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The benefits of outsourced sales for start-ups

Posted on by Doug Roots

When you’re starting out, it can feel like you’re running uphill on a treadmill. Clients are hard won, you never have enough resource and it’s difficult delivering everything on your desk, let alone focussing on the 6 month, 12 month or 3 year plans for growth.  

In 2016, the UK registered the equivalent of 70 new businesses per hour – that’s 660,000 annually; data shows us that more than 50% of these businesses will not survive beyond 2021 (The Telegraph, 2019). So why are businesses that start out so promisingly, failing to see their 5th birthday?  

An Entrepreneurs Network report reveals that nearly a third of the differences in productivity between the UK and US start-ups are linked to management practices. Businesses that are properly managed and benefit from expert advice, are able to drive better sales and recruit better talent.  

A healthy pipeline is essential to every business, especially when you’re starting out. Making sales at the right price-point leads to long-term success and ensuring cash flow back into the business, to invest in marketing and product development. If there is market demand for your product, there is absolutely no reason why you can’t achieve the sales targets necessary for growth. Unfortunately, the reality is somewhat different, when companies are in their formation stages; it’s all hands on deck. Resource and headspace to focus on delivering an effective lead generation strategy and wider sales strategy seems like a pipe dream.  

Part of the reason start-ups founded in brilliant, creative ideas then fail comes back to the fact that their leader, who is likely already wearing several professional ‘hats’, is not a sales specialist. The founder might be the face of the business and certainly needs to be hands on in all aspects of day-to-day operations, sales presentations and investor meetings. There is a myriad of benefits to outsourcing lead generation and sales prospecting to an expert provider. The main one being they have the expertise and resource to hit the ground running and start generating sales for you that will help secure the future of your business. The right provider will help you refine your target markets; your sales approach and build your brand awareness. And you can have some breathing space to focus on the here and now, knowing that activity that will benefit you down the road, is being taken care of by a trusted partner who will deliver for you and your customers and help you build a healthy pipeline.  

Why Air? 

At Air Marketing, we’re experienced in working with start-ups in all sectors to maximise their outsourcing budget to achieve their business objectives. We’ve worked with businesses at every point in their journey to leverage the best return on investment (ROI) for budgets that need to deliver real results.. We work with clients to create a tailored, blend of services that will deliver the best conversion rates in their desired market. If you’d like to hear more about how we can help your business grow or show you how we’ve helped businesses from all sectors achieve success. Get in touch today or call us on 0345 241 3038. Or hear more from our existing customers here. 

What Should You Look For in An Outsourced Partner?

Posted on by Doug Roots

The 7 questions you need to ask.  

Choosing an outsourced partner to handle your lead generation and telemarketing activity is more than a transaction; it’s a trust exercise and a leap of faith. It’s hard to know if you’re making the right decision and like in any tender process where you’re planning a large investment, you’re likely to see a veritable beauty parade of suppliers promising to change how you define success. How do you know if their claims are genuine? Research shows that just 53% of supplier collaborations are successful (Forbes, 2017).  What should you be looking for when choosing a supplier to support you with such fundamental elements of your brand and sales strategy?

1.Do you trust them to guide your decision-making?

Trust is vital in any partnership, especially one where the expertise you’re buying is vital to your future success. There is arguably a low point of entry for setting up a telemarketing agency. Good agencies will offer genuine expertise and work with you to develop a strategy that considers every element of your brief and the challenges in your market. They will be a sounding board offering advice and guidance throughout the life of a campaign, working with you to continuously improve results.  

2.Do they understand your business? 

A provider that’s committed to understanding your business, from your daily operations to your grandest aspirations, has the best shot of being able to deliver genuine results and act as a true extension of your team. They should be experts in lead generation but value your insight and knowledge of your own business and the market you operate in – a partner with a collaborative approach is more invested in your success.  

3.Can they represent your brand the way you want?

If you’re one of the 31% of businesses outsourcing to improve service quality (Deloitte, 2016), a provider that not only understands your business but also can articulate your messages as well as you can, is essential.  Their agents will have much more meaningful and engaging conversations with prospective clients. You can rest assured that your brand awareness is growing in a way that reflects your values.  

4.Who’s making the calls? 

Any business can put forward a slick presentation and a confident sales pitch, you need to look beyond this to the people who will be working on your campaigns and calling on your behalf. Transparency is king, if you’re not welcomed with open arms to their offices to meet the team working on your campaign, can you be confident in their expertise and working practices?  

5.Are they promising the world?

As much as you might want to believe bold, world changing claims. The old adage is fitting, if it sounds good to be true, it probably is. A much better sign is a partner that talks in realistic and achievable terms and will work with you to create a programme with every chance of success.  

6.Is their pricing model too reductive?

Price is important but don’t be taken in by convoluted cost models, that promise to deliver fantastic value for large volumes, ultimately poorly delivered work reflects poorly on your business, and is not worth the investment, even if it seems like a great deal. Working with a supplier that can deliver the quality you want is a far better guide.  

7.What do their customers say? 

Investigate their case studies and testimonials; enquire about what they’ve delivered for other customers. Long-running customer relationships that have extended from an initial project are a positive sign, satisfied customers speak volumes.  

Check out our video where Owen Richards, MD of Air Marketing and Richard Forrest, MD of Forrest Marketing Group, dive deeper into the challenges of outsourcing:   

At Air, we work with clients to create a tailored, blend of services designed to deliver the best conversion rates in their desired market. If you’d like to hear more about how we can help your business grow or show you how we’ve helped businesses from all sectors achieve success, get in touch today  or call us on 0345 241 3038. Or hear more from our existing customers here. 

The benefits of multilingual selling

Posted on by Doug Roots

Local connections for global success 

In a global marketplace, only selling in English will genuinely limit the effectiveness of your sales strategy. If your business is serious about expanding into new territories, then it’s time to move away from a one-language fits all approach. It’s true that native English speaking businesses have been slow to grasp this opportunity, from assumptions that most globally operating businesses are willing to deal in English, to not translating their website. Some of the world’s leading brands have failed to adapt their marketing materials and sales approach to make sense across borders and cultures. Here’s why they’re missing a trick: 

Germany and the Netherlands are the second and third largest export markets for UK goods and services (next to the USA). France and Belgium follow on place 4 and 7. Senior decision makers within large companies in European countries may have an excellent command of English. In smaller businesses outside of major cities it’s far more likely that people will be much more comfortable dealing in their native tongue. Especially in Latin countries like France and Spain for example, there remains a strong emphasis on using the French and Spanish language, demonstrating a willingness to deal in their language engenders a spirit of trust, professionalism and serves as a mark of respect for their culture.   

 

Getting past the gatekeeper 

When it comes to understanding accents and idioms, native speakers will always have the edge. By removing the language barrier, conversation can flow freely. A native speaker can much better convey the benefits of your product or service, and ultimately better gauge the success of the call, resulting in more meaningful conversations, and leading to higher conversion rates.  

 

Building trust and opportunities  

The multilingual debate extends to online presence. Research shows that over half of people prefer buying in their own language; and the days of English language websites dominating the web are over.  70% of people will only make an important buying decision if product specs are in their native language (Common Sense Advisory survey); this strengthens the case for multilingual selling. The customer experience is more important than ever today. If you approach a prospect taking into account the nuances of the local market, you can build trust between seller and client, leading to greater opportunities in previously untapped markets.  

 

Why Air? 

We’re experienced in delivering multilingual campaigns. For our English-speaking clients we can open access into foreign markets, ensuring your brand is communicated effectively through using native speaking, lead generation experts. You will deal with an English-speaking account manager who will work with you closely to understand your aims and goals for the campaign. We can seamlessly blend multilingual marketing into a wider outbound sales strategy; you have the ease of dealing with a single supplier, supporting your expansion into new markets.  

We only use native speakers, so our agents always sound authentic when talking to prospects; all of our agents are skilled in selling over the phone and making every customer touch-point count.  

If you’d like to hear more about how we can help you raise your profile in new territories and target prospects globally with messages that resonate locally, get in touch with our multilingual lead Wouter Vanaelst today directly on 01392 575282 or complete our contact form here.  

What should stop you outsourcing your lead generation?

Posted on by Doug Roots

There are so many powerful arguments for outsourcing lead generation. It gives you back time and frees you up to concentrate on more strategic projects while safe in the knowledge that you can rely on a consistent and quality supply of leads. What’s not to like?

So when is outsourcing not the right decision?

The value of your product

It comes down to the value of your product. A good barometer is if your sales value is below the £5,000 mark (one off sale or annualised if you’re selling a monthly subscription model) then outsourced lead generation might not deliver the results you’re looking for. A good lead generation company is able to guide you on this and let you know the potential return on investment (ROI) they can deliver for your project.

Be realistic

Lead generation can deliver incredible results but it’s important to have realistic expectations at the outset. It’s not a magic bullet that can expertly cut through your sales cycle; the expertise is derived from the skill of the agent’s approach and their commitment to achieving results for your business. If it were easy, you’d simply expand your team and see immediate results.

It takes time

Lead generation campaigns need time to gain momentum, taking up to 6 months to prove their ROI. In the same way you wouldn’t expect a new employee to deliver sales on day one or even month 1, you cannot expect to see immediate results from a very limited trial or a very short campaign. It simply won’t be a meaningful reflection of what could be achieved with the proper time and investment in the project.

The foundations for partnership

Lead generation companies worth their salt will want to build a partnership and collaborate closely with you so they can learn how your business operates. Nobody knows your business and products better than you, so communicating your advice and experience is vital to success. Remember, they are experts in their field but they’re not experts in your business processes, so they will need time and support to get things right for you. This requires access, regular meetings and a level of involvement with your in-house team.  Things don’t always go to plan, it’s important to be able to have an honest and open conversation with your supplier. Work with them to find solutions and spend some time listening to their agents making calls. If a supplier isn’t prepared to let you listen to calls, or see how they train their agents, take them off your list at the supplier selection stage. The relationship works both ways and they need to be transparent about their processes to ensure your partnership thrives.

You have a different sales model

All businesses have quirks that are unique to them. If most of your sales come from referrals and you’ve experienced organic growth as a result, then it’s important to understand that leads generated from cold calls will have a much lower conversion rate, typically between 5% and 30% (dependent on product, price and relevance to the customer).

Know your numbers so you can set expectations

It is important to start outsourced lead generation programme with a clear understanding of what to expect.

Check out our video where Owen Richards, MD of Air Marketing and Richard Forrest, MD of Forrest Marketing Group in Australia, dive deeper into the topic discussing the impact of pricing models and perceptions of supplier collaboration on the success of lead generation initiatives.

At Air, we work with clients to create a tailored, blend of services that will deliver the best conversion rates in their desired market. If you’d like to hear more about how we can help your business grow or show you how we’ve helped businesses from all sectors achieve success, get in touch today or call us on 0345 241 3038. Hear more from our existing customers here.

How to decide what to spend your investment on?

Posted on by Doug Roots

Successfully securing investment can be daunting and those tentative early days spent working out exactly how to translate that winning pitch into a winning strategy that delivers, can be a daunting prospect. In our blog, You’ve secured investment, now what? we covered how it’s vital for businesses to work out the practical aspects of delivery, taking an honest look at in-house resource and scoping out where you might need to buy-in expertise or scale up. This is a vital process. Spending money and thinking later will only lead to regrets when investors need to see return on investment (ROI), and so it’s worth investing the time upfront to do this.

Once you’re happy that you have a solid overarching strategy, it’s time to get into the detail on the tactical plans, specifically where you’ll be spending your budgets. In an ideal world you could press pause for a bit, start to see the benefit of your campaign efforts and product development plans but we all know that’s just not realistic. You need to pay your staff and invest in reward schemes to ensure they stay motivated. You must continue to invest in your brand and your external marketing efforts to let the world know you have a new and exciting proposition on offer. You need to make sure that you’re across your target markets; not only understanding them but also proactively ensuring your business is a relevant contender in that space. To keep that cash flow well, flowing, you need to be confident that you can generate sales, consistently hitting the targets to power your growth and support your investment. Without those sales, things can spiral pretty quickly and there simply won’t be time to see your plans come to fruition.

In the SaaS industry, there’s a real challenge in refining the sales approach in a crowded marketplace where external service, maintenance and development factors can also impact the sales cycle, making it vital for any sales strategy to balance the inbound and outbound efforts, appropriately.

With outbound sales strategies you need to make sure that your sales team are targeting the right accounts, and having informed and tailored conversations that get prospects close to conversion. Even so-called ‘hot leads’ aren’t necessarily ready to buy. SaaS salespeople need to have knowledgeable conversations and ready-to-go sales enablement assets that readily and effectively showcase the benefits of their product.

It’s also vital to consider how customer profile impacts the sales processes; those high value enterprise contracts can take far more time to get over the line. They also need to be mindful of tailoring the approach to prospect, learning to navigate different organisations and their complexity without getting bogged down or limiting the pipeline, is a tough nut to crack. To get the ball rolling it can be worth looking at outsourcing a portion of your inside sales activity to get some of those big contracts closed. The key differentiator in this area is often exceptional relationship building and attention to detail. An inside sales professional can be trusted to nurture your most valuable prospects through the entire sales cycle, as a true extension of your team, adding value to your brand and reputation.

In the meantime, it’s equally important to ensure a healthy influx of leads into the pipeline. That’s where outsourced lead generation activity simmering away in the background can be of huge benefit to your sales team. Sourcing new leads is time-consuming and costly; by removing the burden from internal resource you can focus your efforts on where you need to succeed, confident that a consistent supply of high quality leads will be delivered over time.

At Air, we’re experienced in working with clients to design sales strategies that deliver value from the outset. We deliver value and expertise to our clients’ prospects, at any point in the buying cycle, removing the pressure from your in-house team whilst guaranteeing quality and premium customer experience on your behalf. We work with clients to create a tailored blend of services that will deliver the best conversion rates in their desired market. If you’d like to hear more about how we can help your business grow or show you how we’ve helped businesses from all sectors achieve success get in touch today or call us on 0345 241 3038. Hear more from our existing customers here.

The marketing trends you shouldn’t ignore in 2020

Posted on by dukadmin

Marketing is a fast-changing and often fickle landscape; how do you really know if today’s buzzwords will translate into a meaningful line in your future strategy. Marketing in 2010 is a far cry from marketing today and that’s just the job titles. The growth of digital has changed everything, bringing businesses closer to customers than ever before – it’s been a steep learning curve with brands striving to meet the seamless technology and customer experience expectations of today’s consumer.

Then there’s the searching, no pun intended, questions; is everything offline pointless? Where should I be focusing the marketing strategy?

We can’t see into the future but here’s our take on the trends to watch in 2020.

AI is here to stay

Artificial intelligence (AI) has powered big strides in marketing efforts in 2019, with data insights helping build a more accurate picture of target audiences, campaigns can be much more predictive and focussed. And that’s just the start, AI allows marketeers to target content to potential buyers and deliver a refined content strategy personalised to their interests, which allows marketeers to predict trends. Past research suggested that by 2020, businesses that leverage AI to power customer insights could make $1.2 trillion more than their comparatively less-well informed peers! So it’ll be interesting to see the up-to-date figures this year.

Conversational marketing

In 2020 real-time matters. Immediacy is the new ‘we’ll get back to you in 24 hours’, with research showing that 82% of consumers rate an “immediate” response as very important when they have a question. Interestingly, only 36% of companies use live chat for marketing, sales or customer service enquiries (Hubspot, 2018). There’s a huge opportunity here for businesses ready to invest in their real-time marketing efforts. Chatbots can make this truly scalable, offering your customers true responsiveness. The challenge for businesses is ensuring those scripts are well researched and provide the answers consumers need. It goes beyond product specs and must replicate a friendly, authentic conversational experience.

Customer Experience (CX) really matters

Businesses across the board are recognising the shift of power towards the consumer. Gone are the days where customers gleaned the benefits of your product from your carefully crafted magazine advertorials; today’s consumer comes armed with research, making your website an absolutely crucial first touch-point. Your entire reputation is predicated on how customers perceive you, how easy it is to interact and buy from you. The value of your interactions and approach adds to the buying experience. That means everything from your Instagram videos to your customer service conversations has to be seamless, intuitive and in-line with consumer expectation.

Video just makes sense

It’s easy to generate, and a versatile and imaginative storytelling medium. People love consuming video, whether it’s for learning or educational purposes or to hear others’ experiences – it’s arguably the most powerful tool for brands wanting to win hearts and minds and it’s set to stay that way. In fact, your customers are far more likely to share a brand/ product video than anything else you produce. According to Optinmonster, video marketeers get 66% more qualified leads per year with video marketing achieving a 54% increase in brand awareness. Additionally, 93% of marketeers say they’ve landed a new customer thanks to a video on social media.

At Roots to Market, we build intelligent marketing capabilities using a mixture of proven marketing tactics to reach your target audience and produce marketing qualified leads for your sales team. We offer tailored, blended services of inbound and direct marketing, automation and complete tactical campaigns, dependent on clients’ needs. If you’d like to talk more about how we can help you design a future proofed marketing strategy that delivers results, get in touch today on 01392 796 702.

You’ve secured investment, now what?

Posted on by Doug Roots

You can still hear the echoes of the champagne corks popping but you know the real work lies ahead. Any business that’s been through rounds of investor pitches, meticulously prepared presentations and hundreds of handshakes to successfully secure investment, knows that feeling of celebratory relief. When you’ve been focussed on securing the money for so long it’s hard to shift to the next phase. Your strategy is clear…in theory. And now someone else believes you can do it too, which presents a new pressure, living up to the pitch.

How do you ensure you make your budgets work as hard as possible, so you can deliver the profitability your investors need to see and achieve your predicted growth?

Start with a solid self-appraisal

You’ve likely got a very strong idea or product to sell, some great market insight and a formidable sales strategy. What do you think will be the hardest part of your strategy to get right? Are you struggling to distil the benefits of your product into a targeted marketing strategy? Maybe you need help reaching decision makers. It’s worth thinking about this at the outset. If you’re in the SaaS industry, for example and the bulk of your time and expertise has been focussed on developing your software, it’s going to be a steep learning curve for your team in areas where your strategy demands immediate excellence in sales or marketing. Look at your budget and make some decisions about buying in expertise. Working with experts who can nail your brief and give it the time and attention it deserves, will save you money in the long run.

Don’t limit your own success

Maybe you really are the best person to do it all, but think of the scale of the opportunity. Do you have time to do everything? Or, will you free up valuable diary space if you carefully outsource elements that you believe you could oversee with a guiding hand? Think about where your money and your time are best spent. If you’re the face and the voice of the business, you’ll eventually need to relinquish some of the day-to-day.

Build your supplier network

A trusted supplier is genuinely worth their weight in gold. They can give you a steer on where to allocate budget and where you’ll get the most return on investment, provide a valuable sounding board for any ideas or concerns you may have and genuinely look out for opportunities on your behalf. Good suppliers are an extension of your team, bridging that gap in knowledge and expertise and working with you collaboratively to achieve mutual success. They won’t sell you anything you don’t need but instead make even the tightest budget align with your business aims.

You can be ambitious and realistic

When it comes to your business, there’s nothing wrong in thinking big. We’re living in an age of business insight, if you’ve got an ambitious target in mind you can work out what your conversion of leads needs to be to achieve your goals. A trusted supplier can advise of typical conversion rates and how they’ve achieved this for their other clients, giving you an educated idea of what’s realistic for your business and your timescales.

At Air Marketing, we’re experienced in working with clients to maximise their outsourcing budget to achieve their business objectives. We’ve worked with businesses at every point in their journey to leverage the best return on investment for budgets that need to deliver results. We work with clients to create a tailored, blend of services that will deliver the best conversion rates in their desired market. If you’d like to hear more about how we can help your business grow or show you how we’ve helped businesses from all sectors achieve success. Get in touch today, call us on 0345 241 3038. Or hear more from our existing customers here.

Outsourcing your demand generation, everything you need to know

Posted on by dukadmin

Demand generation demystified

Demand generation is exactly what you’d think, generating demand for a business’s products and services. Where it differs from lead generation is that it’s a long-term, nurturing approach that takes prospects on a journey, moving them from interesting browser to converted buyer. As prospects move through the funnel towards becoming customers, an integrated marketing and sales approach is used to ensure they remain engaged and are targeted with timely relevant content. The upshot, marketing activities can be focussed on delivering quality leads to sales teams that are much more likely to convert. Prospects that aren’t ready to buy today remain under marketing’s watchful expert eye, targeted with relevant messaging designed to maintain the relationship and influence a future purchase.

What’s involved?

Demand generation encompasses all marketing activities from brand building, tactical campaigns, social and digital efforts to targeted email marketing, what makes it distinct from traditional marketing programmes is that all activities build and nurture key relationships for the long term and closely influence the sales cycle.

Why invest the time and effort when I can reach out using lead generation activities on ad hoc basis?

Lead generation, done well, is a vital part of any successful sales strategy, but consider the following: Only 3% of your market is actively buying. 56% are not ready, 40% are poised to begin (source: Vorsight). And 63% of consumers requesting info on your company today will not purchase for at least 3 months (source: Marketing Donut). This makes every interaction a valuable touch-point and an opportunity to convert prospects down the line and importantly, one that can’t be wasted.

But my marketing team are delivering stacks of leads, why would I outsource demand generation?

79% of marketing leads never convert into sales. Lack of nurture is the main cause for this (source: Marketing Sherpa). Research shows that targeting users with content relevant to where they are in the buying process achieved 73% higher conversion rates (source: Aberdeen).

Delivering content that’s relevant to where your prospect is positioned in the buying cycle is the most effective way to achieve conversion. Unless you have a full roster of content specialists in your team, it’s a tall order to expect your in-house resource to design and implement demand creation strategies that deliver immediate results. Producing high-quality leads is the number one challenge that B2B marketers face (source: Hubspot) and, with nearly 7 in 10 marketers still unable to identify their funnel (source: Marketing Sherpa) it makes sense to on-board a partner that has deep expertise in delivering results focussed demand creation strategies into businesses. There’s no need to do away with what’s already in place, often these programmes can work in partnership with the existing marketing plans to leverage existing best practice and content.

Why Roots to Market?

At Roots to Market, we build intelligent marketing capabilities using a mixture of proven marketing tactics to reach your target audience and produce marketing qualified leads for your sales team. We offer tailored, blended services of inbound and direct marketing, automation and complete tactical campaigns, dependent on clients’ needs. If you’d like to talk more about how we can drive tangible results from your demand generation strategy, get in touch today on 01392 796 702.

My 5 Tips to Personal Development

Posted on by Doug Roots

I started my journey with Air Marketing back in 2018 as a Business Development Executive. I really enjoyed the role, the culture and the opportunities that were clearly available from this position. But I was hungry for growth and I knew I wanted to develop my career, within the first year I quickly excelled and was rewarded with the management of my first account. I was thrilled by this opportunity to really show what I was made of and also to give the client the best experience of working with Air.

Fast forward to today, just over a year later and I’m stepping into one of just three Account Manager roles, with my sole focus to deliver ROI for our ever-growing client base.

I wanted to share with you how I got here, so these are my 5 focus areas:

Training

I’m a huge believer in achieving anything, if you’re willing to learn and open to change. Within my time at Air I’ve had the opportunity to learn from various senior team members and taken part in some fantastic training sessions. These have been vital to my progression as it doesn’t feel like I have ever stopped learning. My favourite training was a Time Management session run by our in-house Learning and Development Co-ordinator. It taught me how to balance my workload and keep stress levels under control, which is vital in a fast pace, high performance environment like Air.

Feedback

I may be a Gen Z; however I don’t agree with snowflake culture that the generation has been tarred with. I value and really take on board feedback from those more knowledgeable both inside and outside of work to aid my professional development. Sometimes the feedback has been negative, but I always feel you can take learnings and constructive criticism from these moments. Being in sales I have a tough skin anyway!

Honesty

Yes, honesty. I’ve always taken the approach of transparency with my colleagues and clients. It’s something that fits well in our culture and something we pride ourselves on at Air. You can’t lie when it comes to statistics and data. If you’re honest with clients this will create a strong and respectful relationship for the future.

Creative thinking

A large proportion of my role is process driven, with this we see consistency of delivery and of results. However, you need to be one step ahead in account management. This means you need to be thinking of new ideas all the time to keep things fresh. Nine times out of ten your original strategy is going to change, and you will need to adapt to this to keep on the front foot.

Passion

I believe that passion is the biggest thing you need to get to the next step. I love what I do, and I am lucky to work in a culture that nurtures that passion and ignites it even further. Being dedicated to reach your goal is important and it is this drive and dedication that will see you become successful.

I’m looking forward to everything 2020 has in store in my new role, working with more fantastic clients and achieving great results for them. If you’re interested in joining Team Air, visit our careers page or call 0345 241 3038.

Opinion piece by Gracie-May Bryan, Account Manager at Air Marketing Group

The real differences between telemarketing, telesales and inside sales: could this be the key to a winning sales strategy?

Posted on by Doug Roots

Even the most experienced sales professional might struggle to pin down a comprehensive definition for each discipline and others might not differentiate at all; so it’s not hard to understand where the confusion arises.

The sales and marketing landscapes have vastly changed in the past decade. Digital marketing, content marketing and sales enablement specialisms have emerged alongside the advent of marketing automation and analytics tools. As a result, businesses are closer to their customer data than ever before, meaning campaigns can be focused and personal, and sales and marketing professionals can become laser-focused on their target market. You might ask what does this have to do with telemarketing, telesales and inside sales? The answer, absolutely everything. 75% of companies say closing more deals is their top sales priority, yet 40% of salespeople say getting a response from prospects is getting harder (source: Hubspot). It’s these solutions that help bring businesses closer to the decision maker, generating meaningful leads and supporting your overarching sales goals and objectives. Here’s how.

Telemarketing – a vital part of your outbound strategy

There’s a huge difference between a telemarketer reading a tired, poorly thought out script in an uninspiring environment and outsourcing the job to a professional and dynamic agency who can demonstrate genuine return on investment through happy clients. Highly trained telemarketers are skilled sales professionals, adept at staying on brand and message whilst nurturing a conversation. They are focused on building rapport with your desired targets and delivering detailed reporting that helps you inform and shape your future campaigns. The best agencies offer you full transparency, connecting you to the team making the calls, live reporting and a dedicated campaign manager. They will provide you with a true extension of your in-house team.

Telesales – professionalism and scalability

Telesales is a slightly different focus. Homing in on the sale of a specific product or service, it’s ideal for businesses that might need to scale up their sales resource around a product launch or campaign. Done well, this approach is far cry from the high volume, light touch methods some might associate with telesales; it can help you increase conversion rates and boost your brand in the markets you need to be known. These skilled telesales professionals can build valuable customer relationships without the hard sell.

Inside sales – turning interested prospects into active clients

Inside sales teams target prospects and customers through email, phone conversations or online through LinkedIn, business groups and forums. These professionals are not only skilled in the art of identifying opportunities for upsell and nurturing conversations through a sales pipeline but a valuable support to traditional ‘outside sales’ identifying key opportunities beyond the scope of their role. Converting a sales lead into a valued customer can be challenging to say the least, this is where inside sales comes into its own, taking greater ownership for nurturing this valuable conversion process.

We understand the reasons driving the decision to outsource are often complex. You might want to save time, protect your internal resource, or bring in the expertise you need, when you need it. Whether you have a project in mind or if you’d like to explore how our services could support your business and sales objectives, we’d welcome the opportunity to take this forward and show you how we’ve helped businesses from all sectors achieve success. Get in touch today or call us on 0345 241 3038. Or hear more from our existing customers here.