing things. There will be very little to explain. With each project, the coordination will get better. Employees of both organizations will understand the strengths and weakness of each other. That will enable the answering service agents support your business and vice versa in a more organized way. Then, you wouldn’t have to be worried about your brand image because the call center services will perfectly understand the value of your brand. They will not do something that is not within the purview of your business ethics.

Coming to more professional matters, long term business ties means the BPO firm would take extra care of your work. No call center would like to lose out on assured clients. If they see a sizeable volume of answering service projects coming from your end, they will not hesitate to go all out for your projects. You can negotiate better about deadlines and price tags. Working with long-distance business partners would also mean an atmosphere where you can make suggestions without being pulled up for it. The mode is more relaxed, though not complacent. At the end of the day, the call center firms do realize that this is a fiercely competitive world!

New Career Paths for BPO Employees

2010-06-29T04:15:00.000-07:00

The job market in the developing countries like India was different before the coming of BPO. Most employees were content in the job that they were doing. There was hardly any talk of changing jobs for most middle-class employees. That has undergone a sea-change with call center units.

Suddenly this was an industry where there was always some more to be covered and some more glory to be achieved. The hierarchy in business process outsourcing is anything but flat. There is a lot of opportunity for the career-oriented to go ahead and do something spectacular for themselves and their career.

Thanks to the improvements that they can see in the BPO sector, the young guns are stepping up as well. They see not just a career in the call center company that they are joining up with. They also see that the call center services training that they get here will hold them in good stead when the move to other business outsourcing units in the future.

Nothing that you pick up in the answering service industry goes to vain. Your knowledge will be tapped at some point, in the company you are working at present or in a future one. So if you are a new entrant to this world, pull up your socks and learn!

Police Looking at BPO for Support!

2010-06-28T23:54:00.000-07:00

The police department of San Carlos is looking at the BPO industry for support! No, don’t jump to erroneous conclusions; they are not really looking for help with their investigations! The answering service of the police department is failing to deal with the call volume. The inbound call center agents are needed to bring their skill, expertise and equipment to the table. Because of the deluge of calls that the police departments receive from distressed citizens, several police units are hunting for call center units to take those calls and get them processed promptly.

Untrained answering service agents have led to serious disasters in the recent past. Several deaths happened because the 911 call center couldn’t respond in time. The loss of lives is a bad price to pay for the absence of a proper inbound call center team. No wonder San Carlos is ready to outsource its phone lines to a business process outsourcing firm. The costs cuts are another advantage. Outsourcing the phone lines to call center services will save them $2m a year! That was what they were paying extra to have in-house staff take calls and mess them up at the same time! Surely this deal is what they needed to strike way back!

BP Needs Call Center Monitoring

2010-06-17T05:00:00.000-07:00

Did you read out post on how a call center agent alleged foul play against BP? The agent, identifying herself as Janice, said that the answering service system at BP was a “diversion”. In the light of that statement, industry experts are trying to figure out how a top-brass firm like BP did not have a call monitoring system in place. That is probably the basic quality check that you can have in any call center services outfit. The interaction of the customers and the agents has to be monitored not just for security reasons, but also to measure the performance of the agent. These voice clips can also be used for training purposes.

With BP faltering to keep expectations at more serious levels, the call center flaw is probably being looked at more gravely on a ripple effect. You can say that suddenly people are on an overdrive to find fault with everything to do with BP! But the truth is that the answering service agent’s allegations are something of importance. She also alleged that inbound call center agents keyed in “blah blah blah” when they should type in customer information. BP has commented that they could find only one such entry when the caller had been an incomprehensible drunkard!