High quality data, insight and sales pipeline establish TTMC as a trusted telemarketing partner for Apple Authorised reseller, Sync

Established in 1992 as GBM technologies, Sync is a highly accredited Apple Authorised reseller and Apple Authorised Education specialist, headquartered in Manchester with field teams across the UK. A well-established technology provider for the region, it is a tech company with a heart, supporting local charities and community projects in the Manchester area and beyond.

With a mission to deliver customer centric solutions via a consultancy led approach, Sync offers the latest Apple technologies and a wide range of value add services. The company has supported businesses and schools for over 29 years, helping them thrive, increase productivity and reduce costs.

Campaign objective and project background

Sync approached The Telemarketing Company (TTMC) because they were unhappy with their incumbent agency and experiencing issues such as sporadic communication, inconsistent quality of results and poor service delivery. Sync was impressed with the methodology presented by TTMC, the robustness of their onboarding and quality processes, and the transparency offered through shared call recordings and TTMC Connect, the agency’s real-time reporting platform. After a short evaluation period, Sync appointed TTMC to carry out a six week appointment-setting pilot.
 

Project execution

Sync had recently rebranded from GBM Digital technologies and had carried out a broad awareness campaign through digital channels and media to reinforce their new brand name. The telemarketing programme aimed to further reinforce brand awareness, in addition to generating appointments for the in house sales team. To support calling, TTMC was tasked to source a database in the North West matching the client’s target profile - businesses within the creative, retail, e-tail, hospitality and fashion sectors with between 10 and 150 employees. The goal was to generate qualified sales leads for Sync's subscription service - a low-cost opportunity to deploy Mac in business and access value through Sync's subscription and service stack.

Once data had been obtained, a full briefing was delivered to the team to educate them on the unique benefits of Sync’s subscription service, competitor propositions in the market and the types of objections that might be encountered. As calling began, it became clear that despite prior activity there was a low level of awareness of the Sync brand and a high volume of Windows users within the target audience. These factors combined made it very difficult for agents to overcome inertia and establish a need for a Mac subscription service.

Whilst receptiveness to the offer was not as hoped, Sync was very impressed with the quality of calls and results achieved, the proactive account management and TTMC’s ability to act authentically as a seamless extension of their own team. As a result, a decision was made to refocus activity to target existing Mac users within the education sector where Sync also offers a comprehensive portfolio of value-added products and services.

The client provided TTMC with a database of approximately 1000 organisations, all Mac users in the education sector. The objective was to secure appointments for Sync’s sales team to discuss a range of buy-back, trade-in and upgrade offers designed to allow customers to release residual value from their existing hardware. The goal was to transition education clients to the standard subscription model, which would provide regular software updates and easy access to Sync’s specialist support services.

The data included a range of different customer types including state and independent schools; charities; further education establishments; and universities. As the data was very sparsely populated, it was necessary for TTMC to carry out a full list build to identify relevant decision-makers and append full contact information, then establish the status on their installed kit and the nature and structure of their purchasing model. In some cases, for example, a Head Teacher might be able to immediately sign off a large purchase, whereas in other cases even a small purchase would need to be approved by an external board of trustees involving a lengthy buying cycle.

Once the list build was complete, calling began and a solid pipeline of appointments within the target market started to build. Given the quality and completeness of the refreshed data, now containing up-to-date, profiled decision makers, usage and purchasing model details, calling quickly began to deliver results, hitting the agreed target of one appointment every fifteen hours. In addition, calling gathered valuable insight into the needs and requirements of a priority audience with which to refine and improve future strategy and reinforced brand awareness within a key market sector.
 

Results

The success of the initial two programmes has given Sync renewed confidence in the ability of an outsource telemarketing agency to articulate their proposition, represent their brand in a credible, authentic way and deliver high quality data, insight and sales pipeline. This has been in marked contrast to their previous experience using an outsourced agency and the telemarketing channel itself. Transparent reporting, open communication and detailed analytics have further established confidence that TTMC is a reliable and trusted partner that can support them on an ongoing basis.

As a result, discussions are underway to identify new ways that TTMC can add value to Sync’s sales strategy. The client is looking to outsource their inbound enquiries and has tasked TTMC to nurture business enquiries generated through their website, understand needs and convert these to full business accounts, upselling benefits such as preferential rates, support offerings or purchase facilities.

"I was really impressed with the onboarding process and transparency that TTMC offered. There has been clear communication with Daren and his team, with weekly meetings to help us assess campaign performance and identify opportunities to improve. Their client portal is a revelation and makes ROI reporting so much simpler."

Marketing Manager, Sync