Beyond doubts, telemarketing is highly relevant in the B2B marketplace. Unlike in the B2C Tele calling where customers get annoyed receiving unwanted phone calls, telemarketing in B2B is always welcome. It gives opportunities to both the providers and seekers of the products, solutions, and services to grow their business. Also, it is one of the most effective ways in generating B2B leads as it gives a humane touch to the communication that other media forms fail to deliver. Person to person interaction makes for clarity of message, immediate feedback and saves time spent on sending lengthy emails and waiting for them endlessly. However, for marketers to break out of the crowd is not an easy task. It needs meticulous planning, qualitative database, latest technology, and use of appropriate performance metrics.
Here are 10 tips to build a successful telemarketing strategy and execute the same the right way:
1. Determine Your Objectives
Before you start off your telemarketing campaigns, the first step is to clearly define your objectives from the exercise. Telemarketing campaigns are not always meant to generate sales, but also to raise awareness, take feedback and more.
- Determine campaign objectives clearly
- Communicate the same to the associated teams
- Determine what lead is to your marketing team
2. Failing To Plan is Planning To Fail
Preparation is the key to success in telemarketing. Making thousands of calls to random people without a proper strategy in place will lead to chaos and might even be a risk for your brand’s reputation. Here are the things that you must plan out well:
- Define your target Market.
- List out the reasons why you have chosen a certain market.
- Do a ‘SWOT’ analysis of your selected market and identify your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.
- SWOT will also include identifying major competitors and what do they have to offer.
- Segment your market based on select criteria
- Identify most profitable segments
- Identify the hooks or triggers that may entice the customers
- Know your objectives from the tele-calling campaign
3. Build or Buy a Targeted List
Having a targeted database of your current and potential customers is a competitive advantage. It saves immense time and cost and increases the efficiency of your sales and marketing team. According to a survey, relevant data can increase B2B response by 800%. Great if you have a strong data team in place and you can afford to build a database of your own. If not, the best option is to acquire a qualitative database from a reliable database vendor.
- Identify the specific information you may need to execute your telemarketing strategy- Eg. Job Role, SIC Code, Annual Revenue of the organization, Staff Size, and others
- Identify and compare different database vendors
- Select a database vendor who is flexible, provides qualitative data on time
- Get your list customized based on your campaign specific requirements
- Acquiring email or mailing data together with telephone numbers is an added advantage as you can easily approach your customers using different channels and follow up with them effectively
4. Provide Content that Establishes Strong Foundation For Sales Call
Feeding your target market with relevant and useful content could build up a strong foundation before making a sales call. This can be done by sending emails to the potential buyers containing specific and relevant information about the product or service that you offer.
- Most people prefer to receive preliminary information on email before having a telephone call
- Share brief information about your products, solutions, services through email to establish a base for further communication
- Leave scope for doubts and queries to be answered by a sales call to follow
5. Develop Sales Pitch For Different Customer Segments
Your sales and marketing teams must prepare a different sales pitch for each different segment that you wish to interact with.
- Identify customer persona for each segment
- Learn their pain points and needs
- Develop a different communication approach for each of these segments
- Think through the different concerns that they may have and your response to the same
- Focus more on the value that the buyers can unlock using your product or service rather than focusing excessively on product features.
6. Complement Your Telesales Campaigns with online and offline promotion
When it comes to effective marketing, a bit of everything needs to be used as the in gradient. The right amount of buzz around your brand will make your job easy as you would not have to explain too much about your brand.
- Focus on inclusive strategy
- Create the right amount of buzz around your brand by running email campaigns, sending newsletters, sharing useful content and more
7. Learn to Handle Rejections and Objections Confidently
Telemarketing is never a smooth sail. ‘No’ is the most common response. Tele-callers need to be prepared and cautious while handling customer queries, objections, and even rejections.
- Take rejections positively and try to explore another opportunity to discuss your product/ service with the client
- Develop excellent knowledge about the product/ service in offer so that customer queries and doubts can be addressed confidently
- Know about the strengths and weaknesses of the products/ services offered by your competitors in the same space and how to highlight the value of your own product
8. Stimulate Discussion
Telemarketing should not be just about bombarding the receiver of the call with one-way lectures. It has to be more of a two-way communication where customer feedback is given the due importance.
- Listen to the customer
- Understand their reservations, confusions, and doubts
- Address their concerns in the most objective manner
- Don’t throw product features on customers, highlight the value of the product
- Open a friendly discussion rather than an argument
- Focus more on the positives of your own product/ service rather than the flaws in competitors offerings
9. Follow Up
You may not always be able to close the deal in your first attempt. Therefore, you must follow up with your prospect until you know their final verdict on your offerings.
- Do not forget your clients once the deal is closed
- Know from them if they have any concerns
- Know from them if they are happy with the deliverables
- Do not annoy them with frequent calls and emails
- Take customer feedback from time to time
10. Track Your Campaign
Tracking your campaign is one of the most important tasks in the process. The performance of your campaigns should be monitored and deviations should be timely acted upon to reap the best fruits from your telemarketing campaigns.
- Use and deploy the right performance measuring metrics
- Assess results on timely basis
- Identify deviations
- Take corrective measures
- Continue the cycle.