Insider Perspective

Never stop questioning the status quo - the value of agile telemarketing

An agile organisation is one that accepts the perpetuity of change; and builds the ability to react swiftly and insightfully into its business model.


Change has always been a constant. But the rate of change is picking up pace as rapidly advancing technology is redefining customer expectations – setting the bar even higher for efficiency, responsiveness, relevancy and customer success.

Just being willing and open to change is no longer enough. Any organisation that hopes to remain competitive must be able to adapt quickly, easily and confidently – and do all of this more nimbly than other industry players. Simply put: you need the tools to be agile.

Back to the beginning

The concept of an agile enterprise was born in the software development field and has since been explored further in other spheres, including project management, sales and marketing.

Today, the agile approach makes sense in any organisation but particularly in enterprise organisations where large projects or campaigns, often global in nature, with lengthy, non-linear time frames and many moving parts are the norm. This type of work can be extremely complex but of such importance that quality cannot be compromised. Goals tend to shift as unexpected outcomes become apparent, which often makes it impossible (or at least, unwise) to predict and plan every possible detail before the project or campaign even begins.

Taking a more agile approach, however, helps to deal with uncertainties as they arise – by planning and executing concurrently, instead of in sequence. This means that priorities and action strategies can be adjusted as the project or campaign evolves, unearthing new obstacles or opportunities.

Every industry has its own tools to support the agile approach. Digital technology plays a critical role in increasing organisations’ ability to pick up on and react to change. But people and processes play an important role, too.

How we define “agility”

At the Telemarketing Company, we believe that telemarketing is a powerful and agile channel, which can deliver high value outcomes at any stage of the sales process.

Our business model is based on our ability to accommodate the diverse, complex and often changing compliance and regulatory-based requirements of our clients, many of whom are industry leading blue-chip organisations.

We achieve this by:

 

  • Being flexible and collaborative:

From the moment we meet our clients, it’s all about asking questions, listening actively to their answers, and tailoring our services accordingly. A collaborative approach means getting the best of both worlds – our client’s market and product knowledge, combined with our telemarketing, telesales, data and market research expertise.

  • Generating and testing new ideas and “failing fast”:

We work hard to deliver new ideas, driven by both hunches and empirical observation. We then implement them quickly and test them – changes to processes, different calling hours and approaches are part of our day to day. Those ideas which work are developed and expanded, those that don’t are quickly ceased and insight generated.

  • Being transparent:

We provide our clients with access to all our call recordings, so they can give us input at any stage. We have an open door policy and a robust review process with early stage reviews attended by senior management. We actively encourage live call listening and welcome and respect client feedback, because this always feeds improvement.

  • Being able to scale:

We’re small enough to value every relationship and appreciate the uniqueness of each requirement, yet large enough to offer tailored, end-to-end solutions that can flex and scale to support growth at every stage of the sales process.

  • Never compromising quality or service:

We can guarantee compliance and quality of results. We focus on providing best-in-class, independently audited, industry-leading voice-based services, delivered by highly skilled teams drawing on deep and broad sector experience, and extensive historical client engagement, particularly at enterprise level.

Our service delivery is underpinned by robust quality assurance including 100% call recordings, ISM/AITS[1] trained agents and ISO9001 quality management. This means we can guarantee compliance with our clients’ processes – which is critical in regulated industries.

What sets our agile approach apart?

We have learned that each client and every engagement is unique. Many different factors are at play beyond the common denominators of organisation size, target industry or product type. In fact, the golden rule for telemarketing is to bring uniqueness to the fore. Every proposition must have a USP to differentiate itself from organisations in the same industry and competitive space.

  • First, understand - we never take a one size fits all approach but spend time to understand our client’s requirements and tailor our support accordingly. A thorough briefing process is the starting point for every engagement.
     

  • Challenge our clients’ perceptions – as it is essential for the success of any engagement, we always challenge our clients to clearly define their proposition. When you are deeply invested in your own products and propositions, it can be difficult to step back and see what makes your offering stand out. It is our responsibility to help identify and communicate that USP.
     

  • Focus on the right outcomes – because securing ROI is about quality leads, not just quantity. We help our clients to generate a rigorous definition for the right outcomes from the activity, be that BANT or other qualification criteria – what outcomes represent real value for them. We also provide rigorous quality assurance processes to check whether outcomes meet the criteria.
     

  • Measure everything – monitoring and evaluating each project qualitatively and quantitatively. Agility includes the ability to adapt when things aren’t working and react quickly to new opportunities, so it’s essential to have a solid basis to monitor results, and identify issues and areas of potential. Our on-line reporting and analytics suite, TTMC Connect, provides real-time access to programme performance and results.
     

  • Take a proactive approach – because we’ve learned that requirements can change as a greater understanding of the project components unfolds over time. The needs and wants of stakeholders can also shift through the project journey. We proactively manage every campaign, adapting quickly as issues arrive and unearthing new opportunities as each engagement gains traction.
     

  • Use agile systems – we can’t adapt and change, if the systems that support us are rigid. We have our own proprietary calling platform maintained by in-house developers working to an agile software development process. We can easily and securely tailor our systems and the processes they power, to accommodate the unique requirements of every client.

These, we believe, are the key components of a truly agile approach, an approach which allows us to fully understand our client’s requirements and hone solutions that exploit each and every opportunity on their behalf.

If you need a flexible, collaborative agency that can shape bespoke solutions for your complex, changing requirements, and maintain high quality outcomes that comply with your processes, get in touch today.



[1] Institute of Sales Management, MRS Accredited Interview Training Scheme.

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