Telemarketing
Telemarketing is a method of direct marketing in which a salesperson solicits prospective customers to buy products, subscriptions or services, either over the phone or through a subsequent face to face or web conferencing appointment scheduled during the call. Telemarketing can also include recorded sales pitches programmed to be played over the phone via automatic dialing.
Telemarketing is defined as contacting, qualifying, and canvassing prospective customers using telecommunications devices such as telephone, fax, and internet. It does not include direct mail marketing.
Categories
The two major categories of telemarketing are business-to-business and business-to-consumer.Subcategories
- Lead generation, the gathering of information and contacts.
- Sales, using persuasion to sell a product or service.
- Outbound, proactive marketing in which prospective and preexisting customers are contacted directly,
- Inbound, reception of incoming orders and requests for information. Demand is generally created by advertising, publicity, or the efforts of outside salespeople.
Service Styles
- Call to Action, the implementation of outbound telemarketing to "activate" or elicit an action or response from prospects.
- Appointment Setting, utilizing inbound or outbound telemarketing to create face-to-face or telephone appointments for sales purposes.
- Database Cleansing, the outbound calling of databases with the particular purpose to clean and prepare data and contact details for future telemarketing campaigns.
- Surveys, the implementation of telemarketing with the particular purpose of collecting data and information from specific target markets for qualitative research purposes.
- Telesales, telemarketing with the specific intention of making an actual sale/transaction over the phone. Often includes the collection of credit card details over the phone for payment purposes, which allows for faster sales cycles and payment confirmation.
Procedure
An effective telemarketing campaign often involves two or more calls. The first call determines the customer's needs. The final call motivates the customer to make a purchase. Prospective customers are identified by various means, including past purchase history, previous requests for information, credit limit, competition entry forms, and application forms. Names may also be purchased from another company's consumer database or obtained from a telephone directory or another public list. The qualification process is intended to determine which customers are most likely to purchase the product or service.
In business-to-business lead generation scenarios, telemarketing often targets perceived decision-makers who might be good prospects for a business product or service. The telemarketing approach is often combined with outreach via email or social media, typically referred to as a cadence. Calls are usually made by sales development representatives with the goal of this outreach being a subsequent meeting—often with an account executive at the vendor organization.
Charitable organizations, alumni associations, and political parties often use telemarketing to solicit donations. Marketing research companies use telemarketing techniques to survey the prospective or past customers of a client's business to assess market acceptance of or satisfaction with a particular product, service, brand, or company. Public opinion polls are conducted similarly.
Telemarketing techniques are also applied to other forms of electronic marketing using e-mail or fax messages, in which case they are frequently considered spam by receivers.
Image:Telemarketerjohn.jpg|thumb|right|Telemarketing agent sitting in a cubicle. The brightly colored rebuttal sheets are used to answer most questions a customer might have.
Negative perceptions and criticism
Telemarketing has been negatively associated with various scams and frauds, such as pyramid schemes, and with deceptively overpriced products and services. Fraudulent telemarketing companies are frequently referred to as "telemarketing boiler rooms" or simply "boiler rooms". Telemarketing is often criticized as an unethical business practice due to the perception of high-pressure sales techniques during unsolicited calls. Telemarketers marketing telephone companies may participate in telephone slamming, the practice of switching a customer's telephone service without their knowledge or authorization.Telemarketing calls are often considered an annoyance, especially when they occur during the dinner hour, early in the morning, or late in the evening. A common complaint about telemarketing has been that the calls are a nuisance and a distraction. In 1909, one target of the unwelcome calls declared "My telephone is far more of a nuisance to me than it is a convenience". However, some companies have capitalized on these negative emotions. Since 2007 several forums have sprouted and act as complaint boards where consumers can voice their concerns and criticism. In response, some telemarketing companies have filed lawsuits against these portals. The current legal system in the U.S grants such forums a certain degree of protection through "Communications Decency Act, 47 U.S.C 230" and California's Anti-SLAPP law.
Robotic telemarketing and ringless voicemail
A recent trend in telemarketing is to use robocalls: automated telephone calls that use both computerized autodialers and computer-delivered pre-recorded messages in a sales pitch. Some can simulate a personalized phone call through personalized pre-recorded messages.Telemarketing has recently been advanced to implement a programmed women's voice as the operator instead of hiring a real woman to perform the task.
This attempt is unsuccessful. However, some scholars argue that such technological advancements reinforce commoditization of a woman's speech as a marketable entity and lead to "gendered hierarchy of communication".
Other tactics, such as ringless voicemail, can directly deliver a voice message directly to a landline's or cellphone's voicemail. Its original purpose was to provide a nonintrusive method of delivering valuable messages. There has been debate on ringless voicemail causing issues relating to "hijacking" of the voicemail by companies, which would disallow family and friends to access the voicemail.
Regulations
In some countries telemarketing is subject to regulatory and legislative controls related to consumer privacy and protection.United States
Telemarketing in the United States is governed at the federal level primarily by the Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991 and the Federal Trade Commission's Telemarketing Sales Rule. The Federal Communications Commission implements additional TCPA regulations under 47 C.F.R. § 64.1200 and derives further authority from the Telemarketing and Consumer Fraud and Abuse Prevention Act. Amendments to the TSR issued in December 2024 expanded the rule to cover certain inbound telemarketing calls related to technical-support services, effective January 9, 2025. In December 2023 the FCC adopted a “one-to-one” consent requirement for autodialed and prerecorded telemarketing calls and texts, although portions of this rule remain subject to legal review. Many professional associations also maintain voluntary codes of ethics intended to promote responsible telemarketing practices.Some jurisdictions have implemented "Do Not Call" lists through industry organizations or legislation; telemarketers are restricted from initiating contact with participating consumers. Legislative versions often provide for heavy penalties on companies which call individuals on these listings. The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has implemented a National Do Not Call Registry in an attempt to reduce intrusive telemarketing nationwide. Telemarketing corporations and trade groups challenged this as a violation of commercial speech rights. However, the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the National Do Not Call Registry on February 17, 2004.
Companies that use telemarketing as a sales tool are governed by the United States Federal regulations outlined in the TSR and the TCPA. In addition to these Federal regulations, telemarketers calling nationally must also adhere to separate state regulations. Most states have adapted "do not call" files of their own, of which only some states share with the U.S. Federal Do Not Call registry. Each U.S. state also has its own regulations concerning: permission to record, permission to continue, no rebuttaling statutes, Sunday and Holiday calls; as well as the fines and punishments exacted for violations.
September 1, 2009, FTC regulations banning most robocalls went into effect.
Since many telemarketing calls now originate offshore, beyond the reach of US legal or regulatory agencies, the National Do Not Call Registry is usually ignored, as well as FTC regulations, and every possible number is called in an area code block. Some automated services are sophisticated enough to analyze the audio from the answering party, and if it determines that a human did not respond, will call repeatedly until one does or a limit is reached. This may be coupled with a fake Caller ID display to mislead the call recipient into answering, or even thinking it is a local number calling. These are not actions of legitimate businesses.
Telemarketing techniques are increasingly used in political campaigns. Because of free-speech issues, the laws governing political phone calls are much lesser stringent than those applying to commercial messages. Even so, a number of states have barred or restricted political robocalls.
The National Do Not Call Registry has helped to substantially curb telemarketing calls to landlines and has also helped with the increasing trend for telemarketers to target mobile phones. As a result, there has been a greater push for mobile applications to help with unwanted calls from telemarketers, like PrivacyStar. These companies have helped to log thousands of complaints to the DNC Registry, since the inception of the registry itself.