Latest telemarketing news from B2B Contact Marketing

DMA North elections

Posted on February 22, 2012 by Myles

We’re excited to announce that B2B CM Managing Director Stella Jones is standing for election to DMA North in the current DMA elections.

The role of DMA North is to maximise the use of direct marketing and establish itself as an authoritative source of information and comment on the use and benefits of direct marketing in the region.

Talking about her nomination Stella said,

“DMA North does fantastic work keeping businesses informed of the benefits of direct marketing, and establishing best practice as a goal we should all aim for.

“I understand the challenges businesses face and the impact direct marketing can make on their performance. As part of DMA North I would be committed to promoting best practice across the region and encouraging businesses to integrate direct marketing into their sales strategy.”

Yes we can

If you’re a DMA member and would like to vote for Stella then please visit the DMA elections site. If you’ve not registered for the DMA website previously then you can do so from the elections website.

Posted in Associations, Blog, News, Team | Tagged DMA | Leave a comment

Customer Evolution

Posted on February 21, 2012 by Myles

Turn old customers into new growth.

For any business, an existing customer should be an asset in your growth plans. Customer Evolution provides a 360-view of your current customer base, helping you develop your strategy and achieve more…

Ensure customer records are accurate.
Understand customer needs.
Establish future purchasing intentions.
Encourage customer loyalty.
Target new prospects based on existing customers.

B2B Customer Management helps you understand your customers in more detail. We uncover the hidden information your customer database holds and create a valuable stream of new business from dormant accounts that you have long since forgotten about.

To generate new sales from existing customers call 01244 521 557 or fill out an enquiry form.

Posted in Customer loyalty, Customer survey, Customer validation, Improve customer loyalty, Mystery shopping, Understand customers | Comments Off

If it walks like a duck

Posted on February 14, 2012 by Myles

When we’re talking to prospective customers, one of the first things we do is ask them if they currently do any telemarketing. Some respond to this question with a clear negative. They don’t use telemarketing, and, in some cases go further to say they would never consider it.

Being good telemarketers we don’t leave the conversation there. Instead we question more to find out if:

Field sales teams ever ring customers to book appointments?
Prospects and customers are phoned to confirm contact details prior to sending an email / something in the post?
There’s a phone number for existing customer to ring when they want to buy more?
Anyone contacts existing customers to see if they need any help?

The answer to at least one of these questions is generally ‘yes’. And if you answer yes then it means you do telemarketing without realising it.

A rose by any other name.

Let’s be honest, in some quarters there is a stigma attached to ‘telemarketing’. Despite its transparent ROI, and ability to connect businesses and customers together in a way no other platform can, telemarketing suffers from being the ‘poor relation’ to other marketing platforms. That’s why some companies do the same activities which we call telemarketing without ever using the name.

If you engage with customers using a telephone, you are telemarketing. If you call people to start off a sales conversation, you are telemarketing. If you make sure you have the right contact details for someone by asking them, you are telemarketing.

It doesn’t matter if you don’t use the word telemarketing. It doesn’t matter if your business mistakenly thinks telemarketing is ineffective. Telemarketing activity works, and the fact so many companies use it, but choose a different name, doesn’t change that.

Of course, if a business is conducting telemarketing under another name there’s a good chance they are not doing it as well as they could. That’s where B2B CM can provide the support you need to take your current telephone activity and build a fully productive telemarketing campaign.

Find out more by calling 01244 521 557.

Posted in Appointment making, Blog, Cold calling, Cold calling, Data, Data audit, Data cleanse, Filling sales pipeline, Lead generation, List building, Looking for new customers, Outsourcing, Telemarketing, Telemarketing Services, Understand customers | Tagged Appointment making, appointment setting, B2B, best practice, integrated marketing, telemarketing | Comments Off

Ready to outsource?

Posted on February 9, 2012 by Myles

The benefits of outsourcing are clear. You save time, money and complement existing skills, bringing serious, measurable ROI and delivering your business objectives on target and on budget.

We’re ready, are you?

Choosing the right sales outsource partner is important. The relationship you build together will have a lasting impact on your businesses success and you need to make sure they:

Understand your company ethos — Your business has a unique set of values with drive the business forward. An outsource agency needs to tacitly understand what makes you tick.
Converse intelligently and passionately about your products and services — An outsource telemarketer needs to know your products inside out and ‘live the brand’ if they are to maximise sales results.
Integrate seamlessly with existing systems and teams — Information passed between outsourcer and your internal operations needs to be in the right format for your own CMS platform and the people at both organisations need to work together to achieve the best results.
Represent your brand values — Your brand has been carefully cultivated to create your niche in the market. Your outsource partner needs to reflect your brand correctly.

B2B Customer Management provide sales outsourcing for clients of all sizes. We know we can help you achieve your goals within the timescale you need to achieve company growth.

To find out more call 01244 521 557 or use our contact form.

Posted in Appointment making, Blog, Cold calling, Lead generation, Outsourcing, Telemarketing | Tagged Appointment making, appointment setting, lead generation, outsource | Leave a comment

Cold calling

Posted on February 7, 2012 by Myles

Growing your business means attracting new customers. Attracting new customers means keeping your sales team busy fulfilling appointments. Keeping their diaries full doesn’t mean spending valuable time creating their own appointments through cold calls.

Reaching out to a database of prospects takes time, it involves building a swift rapport with gate-keepers and decision makers, and can mean multiple conversations before an appointment is finally made.

In short, cold calling, for making appointments, is a specialised skill, and your businesses needs to decide if your internal sales teams are best employed making cold calls or fulfilling appointments.

More customers, more sales, more of the time

Outsourcing has many advantages over in-house cold calling.

Free up internal resource — You want your sales team to be as productive as possible, that means having them focus on their core skill of closing sales, not spending time filling their diaries.
Improve conversion rates — We’re cold calling experts. We know how to take a prospect, assess its suitability and turn it into a sales appointment.
Fill a skills gap — Cold calling requires specific skills. If your business lacks those skills outsourcing to B2B CM improves your performance without the need to bring on new staff.

Using our telemarketing skills to outsource your appointment making means boosting sales and improving your ROI, delivering better business performance.

If you’re ready to find out more about how we can keep your salespeople’s diaries busy and generate full sales pipelines then call +44 (0) 1244 521 557 or fill out the enquiry form below.

Posted in Appointment making, Call centre, Cold calling, Cold calling, Looking for new customers, Telemarketing | Tagged Appointment making, appointment setting, B2B, cold call, integrated marketing, lead generation, telemarketing | Leave a comment

DMA concerns over EU Data Protection Regulation

Posted on February 7, 2012 by Myles

The DMA (of which B2B CM is a member) has published its views on the proposed EU Data Protection Regulation. In short, they have concerns over the scope of the regulations and their impact on the direct marketing industy.

If the Regulation were to come into force tomorrow, then it would have costly ramifications for companies involved with direct marketing, and in turn detrimental consequences for the UK economy. The DMA believes the data privacy rights of individuals need to be protected, but this should not be at the expense of business.

You can read more on the DMA’s website.

Posted in Blog, Direct Mail | Tagged direct mail, DMA | Leave a comment

How do you deal with a sales objection?

Posted on February 6, 2012 by Oliver_Gibson

The script sounds so easy.

“Mr Customer, how would you like to buy this wonderful product of ours?”

Customer offers some objection.

Deal with objection.

Close.

The reality is somewhat different as many salespeople find that lots of rejections in a day tends to lead to a somewhat defeatist approach to objection handling.

Don’t worry, there are a few techniques to deal with objections.

Firstly, listen to the customer. Are they saying, “I don’t want to buy this product”, or are they saying “I don’t want to buy this product yet?”

Many objections are the result of limited information. If the customer doesn’t have enough information to make an informed buying decision, they will not make a buying decision!

So, ASK the customer why they won’t buy.

“Please Mr Customer, why don’t you want to buy my product?”

“Is it Me, My Product, or the Price?”

When you get an answer, you then need to check if it really is the truth – customers really hate to make salespeople feel bad!

“In an ideal world, where the price was not relevant, what would be your opinion of our product?”

The answer is very likely to be quite close to the truth.

Now you need to deal with that issue.

Use the FEEL, FELT, FOUND technique.

“I understand why you might FEEL like that about our product
Many of our best customers FELT the same when they first discovered our product
However, they FOUND that due benefit 1, 2 & 3, our product was the best choice for them.”
“Would there be any other reason why you wouldn’t want to buy our product today?”

And repeat.

Objection handling isn’t a one shot deal, it’s more like a game of tennis.

Offer.

Objection.

Objection Handled.

Revised Offer.

Objection.

Objection Handled

Revised Offer

Objection

Objection Handled.

Revised Offer.

Offer accepted.

Sale Closed.

On the other hand, you could talk to B2B CM about getting our expert telemarketers do the work for you.

Posted in Appointment making, Blog, Cold calling, Lead generation, List building, Looking for new customers, Telemarketing | Tagged Appointment making, appointment setting, best practice, cold call, telemarketing | Leave a comment

Sales outsourcing

Posted on February 2, 2012 by Myles

Sales and business development are core functions for the success of any businesses and it’s important your company achieves its objectives in both areas if it is to grow.

But what if your business doesn’t have the in-house skills and experience to achieve sales success? What if you don’t have the time to recruit new staff and train them? What then?

Outsource and outperform.

Outsourcing your sales functions to B2B CM brings many benefits:

Expertise — We know sales inside out, and use our expertise to build sales strategies that achieve your business goals.
No recruitment and training hassles — We already have a highly-skilled telemarketing team, and when we bring on-board new members you automatically benefit.
No sickness and holiday cover — Team management is our concern, not yours.
Sales infrastructure — We’ve invested heavily in call centre technology. Delivering an infrastructure that maximises sales response.
Flexibility — Need to boost your sales activity? We can quickly provide more telemarketers. Want to reduce your activity? We’re like an infinite resource that can be turned on and off as needed.

Outsourcing your sales and business development functions to B2B CM means you’ll benefit from our experience and resources, leaving you more time to concentrate on other areas of your business.

To find out more call 01244 521 557 or use our contact form.

Posted in Appointment making, Cold calling, Telemarketing | Tagged Appointment making, appointment setting, cold call, outsource, sales, telemarketing | Comments Off