A great telemarketing company is hard to find, but the right one can positively impact your sales revenue and lead generation efforts. You’ll need to be completely confident that they will represent your company in a professional manner, so it’s therefore important that you take the time to set your goals and meet with several companies before making a decision.

Here are some things to consider that will help you to identify the right telemarketing company for your business:

Assess your Requirements

An understanding of your marketing objectives and campaign requirements are crucial before you begin the selection process. You should consider BANT qualification. The usual definition of BANT is:

Budget

– do they have an approved budget?

Authority

– have you spoken to the right person with authority to make a decision?

Need

– do they have a need for you product or service?

Timescale

– what’s their timescale?

This kind of qualification is important to manage both expectations for your sales team and help you decide whether it’s the quantity or quality of leads you’re looking for.

Preparing a detailed brief will not only help you get the most benefit from the campaign, but it will also help the telemarketing company pitch relevant credentials that are specific to your requirements.

Budget & Fees

As far as budget is concerned, the old adage of “you get what you pay for” certainly stands true as far as telemarketing goes. A success/commission-based structure usually brings a high volume of leads, whereas a fixed fee basis will usually identify more targeted and quality leads.

A fixed fee structure allows you to accurately budget for your campaign, whereas a success/commission basis can make the process harder to control and budget forecasting sometimes impossible. Regardless of the fee structure, just make sure that it’s easy to calculate the return on investment from your campaign.

Reports & Communication

Once you’ve determined how much you can reasonably expect to pay, you then need to discuss methods of reporting. You should expect to be kept up-to-date throughout the key stages of the campaign, but you will also need a formal reporting process that tracks both the number of calls made and the response rate. Feedback should be both quantitative and qualitative to help give you a full insight of how the campaign has been received – and this often requires more than just a spreadsheet.

Chemistry

Effective telemarketing is a result of a trusted relationship between the telemarketing company and the client, and the best way to evaluate this is through face-to-face meetings. Arrange to meet them at your premises to help them get a good understanding of the culture of your organisation. It’s equally important to check out the environment from which they will be working. Expect to see a positive and productive environment, where telemarketers look engaged and there is good interaction and communication.

Sector Expertise / Track Record

Sector expertise is essential to the success of a targeted telemarketing campaign and can provide reassurance if you know that they have dealt with other clients within your industry. Many telemarketing companies focus on particular industries, such as technology, education or healthcare, for example, which can result in a smoother launch of your campaign.

Ask the telemarketing company for recent case studies or testimonials, but be mindful that client confidentiality may prevent the telemarketing company from disclosing the name of the client and the specifics of the campaign.

Type of company

Telemarketing companies can vary greatly in size and structure. Some are more geared towards large numbers of outbound call handling, whilst others are a far cry from the standard call-centre set up and offer a personal, tailored service. The fact is, if you are a small business you probably won’t need the mighty force of a large call centre to fulfill your needs effectively.

Telemarketing team

You’ll need to be satisfied that the team handling your account has the relevant skill set, experience and even linguistic requirements to talk about your product or service confidently over the telephone. Ask to see the biographies of those telemarketers who will be assigned to your account to see whether they have the relevant expertise and experience. Will you meet and retain the same telemarketers throughout your campaign?

To sum up, a good telemarketing company is a vital part of any company’s sales process. Choosing the right one can mean the difference between success and failure of your marketing and lead generation efforts. Meet with several companies before choosing which one suits the personality of your business and the goals of your campaign.

Lingo Telemarketing

 has over 20 years experience in B2B telemarketing.  They create tailored telemarketing campaigns for companies of any size, in the UK and internationally, to help generate high quality leads for your business.

Contact us

to find out more.