Monday, December 1, 2014

Small Talk and Telemarketing: Do They Go Together?

Only a few call center agents can incorporate small talk in their conversations with customers. Some agents survive without it because they never really do it even in their personal life. Others have tried and failed to sound natural. In the worst cases, agents receive hostile retaliations to their attempts at small talk, especially when it’s a telemarketing cold call.

Monday, November 24, 2014

The Art of Qualifying Leads

If your sales team is having a difficult time closing a sale lately, one of the reasons may be that you are using an outdated database of lead information. In this case, your business would benefit from enlisting lead generation services to qualify your leads. Below are insightful reminders for this process:

The lead-in question is the most important one.

Prevent the lead generation call from getting off the wrong foot. Do this by giving your lead-in question careful thought. The trick here is to avoid asking questions that are answerable by yes or no, like “Are you satisfied with your internet service?” If the person on the phone answers yes, you’ve lost a lead.

Monday, November 17, 2014

Benefits of Hiring a Call Center Service

Companies in the retail industry often see their business pick up when the holiday season rolls around. At times, some are not equipped with the appropriate number of employees to handle the calls and process requests. For them, enlisting the services of a call center can be the ideal solution. Here is a brief look at the advantages of hiring a call center:

Monday, November 3, 2014

Telemarketing Service Provider on why this “Old-School” Method Works


In a perfect world, having a great product or excellent service is enough to draw customers to your business. In reality, though, you have to earn every client that walks into your store or places an online order. Of course, marketing is a key part of building your client base. While there are many ways to promote your business, TeleDirect, a telemarketing service provider, says that the “old-school” method of manually phoning prospects is still one of the most effective. It cites three reasons why.
http://teledirectblog.wordpress.com/2014/09/20/telemarketing-service-provider-on-why-this-old-school-method-works/

Saturday, November 1, 2014

Lead Generation Services Provider on Converting Leads to Customers


Here’s a fact that all businesspeople know: Even the most loyal customers were once mere prospects. As such, finding your next VIP client is vital to ensuring continuous sales. Of course, prospecting for leads is hard enough as it is, but what comes next is an even bigger challenge—turning a prospect into a customer. TeleDirect, which provides lead generation services to enterprises, gives a few useful tips to help you succeed in this endeavor.
http://teledirectblog.wordpress.com/2014/09/18/lead-generation-services-provider-on-converting-leads-to-customers/

Monday, October 27, 2014

Call Center Outsourcing Could Solve Issues on Poor Customer Service


According to statistics, it costs seven times as much to land a new customer as it does to retain an existing one, so it really pays to keep your client base happy. What exactly causes bad customer services? TeleDirect, a leading call center outsourcing firm, says the following are the top culprits. In many cases, companies prioritize improving their product features and relegate customer service to the backburner. As a market matures, though, competing products start to share same features, and customer service becomes a more prominent factor in determining which company a client does business with.
http://teledirectblog.wordpress.com/2014/09/17/call-center-outsourcing-could-solve-issues-on-poor-customer-service/

Tuesday, October 7, 2014

Telemarketing Tip: Profile Your Prospects

For a telemarketing strategy to be truly effective, you must have a well-planned prospecting program. Through this, you can identify potential customers and build a list of contacts who will be receiving your telemarketing calls. The program initially collects basic information and subsequently gathers more specific data on the prospects.

In line with that, here are some important aspects to know about prospects:

Thursday, October 2, 2014

What a Call Center Means for Your Business

What are the services that call centers offer, you may ask? Well, based on the name alone, you can conclude that the services they offer revolve around making and receiving phone calls. As such, their most common services include telemarketing, customer assistance, order processing, and answering service. Call centers may also offer lead generation services if need be.

Tuesday, September 30, 2014

What You Need to Know about Call Center Tech

One of the biggest reasons why you’re better off working with a call center firm rather than setting up your own customer service department is because such a provider already has the infrastructure and technologies in place that can be customized according to your requirements.

One such technology that call centers use all so well is the Automatic Call Distribution (ACD), which essentially controls the flow of incoming calls and makes the work of call center agents that much simpler. Without this system, you’ll have a hard time routing every call that comes your way to the appropriate department or office that can answer them.

Friday, August 29, 2014

Telemarketing: It Should Never Be a Waiting Game

In general, society may hold negative notions about telemarketing, but the practice wouldn't be still alive today if it weren’t effective. The question is: "How can it be effective?" Is there a right time to call those leads?
You Shouldn't Wait
Do it as soon as possible because your business competition may get to your leads ahead of you. Time, as with anything, can affect the results of your telemarketing strategies. If, for instance, your competitor has sealed the deal with a prospect already, the potential customer might have made up his or her mind and made a purchase. No matter how good your sales pitch is, it won’t matter if you call too late.
Your Customers Shouldn’t, Either
Researching, collecting leads, and prospecting are all important, but they have to be done quickly and efficiently. Once you know that an individual has expressed that they need your products, you have to reach out to them directly. Aside from acting fast, you have to engage them in conversation, assess their needs, or make them realize the issues that you can provide solutions to.
How Can You Avoid the Waiting Game?
Maximizing the telemarketing service of a reputable call center, you can contact your leads promptly and proficiently through professional representatives. You won’t need to waste time or money on training staff yourself because telemarketing specialists would already be at your disposal. In effect, the only wait you have to do is for your enhanced revenue.

Friday, August 22, 2014

How a Call Center for Leads Can Help Your Business

When it comes to lead generation, it’s important that business owners exhaust every possible option to find potential customers, from emails to phone calls. Rather than shoulder the work on their own, though, they might want to hire a renowned call center for leads to help them out. This is only practical because call centers have the skills, equipment, and manpower to consolidate other businesses’ lead generation efforts.
More importantly, a call center can employ more effective methods used in gathering leads, namely surveys and telemarketing.
To put it succinctly, telemarketing involves making numerous outgoing calls to random people and asking them if they’re interested in a particular product or service. Although this method has a wide reach, it is also intrusive in nature and many people can find it annoying. It is for this reason that the U.S. and Canada have "Do Not Call" registries so that people can choose to receive “sales calls” or not.
Surveys, on the other hand, are more acceptable because they’re generally sent out to a selected demographic (i.e. the business’s customer base) rather than shot in the dark. While they have a limited scope, surveys net important information, like the customers’ buying habits, which business owners can use to their advantage and improve their products or services.

Friday, August 15, 2014

Actually, Every Business Should Have a Call Center

Businesses thrive with the help of good customer service. Rather than train their own staff, it makes more sense for some companies to simply outsource their customer service to a reputable call center agency. Call centers are more likely to be better equipped and experienced in the job. That said, call centers do more than just receive calls and answer questions from other people.
They can also act as a help desk which provides customers, in real time no less, with extensive technical support on how to solve issues with a particular product. This service is particularly useful for businesses that manufacture electronic equipment, appliances, crafting tools, and the like because these products need detailed solutions to solve any problem they may encounter.
Call centers also facilitate sales and process forms over the phone. Although these transactions are done online these days, banks and credit companies still insist their customers to give them a call so that user information can be validated and any issues can be straightened out before the transaction is finalized.
Last but not the least, call centers can also complement a business’s marketing efforts through their telemarketing services. This is when a call center agency uses various means to find potential customers for their clients and, hopefully, turn them into long-term clients, like customer surveys or outgoing calls.

Tuesday, August 5, 2014

State-of-the-Art Call Center Services: Money Well Spent, All the Time


These days, companies don’t necessarily have to set up infrastructure and train customer service staff from scratch to handle customer queries. A lot of businesses now choose to work with an established call center agency like TeleDirect Call Centers. It’s all about practicality; after all, utilizing experienced call center agents costs less time and money than hiring and training new ones. Reputable call centers hire customer service agents based not only on technical and problem-solving abilities but also aptitude for the job. Qualities like politeness, levelheadedness, empathy, and patience are valued. These competencies, along with working knowledge of communication and networking technologies, enable call center agents to represent the client well and create a good first impression among customers. In addition to receiving calls, call center representatives can also spearhead a company’s marketing campaign by carrying out telemarketing and lead generation activities.
http://teledirectblog.wordpress.com/2014/07/18/state-of-the-art-call-center-services-money-well-spent-all-the-time/

Wednesday, July 30, 2014

Unlike Gifts, Reliable Lead Generation Services Gain More Customers


Some companies go to great lengths to attract new customers. According to the Boston Globe, a number of banks in East Boston are resorting to an old trick to entice people into doing business with them, which is to give out freebies like free cleaning services, grocery items, and even money. One bank even plans to stage a ‘Wheel of Fortune’ contest to give potential customers a chance of winning a $150 discount on their shopping bill, in exchange for opening a checking account! While it remains to be seen just how successful these projects end eventually turn out, they also highlight the need for companies to reach out to their target customers. Although most banks have the resources to host such events, the same thing can’t be said of other businesses. Fortunately, companies can attract new customers through other sustainable means—such as effective lead generation services from a reputable provider like TeleDirect Call Centers.
http://teledirectblog.wordpress.com/2014/07/29/unlike-gifts-reliable-lead-generation-services-gain-more-customers/

Wednesday, July 16, 2014

A Look into the Benefits of a Telemarketing Call Center to Businesses

Telemarketing procedures should be well-documented. Otherwise, there is no justification for business owners to place sanctions on erring employees who deviate from the call script and such. In call centers, not only are the processes firmly established, but they also have a quality department that monitors all calls for seamless operations.

Nothing beats good ol’ phone marketing in ensuring direct interaction with potential customers – if you do it the right way. To gain optimum results, however, it’s best for businesses to outsource their telemarketing needs to an established outbound call center like TeleDirect. The company has been serving the business industry since 1961, making it an ideal outsourcing partner.

http://teledirectblog.wordpress.com/2014/07/02/a-look-into-the-benefits-of-a-telemarketing-call-center-to-businesses/

Monday, July 14, 2014

Advanced Lead Generation Services: Simple Tips for Successful Cold Calls

Cold calls will always be a numbers game. If you know you get two positive responses for every 10 calls, you should make it a point to make 10 calls every day each work week. This way, you can get 10 positive responses. However, you shouldn’t give up on the other 40 people. Try again after a few weeks. Who knows, maybe the next time you call them, they’re looking for exactly what you’re offering.

Unfortunately, you may not have the time (or the patience) to regularly call people day in and day out. In such cases, you may want to work with a trusted lead generation call center like TeleDirect. Doing so allows your business to benefit from hundreds of cold calls every day, and frees you up to do what you do best: running your business.

http://teledirectblog.wordpress.com/2014/07/01/advanced-lead-generation-services-simple-tips-for-successful-cold-calls/

Saturday, July 12, 2014

Call Center Services: How Customer Experience Affects Business Revenue

When a customer calls to give negative feedback, even that potential crisis could be a source of additional income. Contact center agents with sufficient training use prompt resolutions and marketing strategies to turn your “upsets” into “upsells.” The professionals do this by personally communicating with the customer, showing that your business values them, and offering reasonable solutions to their complaints.

Like any other investment, it would be advisable to sign up for services from experienced companies. Established call centers like TeleDirect have ample backgrounds and staff to proficiently handle the customer service infrastructure of your business. Equipped with experience, skills, and technology, the contact center takes proper care of your customers and aids in increasing your revenue.

http://teledirectblog.wordpress.com/2014/06/30/call-center-services-how-customer-experience-affects-business-revenue/

Tuesday, July 1, 2014

Flexible Answers to Tough Customer Queries

Scripts are the easiest way to get customer service agents to say what you want, and how you want it. However, as many experts in the industry will tell you, heavily scripted calls ring the death knell for great service. That is to say, customer service should be an interactive dialogue and not a one-sided, lifeless conversation.

When dealing with customers, tough scenarios are a dime a dozen. Consequently, support staff can certainly benefit from some forward-thinking strategies. In this regard, flexible responses—not scripted ones—can prove very useful. Here are two tried-and-tested responses to challenging customer questions that your agents can apply and tweak as they see fit when providing customer service.

When staff doesn’t know the answer

Good support reps know that answering “I don’t know” is no way to deal with a difficult query. Rather, they assure customers that they’ll do whatever needs to be done to provide the right answers and solutions.

When a product isn’t available

Positive language is one of the most important skills a customer rep should have. Instead of saying that an item is unavailable, your reps should inform customers when it will become available. Positive language does away with negative words like ‘not’ and ‘can’t’ and instead places emphasis on solutions, which is all customers really care about.

Friday, June 27, 2014

Telemarketing Service: Helping Businesses Have a Feel of their Market

Surveys aren’t just a medium for customers to share their thoughts and opinions. They are also a way for businesses to gain better understanding of the market they cater to, especially in relation to demographics like age, gender, and income. Companies can also use surveys to identify their shortcomings like “unfair prices”; finance experts believe unfair pricing could lose customer loyalty.

A reliable telemarketing service can use surveys as a way to conduct telesales, or to mention advertisements and promotions over the phone. With the information gathered in customer surveys, telemarketers can have a clearer picture of their client’s target market.

http://teledirectcenter.wordpress.com/2014/06/13/telemarketing-service-helping-businesses-have-a-feel-of-their-market/

Wednesday, June 25, 2014

Why You Need a Call Center for Leads Management

These days, a lot of companies outsource their telesales and customer service functions to call centers where trained agents handle orders, queries, and other consumer responses to ads or calls to action. Calls in the queue may be from customers and leads or prospects who express their interest for the products or services offered by the client.


Unfortunately, some companies make the mistake of focusing solely on “hot leads” or those who call in to actually purchase a product or hire the company’s services. While it makes sense to prioritize the talk time allotment for hot leads in a bid to maximize sales and ROI, a large number of sales opportunities from “cold leads” may be wasted.


Cold leads, after all, can also be prospects or those that fit the company’s target market. However, these people may not be ready to buy or be converted into customers at the time of the call. This does not necessarily mean they cannot count toward conversions at a later time, e.g. when they reach a certain age, when they achieve financial stability, etc.


Call centers can be counted upon to nurture these leads. For instance, agents can keep in touch and follow up with the prospects until they are ready to be qualified as “dead leads.” Qualify leads, nurture them, and take better care of your paying and prospective customers by outsourcing these tasks to a reputable call center.

Rely on Lead Generation Services to Help Increase Your Bottom Line

In other words, Ash believes that businesses need to build positive relationships with their customers first before they can even implement a successful lead generation system. Many companies tend to forget this and simply gather as many leads as possible, not understanding that leads from less-invested customers are worthless, no matter how many they are.

One way to build a positive relationship is for companies to respond quickly to customer inquiries, which could already be considered as leads themselves. Aside from providing reliable lead generation services, TeleDirect and other call centers also provide reliable answering services to respond to inquiries in a speedy and efficient manner, ultimately helping companies increase their bottom line.

http://teledirectcenter.wordpress.com/2014/06/12/rely-on-lead-generation-services-to-help-increase-your-bottom-line/

Monday, June 23, 2014

Call Center Service: Proper Phone Etiquette in Customer Communication

Phone etiquette is especially important if your business needs to do several outgoing calls, particularly telemarketing. Telemarketing is an outgoing-call service offered by major call centers, which allows you to generate sales, to test the waters for potential customers, or to reach out to your current customers and ask for their insights and opinions.

When it comes to telemarketing, your own customer service team may not realize the importance of adopting a proper speaking tone and volume. Opening a conversation with a jovial, loud voice isn’t always well-received by most people so it is important for your representatives to start their calls as professionally as possible.

http://teledirectcenter.wordpress.com/2014/06/11/call-center-service-proper-phone-etiquette-in-customer-communication/

Wednesday, June 18, 2014

Call Center Services: a Boon to Your Business

Much like any human interaction, a successful phone conversation rests on making a good first impression. Consequently, your customers would rather talk to a professional who is polite, patient, and knows his stuff rather than to a novice who stumbles over every word. This, in a nutshell, illustrates the reason why your business needs to work with a reliable call center.

Answering phone calls has a much larger impact than you might think as it slows down productivity and disrupts employees’ tasks. You can dedicate some people to field incoming calls, but this will cost you a lot of time and resources, particularly in terms of equipment. Why hire and train a separate staff if you can outsource this function to a reputable call center that can provide the skilled manpower and sizable assets you need?

Customer service representatives, after all, do more than answer calls and respond to customers’ queries. They can also make outgoing calls that allow your marketing department to conduct surveys that gauge customer satisfaction. More importantly, working with a call center company gives the impression that you own a sizable and successful business. Who else can afford to have reliable and professional agents on their payroll than a company of some repute?

Wednesday, June 11, 2014

Nurture and Qualify Leads through Telemarketing

Any leads that you’ve acquired through online tools, direct mail, and trade events need to be processed before you turn them over to your field sales people. This where outsourced telemarketing services can prove useful. A telemarketing company can assign a dedicated team to your account that will function like an extension of your company by nurturing and qualifying leads.

A follow-up call from a seasoned telemarketer introduces the human factor early in the sales process, keeping leads hot until your sales people are ready to contact them. With the telemarketer’s help, you can identify your prospective clients’ readiness to buy, any issues that’s hindering them, and answer their questions. The info gathered by the telemarketer should equip your sales team with the confidence and knowledge that they are talking to prospects with a willingness to close.

Additional follow-up calls conducted by the telemarketing company you hire allows you to renew contact with prospects, remind them about new products and services, and even open up pricing opportunities, all of which provide the personalized attention other methods of communication cannot. Put simply, the telemarketing company does the jobs your salespeople don’t always have the time to do, which can be more productive for you in the long run.

Tuesday, June 10, 2014

Why an Outsourced Telemarketing Call Center is More Cost-Effective

An outsourced telemarketing team offers entrepreneurs many benefits. For starters, they no longer have to worry about staffing, which is an important consideration given that telemarketing has the highest employee turnover rate of any industry. When you delegate your outbound calls to a company like TeleDirect, you no longer have to spend money on advertising job openings and training personnel—they’ll take care of all staffing concerns so there will always be people on the job.

An outbound call centers provides tremendous savings to any business. This is because entrepreneurs no longer have to invest money on procuring, maintaining and updating telephone equipment.

With the time and money savings that outsourced telemarketing offers to companies, entrepreneurs can focus their efforts and resources on core business activities instead.

http://teledirectcenter.wordpress.com/2014/05/15/why-an-outsourced-telemarketing-call-center-is-more-cost-effective/

Sunday, June 8, 2014

Use Lead Generation Services to Achieve Your Lead Conversion Goals

Lead generation is definitely not a new marketing method. In fact, it’s been around for years. Virtually all industries have used it, and it has been employed successfully in direct marketing channels such as direct advertising, direct mail, and even on product launches. With more and more companies investing in lead generation, outspending your competition isn’t the ideal solution. The key is to learn to be resourceful with your investments so you can maximize your returns.

Working with trusted lead generation services can positively affect your lead-generation efforts, and ultimately your sales revenue. With their help, you can be completely confident that your company will be represented in a professional manner so you can achieve your lead generation goals.

http://teledirectcenter.wordpress.com/2014/05/14/use-lead-generation-services-to-achieve-your-lead-conversion-goals/

Friday, June 6, 2014

Insurance Industry Survey Proves the Value of a Reliable Call Center

Communication is a vital part of any business transaction, particularly in the insurance industry. A LifeHealthPro article published April 24, 2014 reports that most insurance claims professionals believe good communication is the main thing they need to attract and maintain a solid roster of clients.

While a lot of insurance professionals possess exceptional communication skills, some firms lack the necessary manpower and IT infrastructure to address every customer query or concern on a timely and satisfactory basis. To manage operating costs and improve the quality of customer service, a lot of these firms opt to work with an established call center service provider like TeleDirect.

http://teledirectcenter.wordpress.com/2014/05/13/insurance-industry-survey-proves-the-value-of-a-reliable-call-center/

Thursday, June 5, 2014

Why Small Businesses Need a Call Center for Leads

In the dog-eat-dog world of business, small competitors need all the help they can get to gain a foothold in their target market. Big corporations and business chains with widely recognized brands have the upper hand. Meanwhile, small businesses and startups must be creative when it comes to generating leads and reaching out to customers.

Those are the precise reasons why small businesses need a call center for leads. Instead of laying the task on in-house staff members, small business units can trust trained representatives to handle call requests. After customers’ contact details are collected through the business website, the leads should be nurtured by promptly addressing requests.

It should be noted that customers who submit requests online expect quick responses. Whether they want to set up an appointment, inquire about products or services, or ask for a call back to start processing their orders, these customers want to hear from the business at least within the promised time frame. Otherwise, leads will turn “cold” as potential customers look elsewhere and do business with competitors instead.


Fortunately, call centers these days use technology that allows them to track ecommerce leads similar to how live phone calls are received in conventional queues. This feature ensures maximum ROI and is able to keep up with customers’ short attention span. Through efficient processes and best practices in relation to engaging leads, call center representatives are able to increase conversion rates and achieve business growth goals.

Wednesday, June 4, 2014

A Local Call Center Can Provide Better and Relevant Customer Service

A lot of companies know and understand the definite advantage of outsourcing customer service to a reliable call center. Call centers allow businesses to allot time, finances, and human resources on more pressing matters while customer service representatives handle basic FAQs that come with their products and/or services.

There are many call centers worldwide who can offer quality customer service to companies that need to use the dollars and manpower on more important matters. However, there are some aspects that can affect a call center’s effectiveness.

http://teledirectcenter.wordpress.com/2014/01/13/a-local-call-center-can-provide-better-and-relevant-customer-service/

Monday, June 2, 2014

Outsourcing Call Center Services for Small Business Success

Small businesses are often faced with limited startup capital, and thus are forced into certain dilemmas over allocations. For many, outsourcing makes practical and affordable sense. Outsourcing can help a business save on additional investments of manpower, training, or even additional space. These savings can be used to offer additional service to their clients.

An efficient call center service from companies like TeleDirect Call Centers can give your small or medium business that necessary push to keep staying ahead of the game. This push often comes in the form of savings—both in time and money—that you can invest in more profitable areas for your business.

http://teledirectcenter.wordpress.com/2013/10/20/outsourcing-call-center-services-for-small-business-success/

Call Center Services: A Boon for Small Businesses

Customer service can make or break any company. It is said that 89 percent of consumers are likely to leave a company for one of its competitors as a result of poor customer service. In addition, nearly half of all consumers in the U.S. are likely to cancel an online transaction if their queries/concerns are not resolved in a timely manner.
So where does a call center service fit in all this? First, a call center is simply more experienced and better equipped to handle calls at a bigger volume. Customer touch points are not limited to calls and in fact include live chats, text messaging, and even social media.
Second, call centers employ more people dedicated to providing high-quality customer service. Without a call center to back them up, small businesses are likely to be overwhelmed by the number of calls and queries they receive regularly.

Third, call centers can be enlisted to generate leads, carry out surveys, send out SMS notifications, and more. With each call or transaction, call center representatives can reach out to customers and take note of their opinions, concerns, and insights. The feedback and information gathered should prove useful to any process improvement the client wishes to implement.

Thursday, May 29, 2014

Call Center Solutions: Better Customer Service, Better Profitability

Though price and quality of products and services are what primarily attracts customers, having them return and remain loyal to you after receiving a round of bad customer service might be an utter impossibility. You may think that the customer service you provide is the best that it can be, but you may be wrong in this regard.

Happy employees and happy customers can only mean one thing: Better profitability. Hiring an established call center solution service like TeleDirect will consequently increase your bottom line and productivity, boding well for the future health of your company.

http://teledirectcenter.wordpress.com/2013/12/12/call-center-solutions-better-customer-service-better-profitability/

Friday, April 25, 2014

Customer Service: Three Issues to Avoid

In this age of instant gratification, the company that can give customers what they want in the fastest and most accurate way possible will lord over the competition. Today’s customers are accustomed to greater options and control, and if you can’t give them what they want, you run the risk of losing their business, not to mention destroy your reputation when they spread the word about you. When it comes to customer service, here are three issues you need to avoid like the plague:

Interactive voice response

People in general hate talking to an automated voice. They want to speak to a real live agent, not an annoying phone menu. Lengthy instructions are hard to follow, let alone navigate.

Lengthy hold times

Lengthy hold times can push away even your most loyal customers. According to research, American consumers have wasted 60 million hours on hold. With the average American’s lifespan at 683.806 hours, that’s like losing 88 lives!

Being transferred to another agent

It can be utterly frustrating to get transferred to another agent and be asked to repeat information all over again. Customers want fast and efficient service and it takes only one unpleasant customer service call for them to take their business elsewhere.

Outsourcing your company’s customer service functions to a reliable call center is an ideal way to deal with these issues. Talk to an expert to learn what these centers offer and how they can help you grow your company.


Monday, April 21, 2014

Five Useful Tips that can Help You Generate Leads

If you’re looking for additional customers, then you may have heard that lead generation is one of the best tactics you can use. That said, this is still a task that may be too broad for you to handle, unless you work with a call center for leads or start off with these simple tips.
First, you might want to entice potential customers by offering limited discounts, whether time- or quantity-based. This plays with the psychological effect that the concept of scarcity has over most people, since they’ll know that they won’t be getting a better deal once it’s gone. Second, you should offer something that your competition doesn’t, like a webinar, free consultation, or a subscription-based blog site. Third, and perhaps most importantly, make sure that you spread the word about any offer or special item through social networking sites, which are where customers frequently congregate nowadays.

Fourth, you need to institute a loyalty system of sorts that grants your most faithful patrons with benefits that are unique to them. This can be in the form of special discounts or referrals to your partners that people tend to get interested in. Finally, don’t forget to send out personalized “thank you” messages to all of your customers. After all, people prefer to work with a customer-friendly company than those that are not as empathic. 

How Can a Call Center Agency Benefit my Business?

It is known that friendly, efficient customer service is what gives any company a good reputation. Unfortunately, creating and building a similar service of your own can be very expensive, especially if you own a small or medium-sized business. Why shoulder all the work if you can outsource it to someone else? That is just one benefit of working with a call center agency.
One major benefit that a call center provides is that it allows your business to take in queries and requests from your customers 24/7. While this may sound like something that can be achieved at a lower cost with voicemail, you should know that people generally don’t like receiving automated responses from businesses. This is because voicemail gives them an impression that you prefer to have a detached relationship with your customers, instead of catering to their specific wants and needs. Besides, working with a 24/7 call center agency is almost mandatory if you have a lot of international clients, as they’ll be making calls to your business during hours that may be opposite of your time zone.
Finally, hiring a call center agency gives people the impression that your business is large and successful. While this may sound like a ploy to deceive your customers, it simply encourages you to put your best foot forward. After all, nobody wants to work with a company that fails to exhibit proper customer relations.

Sunday, January 12, 2014

Harnessing Social Media for Customer Satisfaction

Many businesses view customer service as a necessary expense, but not as a way to bring in revenue. This may have been true in the past, but today, social media has completely redefined the relationship between customer service and brand promotion—a strategy which has a direct impact on revenue.