Mobile Text Can Breathe New Life into a Telemarketing Approach

Adding mobile techniques to telemarketing calls can revive a telemarketing campaign. While there are still regulations to followed, companies can breathe new life into telemarketing exploits by reaching out to the ever-growing number of mobile phone users and employing up-to-the-minute tactics.

Its easy for telemarketing practitioners to feel as though they are defending a rapidly shrinking territory. Traditional landlines are disappearing; do-not-call lists further shrink the field of targets; and a barrage of new regulations has made telemarketing feel a little like playing dodgeball. Still, there is good news on the telemarketing landscape, in the form of text messaging and other mobile phone techniques.

Naturally, this involves rethinking the definition of a telemarketing call, but that rethinking would be timely. The nature of telecommunications is changing rapidly, and telemarketers need to change along with it. The classic business school example involves the railroad industry. At the beginning of the 20th century, the railroads dominated transportation. However, by the second half of the century, they had been reduced to a lesser role, behind automobiles and airlines. The takeaway is that, had the railroad companies thought of their role more broadly--had they perceived themselves as being in the transportation business, rather than narrowly in the railroad business--they might have captured some of those new markets rather than being victimized by them.

So, it is important to define telemarketing as more than just the traditional telemarketing call, but as any form of marketing outreach using telecommunication devices. More and more today, telecommunications means text messaging.

Advantages of Adding Text to a Telemarketing Approach

The following are some of the reasons why adding text and other mobile approaches can revive a telemarketing campaign.

• Growth vs. decline. Everyone knows sales is a numbers game, so the choice is clear--settle for declining numbers by sticking with landlines, or reach a growing market by going mobile.
• No such thing as a bad time. One of the traditional difficulties with telemarketing calls is trying to reach people at the right time--catching them when they are home and willing to take a sales call. Mobile phones increase peoples availability tremendously, and because text can be stored and viewed at the recipients convenience, theres no such thing as a bad time to send a text.
• Immediate response capability. With more and more mobile phones being Web-enabled, reaching them on these devices carries the possibility of immediate action.
• The call is a coupon. Texts can be used as coupons, giving marketers a two-for-one approach which combines an immediate contact with a reason for follow-through.
• The potential of proximity. Few things help sales as much as catching people at the right time and the right place. Proximity marketing can alert people to products and specials when they are in a good position to act on the information. Bluetooth and GPS technologies are rapidly increasing the ability of marketers to tailor the contact to the recipients location.

The Value of Professional Telemarketing Services

The transition from traditional telemarketing calls to text underscores the value of outsourcing telemarketing services. Professional telemarketing companies are not only on top of the broader trend, but they have the technologies and techniques to make the most of the still-emerging field of text and mobile marketing. The bottom line is, the telemarketing bar has been raised. Telemarketing companies that are not prepared to meet that challenge will get left behind.

Source

Direct Marketing News