Telemarketing or Telesales: Do you know which one you need?
Let’s face it; most people don’t know the difference between Telemarketing and Telesales. This suggests that they don’t understand the important distinct values that can be gleaned from each service. The words ‘Telemarketing’ and ‘Telesales’ are still often used interchangeably and then, they can be used to describe activities that often cross over. However, if you wish to get the most from your telephone campaign, knowledge of the differences and how they can be best employed to help your business is vital.
One of the greatest confusions exists around the history of use of the terms themselves. Traditionally, Telesales (a much older term) existed as its own separate activity. Telemarketing is a much more recent term by comparison and has often been used as an overarching term that also includes Telesales as one of its component elements.
Image by Billy Brown (CC License)
Today, many industry experts use the term Telemarketing to incorporate all activities that use the telephone to connect with (potential) customers. This includes making customers aware of a product or service, generating leads or opportunities, canvassing established customers, providing information, conducting market research, and selling products or services to new or existing customers. So, Telemarketing has become a blanket term that includes Telesales and other areas within its remit
Don’t let that confuse you further; Telesales and Telemarketing are clearly quite different activities. When looking to use a specific service for your business, the following key distinctions should be kept in mind:
TELEMARKETING IS: A service that generates interest, creates opportunities, provides information, factors customer feedback, makes appointments and produces leads by telephone.
TELESALES IS: A service that sells your products or services directly to the customer by telephone.
Telemarketing creates prospects, lets people know about what you have to offer them and provides the opportunity for both customer and business to find out more about each other. Telesales converts those opportunities into business for your company.
Now that you’re aware of the main difference between the two activities/services offered, you can choose which service caters to your own specific needs best. The choice that you make depends entirely upon the results that you wish to acquire.
What can Telemarketing Do For You?
- Telemarketing takes the time and cost out of finding new customers or generating interest in your brand, product or service by taking the information directly to your customer.
- Identify excellent potential leads for your own Telesales team to close.
- Creates a more reliable source of data for your Telesales team, rather than buying the data.
- Good Telemarketing Campaigns drive Great Telesales Campaigns
- Excellent Telemarketers remove the need for large periods of cold calling for sales teams.
- Reduces training costs – Great Telesales staff are not always good Telemarketers; there’s a different skill involved and distinct manner required.
- Professionally presents your brand, product or services to potential customers.
- Canvas existing customers to reveal buying trends, or the potential for new business.
- Inbound calling provides a customer service opportunity that can later be converted into further lead generation or sales.
- Inbound Telemarketing teams can staff your ‘Information’ lines, turning simple requests for information into its solid sales leads.
- Outbound calling provides market research activities that can also produce leads.
- Telemarketing can often reveal ‘low hanging fruit’. These are customers who are already prepared to buy a product or service and do not require much (if any) persuasion.
- Appointment making is a People-skill. Experienced telemarketers create stronger appointments.
- Telemarketing helps to provide a stream of appointments based on customers who are looking for precisely what you offer.
- Telemarketing provides customer satisfaction and often exceeds the needs of the customer.
Image: Pixabay
What can Telesales Do For You?
- If you already have your customer data, you need someone to persistently and persuasively convert those leads into sales.
- A professionally trained telesales team increases your conversion rates whilst decreasing your costs per sale.
- A specialist telesales team is often required to convert difficult leads into sales.
- Resourceful telesales campaigns respond to the accurate customer data supplied by well-organized telemarketing campaigns.
- Effective telesales requires specific expertise. Outsourcing that expertise saves money and increases your sales team to meet your current need. The great value of this expandable sales team is that it can easily be reduced.
- Tailor the size of your telesales campaign to your budget.
- Cold Calling needs a particular temperament; reduce potential customer annoyance by employing experienced cold callers who are sensitive but highly persuasive.
- Remove travel expenses by having a telephone-based sales team.
- Leave customers with a professional impression of your company.
If you’re good at speaking to customers about your products and services, but are lacking interest or contact with customers, you need help with Telemarketing.
If you’re great at attracting potential customers, but find it difficult to convert all that potential into business, you need help with Telesales.
Of course, both telemarketing and telesales services can be combined and carried out by the same company, employing them to work strategically as a joint team. One service can generate a pool of potential leads, whilst the other turns those leads into sales. The Telemarketers set up the appointment, the Telesales staff close the deal.
When Telesales and Telemarketing teams work together, planning, coordinating and tailoring their approach, they produce dramatic results. The great advantage of using one team to bring in a constant stream of leads and another team to convert those leads is the quality of communication and interaction that goes into ensuring both services are serving the same goal, the same customer, you.
However, not all companies can provide the full range of inbound and outbound telemarketing and telesales solutions. Always pick a provider that can fully service your marketing and sales needs.
If your business could benefit from either Telesales or Telemarketing services, or if you would gain greater advantage over your competition from a joint Marketing/Sales approach, contact Andy Dickens today to increase your quality leads today!
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Andy Dickens
Andy Dickens is a veteran of IT Sales, used to leading by example. He is the CEO of Virtual Sales Limited (VSL) who offer telesales, telemarketing, lead generation and appointment setting services to B2b businesses. He previously was Sales Director EMEA for Red Hat and before that ran sales at Visio before it was acquired by Microsoft.