Toll Free Numbers

Consumers are used to being offered 1-800 numbers to dial. Because these phone numbers are toll free for the caller they are appealing to customers. 1-800 numbers are an effective for any remote sales businesses to get people to call them.

Toll free numbers are set up to charge the called party, not the calling party, for the placed call. This added cost of the phone call is offset by the benefits of toll free telephone numbers, especially if the business has some way to directly monetize incoming calls.

Using one or more toll free numbers increases company visibility, and encourages customers to call. This benefit is one of the most obvious returns to establish such a number. Toll free numbers can also increase company efficiency, and there are numerous telephony software solutions that have been designed to help remote sales teams to do this.

One such software solution is a lead management CRM. By linking inbound toll free calls to the CRM, relevant, real time information on the caller will automatically be captured and updated in the CRM’s database. These leads can be saved as future prospects for phone or email campaigns.

Another piece of telephony software that helps sales reps capitalize on toll free numbers is inbound-outbound call blending telephony. With this, sales reps may make outbound calls while they wait to receive an inbound call. The use of a CTI (Computer Telephony Integration) system blending can additionally enhance call blending. These CTI solutions often involve pop-ups or pop-screens, windows that open automatically when the inbound call is answered. This immediately displays all relevant information and allows the sales rep to easy update the contacts data in the CRM.

Automatic Call Distribution (ACD) is another business solution that increases the effectiveness of toll free calls. ACD software is known as call routing software, and it automatically forwards incoming calls to the best available agent. Individual agents can be specified as the primary agent for individual toll free numbers or geographic locations. If preferred agents are not available, incoming calls can then be routed to a designated fail-over destination. This could be the company’s general telephone line, an internal messaging system, or a private cell phone.

The implementation of a toll free number can be the added incentive a potential customer needs to call a business they have not contacted before. These telephony pieces of telephony software gives sales representatives the tools they need to make these calls even more profitable.

What can separate a Remote Sales Professional from a Telemarketer?

rWhat can separate a Remote Sales Professional from a Telemarketer?

Even those of us who work in telephony software can find ourselves annoyed with telemarketers. Perhaps we are even more annoyed with the tactless tactics these sales people use because we see how telesales should be done. We know that there are types of auto dialers that fix many of the “problems” with remote selling by telephone.

Telemarketing originated in the 1950’s, and by the 70’s telemarketing companies were experiencing a tremendous amount of success. By the 1990’s telemarketing was often seen as a public nuisance, and by the end of the decade legislative action was taken with the implementation of the “Do Not Call” registry.

There are several reasons why telemarketers fell out of favor with the American public. These calls were often placed at the least opportune times, right about the time dinner was being served and the family was gathered together. Telesales professionals were often aggressive and refused to respect their contacts wishes not to purchase what they were selling.

On top of this is added the insult of the “telemarketer pause.” This occurs when the telesales company uses a predictive auto dialer. A predictive dialer calls more numbers than available sales agents. It does this based on the amount of dropped calls or busy signals it has been encountering, as well as how much time the sales agents are spending on an average call. Since there is no guarantee that there won’t be more calls answered than there are sales agents to take those calls a percentage of calls trigger a telemarketer pause. This is when there is no agent on the line when the contact answers – the phone is dead.

It is a possibility that such a call will be routed to a sales agent shortly, but in these cases the person called is expected to remain on the line and wait. Most often these contacts simply hang up the phone. With practices like these it is no wonder that we all find ourselves annoyed with these telemarketers.

Responsible remote sales professionals opt for a different kind of auto dialer – a Power Dialer. A power dialer only calls one number at a time for each available sales representative; there is no opportunity for a telemarketer pause to occur. This kind of auto dialer not only satisfies the call center’s need to make more calls but also gives the potential customers being called courtesy that a predictive auto dialer cannot.

It is up to the sales people to deal with the problems of over aggressiveness internally.

3 benefits of using Inbound – Outbound call blending

Many call centers suffer because they completely separate the duties of calling outbound numbers and answering inbound calls. Inbound – outbound call blending is a telephony software solution that increases the productivity of an entire call center by allowing individual sales representatives to handle both inbound and outbound calls.

Sales reps who wish to perform both inbound and outbound calls log into an inbound call receiver and mark themselves as available to take incoming calls. While waiting to receive calls the rep can then log into an outbound initiative in their telephone dialer. By doing so the rep will continually be routed new outbound calls.

When an inbound call is received, inbound – outbound call blending technology routes that call to an available sales rep and disconnects that rep from the outbound dialing initiative (not a call). When the sales rep is finished with that call he is then able to jump right back to making outbound calls.

Screen pop is another type of CTI (computer telephony integration) software that increases the usability of inbound – outbound call blending. CTI screen pop creates a live data link between the sales rep and the company’s CRM for each inbound call. Screen pop detects the caller id of the incoming call and compares that to the CRM database. When a matching entry is found, screen pop opens a new window displaying all of the contact information and history for that phone number. If the incoming call’s caller id does not match an existing entry in the CRM, screen pop opens a blank window instead. The sales rep can record all of the relevant information inside this window which will be saved within the CRM.

This inbound – outbound call blending solution offers the following benefits:

First, businesses stay more productive during down time. By having the same sales representatives take inbound calls while making outbound calls, the amount of inbound calls slows during the work day the sales rep is able to stay just as busy. This creates a significant increase in net calls made and taken per day, per rep.

Second, businesses can spend less on payroll. Since inbound – outbound call blending allows sales reps to take care of both inbound and outbound calls, fewer employees need to be hired to cover both responsibilities.

Third, sales representatives can respond more intelligently to incoming calls. With the uses of CTI screen pop, sales reps are able to have all of the information they need on each incoming call to respond to that lead as effectively as possible.

Contact Managers, what can they do?

Any sales team that sales remotely depends on fresh leads and contacts. A contact manager system keeps all of these leads in order and keeps sales reps selling.

Contact manager systems organize and control all of the tasks and processes associated with creating, contacting, and selling to leads. These systems, which are also called customer relationship managers or CRMs, start their job with lead capturing. A third party lead generation company is certainly one location that a contact manager can upload lead information from. Another productive source of leads is the company website. Contact managers can be programmed to gather information from web forms filled out and submitted on the internet. The information on these web forms are gathered and stored within the CRM and that lead is then qualified based on the information available.

A contact manager system organizes contacts into three separate categories (sometimes referred to as “buckets”). The contacts with in these three categories – leads, prospects, and customers – can have specific tasks assigned to them, or these contacts can be split into smaller groups within their category. Using a CRM a sales representative can interact with a whole group of contacts at once, such as sending them all an identical email or fax message.

Contact managers act as calendars to keep track of meetings or call-back appointments with contacts. Syncing with email systems like Microsoft Outlook and reminding agents of important meetings is only the beginning of what a CRM can accomplish.

Contact managers are the central piece of software that supports many of the other telephony software that allows call centers to function. Power dialers pull lists of leads from the CRM and upload all important data from a call there. Automatic call distribution, or ACD, routes inbound phone calls to the best available agent that is free when the call is received. Contact managers can also be the most reliable basis for business reporting. The real time analytics that a contact manager calculates allows for an accurate interpretation of data to show the underlying trends of the current sales market.

Contact managers also aid sales agents in fulfilling the needs of their contacts. One way that a customer relationship management system does this is with its prewritten email templates and voice messages. These emails or voice messages can be left by the CRM whenever the need arises, stopping the sales agent from wasting calling time in order to send emails to clients and contacts. A contact manager helps with all parts of inside sales.

5 benefits of using CTI Screen Pop with Autodialers for Remote Sales Reps

Screen pop is a useful tool for sales reps that make outbound calls and receive inbound calls.

Screen pop is a form of CTI – computer telephony integration. This refers to any technology that enables a computer and a telephone work together. CTI includes a large number of telephony tools.

Screen pop is a feature of lead management CRMs and telephone dialing systems. Screen pop is especially useful when inbound/outbound call blending is being used.

Inbound/outbound call blending works as follows; first, the sales rep becomes available to receive incoming phone calls. The sales representative then signs in to an outbound autodialer initiative. The autodialer will continue to route new leads for the sales rep to call whenever he is available.

When an inbound call is received by the call center, and the sales rep is between calls, he is automatically marked as unavailable in the outbound autodialer initiative. The inbound call is then routed through to the sales representative.

When this call is routed, CTI screen pop is activated. The screen pop creates a live data link between the company CRM and the incoming call. Key information from the call is immediately captured within the CRM. The caller ID of the incoming call is compared to those stored in the lead management CRM, and the information stored on the incoming call is displayed on screen for the answering sales rep. If there are no records available within the data base a blank screen is displayed. The sales rep can record more contact information and notes on the phone call directly into the screen pop and those changes are saved within the CRM.

There are several important benefits from using CTI screen pop:

1. Sales reps can answer inbound calls knowing much more about those callers. This could include what search engine they visited the company website from and which keyword they had searched for, their company name, their phone number, and more.
2. Sales reps have instant access to prior conversations and the dates and times of those previous calls.
3. Sales reps can immediately capture inbound call data and mark the record for future use.
4. Sales representatives can appropriately response to calls coming from multiple inbound initiatives because of the relevant information presented to him at the start of each call.
5. All information gathered is stored within the lead management CRM’s centralized database, allowing any sales rep to have instant access to all relevant data on any specific caller.

Call Center Auto Dialers

Inside sales is the process of collecting leads, making contacts, and closing sales from a remote location – typically over the telephone. This differs in several ways from outside sales, where sales professionals meet with their prospects face to face. Because it is different inside sales professionals need to utilize sales technologies in order to be the most effective, and compensate for the personal touch. An auto dialer is one such technology that is essential to productive inside sales call centers.

Call centers need to make as many quality calls in a day as they possibly can. A high number of outbound calls also allow call centers to contact individual leads numerous times, if necessary, in order to convert as many customers as possible. Many call centers use ratio auto dialers or predictive auto dialers because of the high level of calls that can be made each day with these solutions.

Ratio and predictive dialers both burn through a large number of leads very quickly because both types of dialers dial more leads than there are available sales agents to take those calls. This is done to account for the number of calls that are not answered or busy. These auto dialers also come with a percentage of dropped calls. For B2B call centers that have a more complex sales process and typically a higher profit on each call, dropped leads are not an option. In this case a power dialer is the only type of auto dialer that should be used.

Power Dialers call only one lead for each sales agent at a time. When a call starts to ring it is routed through to the agent. If the answering machine picks up the auto dialer can be instructed to leave a prerecorded message while the sales agent takes another call. Since these B2B sales are complex and could require a significant amount of time, the power dialer will not begin dialing other leads until the sales agent finishes his call. This solves the problem of burning through leads, dropped calls, and lag time.

Companies using a power dialer can expect to triple their daily call volume compared to manually dialing, but cannot dial the same volume of leads that a company using a ratio or predictive dialer can in a day, which for B2B companies is not necessary. What this kind of auto dialer may lack in shear call volume it more than makes up in its ability to provide each lead with a quality sales experience.

Key features of a Lead Management CRM

A lead management CRM allows sales representatives to effectively use other telephony tools. The CRM is able to triple sales productivity by integrating there numerous telephony software tools into a single, easy to implement, software platform.

The simple interface of a lead management CRM allows sales reps to easily complete their required tasks. Everything a sales representative needs to do can be done within one computer window. From here he can choose to disconnect from the phone dialer, move on to the next call, schedule a call back appointment, view call reports, send an email, and a number of other key tasks.

The technology used by a lead management CRM also helps a sales rep know the best time to contact a web-based inquiry in order to contact, qualify, and close a sale. It uses what is known as web form callback technology to do this. The web form on any website can be programmed to capture the data from the form and transfer it to the CRM. Once in the customer relationship manager, the phone number is immediately routed to a sales rep. The CRM also makes the newly generated and captured lead a high priority for the sales rep to call, ensuring that the call is placed within minutes of the lead submitting information and demonstrating interest. According to a study with Insidesales.com and MIT, when leads are contacted that quickly, the contact rate increases upwards of 800%.

Lead management CRMs add further time saving features with automated voice messaging technology. During the calls when a lead is unable to be contacted, prerecorded messages can be left by the dialer while the sales rep moves on to the next call. Prior to making calls sales representatives can create a whole library of prerecorded voice messages, and have these messages checked for quality control. When a voice mail machine is encountered the sales rep only has to click a button on their screen to have one of those messages left while he moves onto the next sales opportunity. This keeps sales reps talking to live leads, not dealing with machines that can’t make a purchase.

Lead management CRM is a powerful productivity enhancing software solution that is suitable for both B2B and B2C remote sales. Users need very little training before using a CRM for their sales calls, and it has an immediate impact on any remote sales organization.

Online Customer Relationship Managers

Online Customer Relationship Managers provide all of the functions a remote sales team needs to successfully operate. These online CRMs have telephony software solutions, such as power dialing and voice messaging, built right into them. These technologies are designed specifically for businesses who sell to other businesses through their website or over the phone.

Customer Relationship Managers provide a platform for organizing and managing all of the different processes related to inside sales. An online CRM is one specific type of customer relationship manager and is also called a hosted CRM. The software needed to run the CRM is stored on a host company’s server and is accessed over the internet. Using an online-hosted CRM frees an organization from needing to developing its own system and database. Additionally, the information stored in the CRM can be accessed from any computer with internet access. This can be especially convenient when sales agents work remotely and not all in one physical location.

Some of the key featuring that an online CRM includes are power dialing, voice messaging, fax, and email marketing.

A power dialer is also called a phone dialer or an auto dialer. Dialer software will automatically calls through a predefined list of phone numbers and patches them through to available sales reps. This automation software frequently triples the amount of calls each agent is able to make in a typical work day.

Voice messaging technology allows a sales agent to save a previously recorded voice message within the online CRM. By saving and using only their most compelling voice messages a good first impression can be guaranteed with each message left. Voice messages can also be designed allowing listeners to press a button on their own phone in order to prevent further calls from reaching them or to automatically patch them through to an available agent.

Fax and email messaging serves a similar purpose as voice mail. Carefully crafted templates for both kinds of messages can be saved in the online CRM. These templates can be sent to a contact that a sales rep is speaking to as soon as the contact requests additional information. Alternatively, these messages may be sent in place of a voice message. Since these messages are saved with the Customer Relationship Manager they can be sent by the system quickly with little extra work from the sales representative.

Recession Solution? Auto Dialer!

Rising unemployment rates and sinking consumer confidence affects business to business companies, just like any other. In these slouching economic times, all businesses have to look at new ways to reach their targeted audiences.

An inefficient business can still turn a profit in a good economy, but a recession can painfully highlight all the failing areas in a company. One such area is manually dialing sales leads instead of automating the process using an auto dialer.

An inside sales call center who’s sales professionals manually dial all numbers can at times perform reasonably well when a greater percentage of contacts convert into clients. In a typical well-run B2B call center a sales professional, whose primary responsibility is lead generation, can be expected to make 40 or 50 calls each work day. That’s if he was dialing manually. Once that same sales professional switches to using an auto dialer he can expect to be making 170 to 350 calls each workday.

An auto dialer works like this: First the auto dialer has a contact list of leads loaded into the database. The auto dialer will then automatically place a call to each number on that list. Once dialed, the call is routed through to an available sales agent who takes the call as the number is ringing. If the call is busy or not answered, the auto dialer system can be used to send fax, voicemail, or email. By doing all this, auto dialers not only reduce the wasted time spent manually dialing, but also eliminate much of the wasted time spent dealing with busy signals and voice messaging systems.

A hosted auto dialer solution adds even more value to this system. By contracting with a hosted auto dialer provider the maintenance, development, and set up of the dialer is completed by the host company. Also, no software needs to be downloaded on company computers. Instead the auto dialer software is accessed through the internet. This allows sales professionals to work from any location with a telephone and a PC connected to the internet. A hosted dialer solution works with whatever hardware a call center may currently be using.

Inside sales operations can continue to grow in a difficult financial recession, but only when smart telephony technology is used. An auto dialer is such a solution that eliminates much of the wasted time in call centers.

Phone Dialer for the Complex Sale

Business to business (B2B) sales occur when commerce happens between businesses, such as a manufacturer trades with a wholesaler or a wholesaler selling to a retailer. When a remote sales operation participates in B2B sales, those sales are often more complex than business to consumer (B2C) sales. These complex sales require different telephony software than the simpler B2C sales, such as a different kind of auto dialer.

All auto dialers work in a similar way, but not every kind could be described as a complex sale dialer. The purpose of any dialer is to increase the amount of calls and contacts a sales agent can complete in a business day. All auto dialers load a previously generated list of phone numbers and then systematically call each of those numbers. These calls are then routed through to a sales agent. This method is significantly faster than manually dialing, often bringing an increase in call volume upwards of four times what it was previous.

One of the largest differences in telephone dialers is the amount of phone numbers that the dialer calls at a time. Ratio dialers or predictive dialers call several at a time. This ensures that on each dialer a customer will be reached, but comes with some very large drawbacks. First, when a call is answered the dialer has to determine that there is someone on the line before they patch that call through to the sales agent. During this process there is a few second gap between when the contact answers the phone and when the sales rep starts speaking. This “telemarketer pause” is one of the negative experiences that contacts often complain about. Another problem that these kinds of dialers face occurs when more contacts answer the phone than there are available reps. When this occurs the extra calls are dropped, even when their was a person on the contacts line.

Both of these problems are not acceptable for a complex sale dialer. One of the unique qualities of the business to business sale is the “gatekeeper.” This can be either a recorded message system to navigate through or a receptionist whose job could very well be to prevent sales calls from reaching his or her employer. In order to speak to the important decision makers, sales teams cannot afford to come across as automated and impersonal. That is why power dialers are a much better solution for complex B2B sales. These complex sale auto dialers call only one phone number at a time for each available agent. This still speeds up the sales process dramatically, but eliminates the problems of dropped calls and telemarketer pauses.

Inside sales is the process of collecting leads, making contacts, and closing sales from a remote location – typically over the telephone. This differs in several ways from outside sales, where sales professionals meet with their prospects face to face. Because it is different inside sales professionals need to utilize sales technologies in order to be the most effective, and compensate for the personal touch. An auto dialer is one such technology that is essential to productive inside sales call centers.

Call centers need to make as many quality calls in a day as they possibly can. A high number of outbound calls also allow call centers to contact individual leads numerous times, if necessary, in order to convert as many customers as possible. Many call centers use ratio auto dialers or predictive auto dialers because of the high level of calls that can be made each day with these solutions.

Ratio and predictive dialers both burn through a large number of leads very quickly because both types of dialers dial more leads than there are available sales agents to take those calls. This is done to account for the number of calls that are not answered or busy. These auto dialers also come with a percentage of dropped calls. For B2B call centers that have a more complex sales process and typically a higher profit on each call, dropped leads are not an option. In this case a power dialer is the only type of auto dialer that should be used.

Power Dialers call only one lead for each sales agent at a time. When a call starts to ring it is routed through to the agent. If the answering machine picks up the auto dialer can be instructed to leave a prerecorded message while the sales agent takes another call. Since these B2B sales are complex and could require a significant amount of time, the power dialer will not begin dialing other leads until the sales agent finishes his call. This solves the problem of burning through leads, dropped calls, and lag time.

Companies using a power dialer can expect to triple their daily call volume compared to manually dialing, but cannot dial the same volume of leads that a company using a ratio or predictive dialer can in a day, which for B2B companies is not necessary. What this kind of auto dialer may lack in shear call volume it more than makes up in its ability to provide each lead with a quality sales experience.

How to use an Auto Dialer... aka Don't be a rude Telemarketer

What can separate a Remote Sales Professional from a Telemarketer?

Even those of us who work in telephony software can find ourselves annoyed with telemarketers. Perhaps we are even more annoyed with the tactless tactics these sales people use because we see how telesales should be done. We know that there are types of auto dialers that fix many of the “problems” with remote selling by telephone.

Telemarketing originated in the 1950’s, and by the 70’s telemarketing companies were experiencing a tremendous amount of success. By the 1990’s telemarketing was often seen as a public nuisance, and by the end of the decade legislative action was taken with the implementation of the “Do Not Call” registry.

There are several reasons why telemarketers fell out of favor with the American public. These calls were often placed at the least opportune times, right about the time dinner was being served and the family was gathered together. Telesales professionals were often aggressive and refused to respect their contacts wishes not to purchase what they were selling.

On top of this is added the insult of the “telemarketer pause.” This occurs when the telesales company uses a predictive auto dialer. A predictive dialer calls more numbers than available sales agents. It does this based on the amount of dropped calls or busy signals it has been encountering, as well as how much time the sales agents are spending on an average call. Since there is no guarantee that there won’t be more calls answered than there are sales agents to take those calls a percentage of calls trigger a telemarketer pause. This is when there is no agent on the line when the contact answers – the phone is dead.

It is a possibility that such a call will be routed to a sales agent shortly, but in these cases the person called is expected to remain on the line and wait. Most often these contacts simply hang up the phone. With practices like these it is no wonder that we all find ourselves annoyed with these telemarketers.

Responsible remote sales professionals opt for a different kind of auto dialer – a Power Dialer. A power dialer only calls one number at a time for each available sales representative; there is no opportunity for a telemarketer pause to occur. This kind of auto dialer not only satisfies the call center’s need to make more calls but also gives the potential customers being called courtesy that a predictive auto dialer cannot.

It is up to the sales people to deal with the problems of over aggressiveness internally.

Over at InsideSales.com they've started up a company blog. They have an all-star team of employees over there, and they are sure to be providing some quality content. Check them out.

The Insider - Essays, Cool Ideas, & How-To's about Selling Remotely, by InsideSales.com
http://insider.insidesales.com/

What does a dialer do? How about a CRM?

What does an auto-dialer do? The short answer is that it increases sales. That is a tall order for any one business tool. That is why auto-dialers go hand-in-hand with CRMs (customer relationship managers). This pairing provides all the options needed to triple or quadruple sales.

An auto-dialer is a telephony software solution that lets a single telephone operator call through a large volume of phone numbers. What that means is that any particular sales agent can increase the amount of calls that they make during a regular business day. The more calls made the more sales are made. The auto-dialer pulls these numbers from the CRM, which stores contact information in a database.

The auto-dialer automatically routes calls through to the sales rep. Wasted time dialing and dialing wrong or busy numbers is eliminated by the use of an auto-dialer. In addition, an auto-dialer can be programmed to only call numbers in specific time zones or geographic locations at predetermined times of day or days of the week. This allows agents to call leads only during the most productive hours.

Auto-dialers also speed up the how much time a sales rep needs to spend following up on calls each day. One way it does this is by automatically capturing and recording information on each call. This can include the name, address, zip code, and call duration for each lead. In addition, comments about the result of the contact can easily be typed into the CRM to be retrieved the next time that customer is dealt with by the sales team.

Following up is quicker and easier by email messaging or fax messaging software solutions built in to many Customer Relationship Managers. When a sales rep makes a promise to email or fax additional information to the contact he or she can do so immediately with a click of the button from within the CRM. Additionally, email and fax templates can be saved in the system that sales reps can quickly select and send. Consenting contacts can also be added to email campaigns. This is where the Customer Relationship Manager automatically sends, at predetermined intervals, a selection of previously written emails to the lead. The CRM automatically personalizes the emails with the name or business of the lead. These email campaigns serve to help the lead be prepared, or nurtured, for a future conversion

The dialer and CRM both cut time and increase revenue in sales. They effectively get agents connected to leads, keep in contact with clients, and prepare leads that did not convert to become valuable customers in the future.

A Comparison of Telephone Dialers

A phone dialer is a type of telephony software that helps a single sales representative dial a large volume of leads. Because the phone dialer automatically calls through a predetermined list of contacts, the sales rep is able to stay on the phone longer and close more sales.

These dialers are also known as auto dialers or outbound dialers. These auto dialers will allow sales reps to reach thousands of prospective customers per day.

There are several types of telephone dialers, with the main kinds being ratio dialers, predictive dialers, and power dialers.

Ratio and predictive dialers both work to keep the sales reps on the phone every moment they are logged into a dialer initiative. Ratio dialers place numerous, simultaneous calls for each available sales representative. When one of these calls is answered the rest are dropped and the sales rep is transferred to that call. Predictive dialers usually call less people at a time, but start dialing leads before any sales representatives become available. This ensures that a lead will be waiting for each available sales rep, but when leads answer sales calls before any sales representatives are available, those leads are expected to wait on the line until a sales rep is routed in – they rarely do.

Dropped calls are a standard part of inside sales when using either a predictive or ratio dialer. Power dialers offer a solution to the problem of the dropped call.

A power dialer, in comparison to other dialers, focuses on quality interaction between the sales representative and their contact. This is achieved by having the power dialer place a call to only one lead at a time for each sales rep. The sales rep hears the phone rings, and can respond immediately when the call is answered. There is no “preferred drop rate” with a power dialer.

The power dialer is a technological improvement over manual dialing, increasing the number of calls made in a day by roughly 3 times. Power dialers are perfect for B2B communications, where secretaries need to be impressed by a sales rep before they connect him to their boss, and each individual sale is larger. In B2C sales, a power dialer stops the wasting of hundreds of leads a day because of the placement of too many calls.

All of these auto dialers can increase a sales representatives call per day ratio, but only a Power Dialer ensures that each call placed becomes a money making opportunity.

Lead Generation, Web Form Callback

Companies succeed best when they have a lead generation plan. Web form call back is a powerful CRM and power dialer feature that can easily help any lead generation campaign be even more successful.

Many remote sales companies purchase a large number of unqualified leads for their sales representatives to cold call. Cold calling is the practice making unsolicited calls to potential customers. These cold calls have a very low rate of success, but the list of unqualified leads is often the cheapest to purchase. Companies who exclusively cold call often fail to realize that the money saved by purchasing cheap leads rarely equals the cost in time and money spent on calling these leads.

Another common, but ultimately unproductive, system for gathering leads is to expect sales reps to find their own. Companies who engage in this kind of practice frequently find their sales reps spending upwards of forty percent of their day trying to find a person to call.

An effective marketing campaign designed to generate leads is by far the best method of lead generation. These leads are pre-qualified by the marketing process, and significantly more likely to convert into a sale. The most successful businesses target many different outlets in their lead generation campaigns: radio, television, newspapers, and the web. Such marketing campaigns produce both scalable and sustainable sources of new and qualified leads.

The internet serves as a powerful tool in gathering the leads generated through marketing campaigns. The internet is currently the fastest growing and least expensive source of leads for almost every business. Web form callback technology makes the creation of an effective lead generating website even more important.

Web form callback works like this: First, a web form is created a posted on the company website. Interested prospects fill out the web form. The information on the form, such as name, phone number, and email, is instantly captured and transferred to a CRM. The accompanying dialer then routes that newly created contact to a sales rep. The rep then places a call to that lead. Within minutes of submitting the form online the lead is contacted.

Web form callback technology not only produces leads that are interested in the company’s services, it enables the sales rep to contact that lead while the company is still top of mind. This lead generation strategy yields much higher returns than any campaign that focuses on mass amounts of unqualified leads or on sales reps solely responsible to find their own.

Regardless of type, and Auto Dialer is a needed Sales Tool

Auto dialers are powerful software tools used in inside sales. The purpose of an auto dialer is to give the sales representative the ability to dial more quality leads in a day as he or she could without the technology. Numerous companies provide auto dialer software for call centers and individual sales people to use in their work.

To operate, an auto dialer needs to be programmed with a list of phone numbers. If the sales company uses a CRM (customer relationship manager) this call list can be uploaded from the list of leads within the CRM database. As these numbers are called by the auto dialer the CRM displays for the sales rep all available information on the lead, including contact info and previous contact history. These numbers are routed to and answered by the best available sales rep. This greatly reduces the amount of time individual sales representatives spend looking up a leads’ contact information, manually dialing the phone numbers, and sitting through ring tones, busy signals, and answering machines.

Some auto dialer providers require their customers to purchase and host the auto dialer software on their own computer system. Others may require special hardware to be bought and installed to use their auto dialer system. These practices can drive up the cost of acquiring an auto dialer, significantly.

An alternative to this is a company that provides a hosted auto dialer. These hosted dialers require no on site software hosting, instead all of the necessary software and databases are housed on the host company's servers and accessed through the Internet. An online hosted auto dialer also requires less specific telephony hardware as some other auto dialer providers. Hosted auto dialers only require a telephone, a phone line, and a computer with Internet access.

Auto dialers are able to be integrated with other telephony software. A CRM can be used to upload and save data on the leads and customers dialed. Email and fax messaging solutions can be used to send important messages to contacts right from the dialer interface while the sales rep is still on the phone with the contact. Inbound-outbound call blending allows sales representatives who are using an auto dialer to also receive incoming business calls.

In addition to online auto dialers, there are several different forms of these telephone dialers, such as the power dialer that strategically dialers one lead per each available sales rep at a time. Regardless of the type of auto dialer, they are used for one purpose – make more calls and close more sales.

Presenting Ken Krogue!

Ken is one the bosses over at InsideSales.com. He's a great guy with a keen sense on what works and what doesn't when it comes to remote sales opperations. He has quite the resume, but I'll let Ken tell you all about it over at his own Blog. It will be worth the click to get access at all of the juicy knowledge Ken's been gathering over the year.

Ken's Blog:
Inside Sales Entrepreneur
http://www.kenkrogue.com/

Why do I need software to do telemarketing?

Businesses that practice remote sales need to use telemarketing software in order to be productive. Telemarketing is now used by many retail businesses, and these remote call centers should be organized, efficient, customer service oriented, and above all—profitable. Telemarketing software has been developed to help the growing number of businesses reach these goals. The use of telemarketing software provides a competitive edge in this market by allowing companies to get more done.

The auto dialer is a type of telemarketing software. Dialers call through a list of leads or contacts. In between calls the sales representative stays logged into the dialer system and the dialer continues to calls leads for him. This allows the dialer to immediately route new calls to the sales person. Over the course of a typical work day each sales agent is able to make more calls and spend more of their day selling. Compared to dialing manually sales agents are able to make as many as four times the amount of sales calls when using a dialer.

Contacts can be uploaded directly from a CRM and many dialers have the ability to integrate with the top CRMs. CRMs (customer relationship managers) also track all of the processes associated with remote sales. From the information screens within the CRM calls can be made instantly to contacts and clients. With this click-to-call technology a single mouse click will connect a sales agent to the specified contact.

Email messaging is an important feature available with telemarketing software. Remote sales professionals spend up to a third of their day following up on the calls they made that day. This involves sending emails with additional information on products or promotions. Email messaging technology cuts this time drastically by automating the process. Email templates are designed before the sales calls even take place and can be tested to see what email best achieves the desired action. When an email needs to be sent, it can be done during the actual phone call from within the CRM. By cutting out the time it takes to follow–up, sales agents can spend more time on the phone making calls and closing sales.

The investment in these software programs is worth it to any organization that expects to compete in the remote sales market.

Trying to stop time wasting in your call center? Start using a Power Dialer

There are common obstacles that waste sales representatives’ time. It can take a lot of time to manually dial each lead on a long contact list. Sales representatives then have to spend more of their time waiting for someone to answer their calls. Often those calls are sent to voice mail systems, and sales reps have to wait through automated responses before leaving their own message when they could be moving on to a new lead. Sales agents often have to take a significant portion of their work day to follow up on those calls, including sending emails or fax messages. Inside sales companies with a complex sales process who perform business to business sales have the added obstacle of negotiating with receptionists and navigating around “gatekeepers”.

A power dialer is a software solution that calls through an uploaded list of contacts. This automated process immediately removes the dullness of manually dialing from a sales agent’s routine. Between dials the agent stays on the line, there is no hanging up after each call when using a power dialer. The next contact is immediately patched through. This feature of the power dialer can increase call volume three or four times from what it was previously.

Power dialers also incorporate voice messaging capability. Sales agents prerecord the messages they plan to leave. This lets agents proof the messages they will leave during the day to ensure those messages are exactly what they want to leave. These prerecorded messages can then be automatically left when an answering machine is encountered by the telephone dialer. This saves time for the sales agent who can move on to another call while the message is being left.

Power dialers work similarly in regards to email or fax messages. Templates for these messages can be created before calling through a list. When a sales rep promises to send an email or a fax message he or she can select the template on their computer. This message is automatically sent with very little work on the part of the sales representative, and the lead wouldn’t be able to help but be impressed by how quickly their requests are met.

Power dialer software provides many benefits. It saves so much time for sales representatives and with all of that time saved sales reps can spend more time selling. It is hard to find an excuse not to have one.

Two big problems with Predictive Dialers

Predictive Dialers are old news.

Predictive phone dialers are a staple of call centers whose business plan involves cold calling a large volume of contacts each day. These calls centers have generated not only profit, but a good deal of contempt, and have been the targets of sweeping FCC regulations. Because of changes in how both consumers and lawmakers view telemarketers call center technology has also had to change. The problem with predictive dialers – and cold calling in general – is the lack of respect given to the contacts.

This is how a predictive dialer works. The sales manager uploads a list of contacts into the dialer. The dialer checks how many representatives are available to take calls, and then it starts dialing. When calls are answered they are automatically patched through to a sales rep waiting for a call. Because call centers using predictive dialers want as little down time as possible their dialers call more numbers than there are available reps - sometimes as many as 10 calls for each sales rep - and starts dialing new contacts before the reps finish their former call. This certainly ensures that all sales reps will be busy all the time, but it also frustrates contacts.

This frustration arises out of two things, the inconvenient times telemarketers call and the famed “telemarketer pause.”

Call centers using predictive phone dialers often call at times when they are most likely to reach a contact at home. But, these contacts are not in a buying mindset when called, and frequently view the sales rep as a nuisance. This annoyance is even greater when the contact answers their phone and has to wait on the line until a sales rep pitches him something he does not want.

Since the predictive dialer calls more contacts than there are sales reps, those “extra” contacts who answer are left on the line with no one on the other end of the line. If contacts are patient enough, and a sales rep becomes available fast enough than a sales rep will be patched into the call after a few moments of silence, the telemarketer pause. What is more likely is that the contacted lead will be annoyed with the dead call and disconnect before they ever speak with a sales agent.

A power dialer is an alternative to the archaic predictive dialer, and fixes the frustrations that a predictive dialer causes. A power dialer calls through a list of contacts for each rep, one at a time. Each answering contact is guaranteed to have a representative available to talk with them immediately. Power dialers can also help sales reps contact leads at the best possible moment with web form callback technology. This software solution captures leads from submitted web forms from a company’s website, and immediately dials that lead for an available rep. This lead is contacted at the time they are thinking about the product being sold – not over their family dinner.

Power dialers still increase call center productivity three times that of a call center that dials manually, but eliminates the predictive dialer’s flaws that make cold calling a less effective method of selling.

Steps for Tracking Sales Leads

Sales lead tracking analytics makes sure that all leads are given the care and attention they need to become a profitable client. Software available with CRMs (customer relationship managers) aids greatly in the sales lead tracking process.

It takes both time and money to gather leads. The internet is a powerful resource for lead generation. Company websites are frequently developed to lead visitors to fill out and submit a web form. With the submission of the form that visitor becomes a new lead for the company’s sales representative to contact. Alternatively, companies can purchase leads from third party lead generation businesses.

Sale lead tracking for these newly captured web leads or purchased leads begins by having these leads imported into a CRM database. The CRM qualifies these leads based on the information gathered and converts these leads into “prospects” within its system.

These prospects are then routed through to sales people who move them through the sales process. The specific actions that the sales people offer the prospect are predefined within the CRM, and as prospects progress through the sales process that is recorded within the database. Based on defined probabilities that of a sales closure for each step of the sales process, sales lead tracking software can then give a prediction of sales revenue for the week based on prospects within the sales pipeline.

Visibility reports can easily be created in various formats with sales tracking software. These reports allow managers to evaluate the individual, team, or company return on investment. Added to this, forecast reports give important insights to the rest of the operational and support teams to stage the resources necessary to support the sales and marketing efforts.

These steps of sales analytics are important in maximizing ROI, and making sure each sales person is doing their part for the sales team.

Get more out of your CRM by using a Power Dialer

A power dialer is one piece of software that will instantly increase the productivity of your current CRM. CRMs (customer relationship management) track all of the processes associated with sales and store all the data about your clients. A power dialer enhances the outbound calling functions of the CRM.

A power dialer can be integrated into all major brands of CRM. The power dialer and CRM work together like this: The CRM stores a list of contacts and their relevant information. That contact list is then uploaded into the power dialer. The power dialer then calls through each contact on that list automatically one at a time. These calls are then patched through to one of your sales agents.

The power dialer provides several benefits. Leads and contacts can be called on average of four times faster when using a power dialer as compared to manually dialing, which cuts down the amount of wasted time between calls. Because of this three to four times as many calls can be placed in a typical work day. Both of these benefits allow your sales agents to spend more of their time selling. Not only does this increase the number of sales closed it also boosts employee moral – sales agents want to be selling, not dialing!

These are not the only benefits a power dialer can give you when integrated with a CRM. It automatically makes the CRM a more powerful tool for your business, which also makes the CRM a more valuable investment. With both of these software solutions, it becomes easy to measure results with real time metrics and clear analytics.

Power dialers that have been designed to be added to a CRM can be installed in minutes. Training to use power dialers is minimal. There is no additional, costly hardware to purchase when acquiring a power dialer. Instead a power dialer uses your existing phone lines.
Other telephony tools built into a CRM work perfectly with a power dialer. Automated voice messaging is a perfect example. Voice messaging works by having your sales agents record messages to be left for clients which are then stored within the CRM. Normally these messages can be left while the sales agent stays on the line with a voice mail system. With a power dialer, that recorded voice message is left without the sales agent having to stay on the line. The sales agent can move onto a new call, saving even more time and giving him the chance to make even more sales.

An Online CRM will earn Money for an Inside Sales company

A company is performing inside sales if it a company that sales its services or products from a remote location, meaning they interact with clients using the telephone and internet instead of face-to-face. These companies often cut costs associated with travel and store front upkeep while having access to a more reliable stream of potential clients. If a company’s own marketing efforts are not enough to bring in the desired amount of leads, they can be purchased from lead generation sources and divided up among sales representatives.

Like any type of sales, inside sales requires several steps from start to finish. From lead generation all the way through closing the sale, many different sales agents may interact with any particular lead or client. In order to track all of the interactions that a contact has with the company, and to plan what needs to be accomplished with that lead next, CRMs were developed. CRM stands for Customer Relationship Management, and these systems are the brains behind inside sales. Particularly, an online CRM saves an inside sales organization time and increases their sales volume.

The difference between an online CRM and other kinds is how convenient it is for the companies that use it. Instead of having to purchase and download software on each computer used, the CRM is hosted completely online. This is especially helpful for companies where employees work from home and also a time saver for companies who use a call center. The information within the online CRM can be accessed anywhere the internet is available.

All CRMs benefit from the integration of other telephony tools. This integration creates the most powerful and convenient package of software solutions for the sales agents. Power dialers are a very important telephony tool that should be fully integrated with the CRM. Dialers double or triple the amount of calls sales agents can make in one business day. The prerecording of voice messages, as well as the function to automatically leave them on answering machines, is a time saving integration that also increases the quality of the messages and impressions sales agents leave. Automatic enrollment of new contacts into a campaign, a predetermined series of tasks that the online CRM will automatically schedule to be completed at specified intervals, is another software solution that greatly increases the productivity of sales professionals.

Venturing into inside sales offers many benefits to any sales organizations. Researching, purchasing, and using a trusted online CRM can help increase contact volume and sales closure in those companies.

Explore your options in Telephony Software

In telecommunications, when the term telephony is used it encompasses the general use of equipment and software to link two or more telephones. The goal is to allow individuals to communicate over great distances. Telesales has moved telephony software outside of the realm of simply allowing two people to talk. Today, many different telephony software solutions have been developed to aid sales agents through the entire sales process.

A key advancement in telephony software is known as CTI. This stands for Computer Telephony Integration. This technology allows telephones and computers to interact with each other and to share information. Here is an example of CTI in action: when an incoming phone call is received by a sales agent the computer automatically recognizes that phone number, finds that number within its database, and displays on the computer screen of the sales rep all of the information stored on that individual. With this automatic data retrieval the sales agent is prepared to have a profitable interaction with the caller.

The database that makes this possible is called a CRM (Customer Relationship Management). In addition to storing information on each contact, this piece of telephony software organizes, calendars, and tracks all of the processes that are done as part of inside sales. A customer relationship management system is most useful when another telephony software solution is utilized, the power dialer.

One of the most basic tasks for a sales representative is placing a call. He or she can make three times their previous volume of calls per day by switching from manual dialing to using a power dialer. A power dialer is programmed with an uploaded list of phone numbers, and then automatically dials those numbers one at a time for the sales agent. When a call is answered it is instantly routed through to the agent. This telephony software solution capitalizes on the incredible data management capabilities of a CRM.

A myriad of additional telephony software can be incorporated with the CRM and power dialer pairing. Web form callback technology allows leads to be created with in the CRM every time a web form is submitted on the company website. Voice message broadcasting technology allows sales representatives to automatically send prerecorded messages to an entire list of leads. Automatic call distribution technology removes the need for an operator to route incoming calls through to the appropriate agent.

These are just a few of the different telephony software tools available to inside sales departments today. Look for a company that offers a variety of software solutions that are already fully integrated with their CRM and power dialer.

Don’t give up on leads! How you can get a conversion from every contact

Your team of sales professionals works hard, day after day, to convert new leads into paying clients. Power dialers, CRM, and other telephony tools aid sales people in qualifying leads, placing calls, and closing sales, but even if they are the best group of sales agents in your field they undoubtedly still encounter prospective clients who do not convert. With the same power dialer suite they use to make calls they can also use to lead those contacts to conversion in the near future. This process is called lead nurturing.

The idea behind lead nurturing is that your product or service is so great that everyone will want it at some time. By keeping the mindset that every lead will convert at some point, leads are never automatically dumped into a “not interested” category where they are never thought of again. After all, your marketing department has gone through a lot of hard work to get those leads for the sales team.

Lead nurturing works like this; after the power dialer connects the sales rep to the contact the sales person makes sure he or she gathers a few important pieces of information. This would include name, company name, phone number, email address, and permission to email them in the future. All of this information should be saved with in the CRM (which stands for customer relationship management). If your lead was generated from a form filled out on the company website, it is still a good idea to verify both the information and whether the prospect has given permission to be emailed. With this information your sales team is prepared to help that lead move along the path to conversion even if they initially decide not to purchase your product.

After gathering these crucial data points the contact can be assigned to an enrollment campaign, which can be done right from the power dialer software. These campaigns are a series of tasks that you design to help your contacts build up a bank of positive impressions of your company. What works best is a combination of emails and phone calls. Each task is automatically scheduled by the CRM. Emails are sent at predetermined intervals, and calls are scheduled for your sales agents. The enrollment campaign solution built into the CRM saves time for your sales team, and the small time commitment they do have to give towards these leads pays off in dividends as they convert into valuable customers over time.

What are the strengths of SFA?

A customer relationship management system tracks and organizes all of the processes and tasks that are needed to be done during the sales process. The collecting and automating of all of these tasks is also called sales force automation. A sales force automation system (SFA) is most effective when it is able to integrate the many different departments needed to complete a complex sale from beginning to end. Many telephone software solutions have been developed to support an SFA.

The most basic functions of a sales force automation system are calendaring and scheduling. SFAs are able to keep track of appointments and tasks on both an individual level and for entire groups. This ensures that all follow-up and call-back appointments are kept by sales and support representatives. This simple function is very important to sales force automation, but the other innovative tools used alongside an SFA are what separate it from a simple calendaring application.

Power dialer is a perfect example. A dialer’s purpose is to automatically call through a list of contacts and prospects for a sales agent. This saves a large amount of time for the sales agent who would normally have to look up and dial each number manually. What separates a power dialer from other kinds of telephone dialers is the fact it only calls one number at a time. This straightforward way of placing calls ensures that every answered call will have a sales agent to speak to immediately, and that no call placed by the power dialer is ever dropped.

Faxing, emailing, and voice messaging are three additional tools that support sales force automation. These messages, regardless of the media, can be prerecorded and saved within the
SFA. Any sales agent can send messages with just a click of the mouse and at anytime during a call. This allows him or her to not only give the contact additional information that a sales rep may promise to send, but also leave the best impression possible by using carefully thought out and executed messages.

The true strength of an SFA is enrollment campaigns. This feature is sometimes referred to as ELF for Electronic Labor Force. If a lead or contact fits a predetermined demographic or type of prospect then it can be assigned to a specific campaign. Once enrolled the SFA does all of the work. Previously specified emails, faxes, and voice messages will be sent to the enrolled lead at specified intervals. Additionally tasks will be created for sales agents to call that lead, too. This enrollment program ensures that the lead will receive all of the attention it needs to convert, and sales force automation takes the work out of it for the sales representatives.

Voice Broadcasting

A voice message dialer allows a remote sales business to use voice broadcasting. This technology takes traditional voice message campaigns and implements them in a much more efficient manner.

Voice messaging fulfills several important roles within inside sales. First, it gives sales agents the opportunity to make positive contact with a potential client when they are unable to reach them on the phone. The best possible message a sales representative could leave can be recorded before the sales rep ever makes a call. This message is saved to be used later, whenever a message like that needs to be left. In this way voice messaging becomes a convenient tool, letting the sales rep leave the kind of quality messages he or she would like to every time. Several advances in telephony software make it possible for a sales agent to be able to move onto another call as their computer program leaves that message, which adds up to a large amount of time saved.

These voice messages can still be interactive, for times when a client answers the phone after the sales agent directs the message to be left. Interactive Voice Response, often refereed to by the acronym IVR, grants the contact the option of pressing specific keys on their dial pad to direct the computer program what to do. This could include having their number placed on a do not call list or having a call routed through to a live agent immediately.

Voice broadcasting takes this technology one step further. Voice broadcasting means no longer will a sales agent call through a large volume of calls one by one and leave messages only when a new lead is not contacted. Voice broadcasting takes care of all of that for the sales representatives.

Voice broadcasting works by having a prerecorded message uploaded into its system. Additionally a phone list of potential clients needs to be provided. The voice broadcasting system will dial through to each of those phone numbers automatically. Once those calls are either answered or a voice message system picks up the voice broadcasting system then relays the message saved within it. These messages traditionally are compatible with IVR. Because of this clients are able to speak to a live agent if they choose to do so.

Voice broadcasting not only speeds the contact process, but it also frees sales agents to perform other calls. Voice broadcasting can serve as a powerful way to contact a large volume of contacts in a short period of time.

Sales Lead Tracking

Sales lead tracking is a very important part of the remote sales process. Without it, it is impossible to ensure that the most amount of contacts and leads convert into profitable clients. With it, a remote sales organization can really flourish. There are many B2B software solutions available to help with sales lead tracking. This includes Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems that track and calendar all of the processes associated with lead tracking.

Sales lead tracking starts with importing sales leads from the CRM to prospecting teams. These individuals are responsible for qualifying leads before they are handed over to the men and women on the sales teams. Power dialers help with this process considerably by increasing the number of leads each member of the prospecting team can contact and qualify. Often this number is three or four times greater than what any particular sales individual can call manually. Once these leads are qualified they are transferred from leads to prospects in the CRM.

These prospects are then routed through to available sales representatives. The customer relationship management system can be set to record any or all of these phone calls. These can be saved with an individual’s contacts information within the CRM for future reference, or can be reviewed for quality control. Each action that a sales agent takes with the contact is recorded within the CRM as well, tracking where in the sales process each lead is. Future tasks that need to be completed concerning that lead, such as a follow up call, can be calendared by the CRM. The CRM will automatically remind the sales representative when that scheduled item needs to be completed.

Real time statistics and analytics are an important part of a CRM’s sales lead tracking functionality. These reports are highly customizable so the configuration can be altered to best suit any remote sales organization. The sales lead tracking software built into a CRM can import, export, organize, format, and forecast all of the data it collects through the sales process. By creating visibility reports for management, individuals, teams, or companies can each be accurately evaluated based on their return on investment. By using forecasting reports, in both graphical summaries and detailed sales deal records, sales representatives can accurately forecast revenue flow and prepare the organizations support teams to adequately support the sales and marketing efforts.

Even sales leads that do not instantly convert should be kept track of by the CRM. These contacts often become valuable clients in the future. Sales lead tracking software can make sure that these individuals are kept in regular contact with the company.

Avoid company burnout with an Auto Dialer

Burnout is a serious problem in any profession, including inside sales. This exhaustion often arises when an employee is required to do monotonous tasks over and over again. Disinterest and a lack of efficiency are common symptoms of burnout. To prevent burnout simple and monotonous tasks need to be automated so that the sales representatives don’t have to manually accomplish all of these tasks. An example of a telephony software solution designed to fix this problem is the autodialer.

An autodialer allows a single sales team representative to make a large amount of outbound calls, and to make them quickly. To do this the autodialer needs to be loaded with a list of phone numbers. The autodialer then calls through this list one at a time. As the calls are being completed the autodialer patches the call through to the sales representative. Not only does this remove the monotony of manually dialing, it also speeds up the process. Typical sales agents can increase their sales volume as much as four times when they switch to using an autodialer. Sales professionals can then call three hundred or more people in a single workday.

Dialing is not the only common task that an autodialer can help a sales agent accomplish. This is especially true when an autodialer is used in conjunction with a Customer Relationship Manager. For example, many dialers are integrated with Customer Relationship Managers (CRMs) to provide instant email messaging for sales agents. A significant amount of time a sales representative spends at work is used to fulfill promises he or she made to his or her contact. For every five or six hours spent on the phone two or three them are typically spent sending emails or faxes in response to those conversations.

While a sales rep is on a call using an autodialer, he or she can send en email with barely any effort at all. The CRM stores several email templates that are used often by sales people. With only a couple of mouse clicks the sales representative can have the contact receiving exactly what they wanted within moments of asking for it. This reduces burnout by automating the writing and sending of the myriads of emails a typical sale’s agent is asked to send in a day. That added time can be spent on more dynamic calls to live contacts.

Even the most basic of tasks, creating phone lists for the autodialer, can be automated by the CRM and loaded into the autodialer. The automation of these simple sales chores reduces employee burnout and increases customer satisfaction.

Automatic Call Distribution and what it can do for your business

Inside sales operations spend a most of their time calling people, at least that’s what they should be doing. These outbound calls are often what receive the single greatest amount of a sales representative’s time. Inbound calls are usually more valuable than the individual outbound calls because they can represent existing clients or those contacts who are actively seeking out a company’s product or service.

There are telephony software solutions that increase the efficiency of receiving these inbound calls regardless of whether an inside sales business uses in-house agents or if those agents work remotely. One of these solutions is ACD, or Automatic Call Distribution. The purpose of this telephony tool is not only to allow sales agents to receive inbound calls, but also to route those calls to the right personnel automatically.

ACD call routing works well in combination with toll free phone numbers. Managers of the system can establish which toll free numbers should be answered by which sales representatives. This can be determined by which geographic location the toll free number is advertised in, by which department that toll free number is associated with, or any other delineation. By automatically routing calls based on which sales agents can best responds instantly improves customer relations. In the event that there are no designated sales reps that call is not dropped. Instead, the Automatic Call Distribution system can be directed to route that incoming call to a fail–over number. This fail-over number could be anything from the general office line to voice messaging systems. ACD could even route the call through to one of the agents’ personal cell phones. There is no need for any inbound call to be unanswered or dropped when using ACD call routing.

This telephony solution often offers many quality control features. Usually this includes the option to record calls being completed. These recordings can be stored along with every other bit of data associated with a particular caller. These calls can be retrieved and played back if ever the need arises.

All of this makes it faster and easier to connect incoming calls to the right people. By decreasing customer wait time ACD raises customer satisfaction. When this is linked to an outbound dialer all agents that receive inbound calls can also be actively making outbound calls. ACD removes the slow, down times that can occur in a business day, generating the greatest amount of calls made and sales closed.

Dialer Software that meets the Demands of Inside Sales

Several problems are faced by inside sales teams. Those problems may include—what can be done to increase productivity by making more calls and closing more sales? How is a high level of quality and customer care going to be assured? What measures are going to be taken to ensure that all promises made to contacts will be fulfilled? There are probably numerous answers for each of these problems, but to remain efficient a sales team needs to use one simple and effective solution to meet all of these needs. Power dialer software is such a solution.

Power dialer software, in its simplest form, is a program that automatically dials phone numbers from a contact list for a sales agent. This alone decreases the amount of time spent on each individual call and increase the volume of calls each sales person is able to make in a typical work day. Power dialers are designed to help a sales representative to make three hundred dials in a day, compared to a manual dialing average that is around seventy five.

Phone dialer software increases productivity further when that dialer is integrated with email or voice messaging solutions. From the dialer software previously composed emails and voice messages can automatically be sent. This frees the sales agent from using valuable calling time waiting to leave messages himself on voice mail systems or sending various different emails to many different customers at the end of his or her work day. A typical sales person spends only five or six hours of their day making phone calls and upwards of three hours sending emails or other messages to those contacts. Phone dialer software cuts this time down to a fraction of what it commonly takes, all with only a couple of mouse clicks.

Using carefully constructed emails and voice messages is also one of the steps dialer software takes to ensuring quality control. Instead of fumbling over their messages sales agents can record one in their own voice that says exactly what they and their employers want said. An additional way phone dialers assure quality from a sales team’s performance is with optional call recording. By recording and monitoring sales calls training can be planned to strengthen the sales agents and help them be more efficient in their job.

Each of these functions of well designed dialer software works together to create an easy to use system that meets the demands of inside sales.

Complex Sales require the Power Dialer

An outbound phone dialer is a kind of telephony software that automatically calls through a list of phone numbers for a sales agent. Power dialers are one specific kind of dialer that is particularly effective. A sales representative who switches from dialing manually to using an outbound power dialer can expect a large increase in the volume of sales calls they can make in a business day. Research has shown it is not uncommon for this increase to be as much as four times the previous call volume. Some sales reps report that they are able to make three hundred to upwards of three hundred and fifty calls using a power dialer. That is equivalent to doing eight hours worth of work in only two or three

Outbound dialers work by loading a telephone number list of contacts or leads and then dialing them one at a time for the sales agent. The agent receives a phone call, from the dialer. When he or she answers the call, the dialer automatically patches through the phone call with the lead. After the call the sales representative stays on the line, and the dialer automatically patches through another call. This continues for as long as the agent stays on the line.

Power dialers call through this list one number at a time. Other outbound dialers that call a group of leads simultaneously are called ratio or predictive dialers. This allows these other dialers to call more leads, but only one of those calls can be routed through to the sales agent at a time. If more than one lead answers during each round of calling those extra calls are dropped, cutting off the other contacts who answer their phones. Additionally, it takes a moment for the outbound dialer to recognize when one of the many calls they are making is answered. This small time is referred to as a telemarketer pause, and often annoys leads being contacted.

Power dialers eliminate both the problems of the telemarketer pause and dropped calls. This makes the power dialer especially suited for complex sales processes, including B2B (business to business) sales. Since B2B sales often involves speaking to secretaries before a decision maker, and since they also tend to be high stakes sales, it is especially important to give each contact a personalized and streamlined approach. Other types of dialers just cannot do this.

Four telephony software solutions that increase lead management

Proper lead generation and response management requires a whole collection of complementary communication and telephony software tools. These lead management solutions work to better the sales experience during the entire sales process.

A power dialer helps you reach more leads quicker. Dialing manually sales agents generally average thirty to fifty calls in a standard work day. With a power dialer sales representatives can contact one to two hundred leads in a workday. In addition, when a power dialer is integrated in other telephony software such as an online CRM, the dialer is able to organize, guide, and prompt the sales agents using it to follow a pre-defined sales process.

Generally, a sales rep who spends five or six hours a day on the phone will need to spend two or three hours off the phone fulfilling promises to provide proposals, faxes and emails. Email or fax messaging telephony software provides a sales team with templates for all of these collateral processes. Sales agents are then able to fulfill these tasks while they are still on the phone with a lead. Sales team members can then spend a full day contacting newly generated lead, and all without sacrificing any customer service.

The addition of inbound outbound call blending to a telephony software suite allows sales reps to address customer needs even further. With this software solution every sales agent can be actively calling newly generated leads. These lists of leads are programmed into the dialer, and they are automatically routed through to the sales agent. With inbound outbound call blending, these outbound dialing sales reps can also receive calls. When an inbound call is received the dialer patches that call through to the sales agent instead of dialing a new lead for them. This ensures that every existing customer is adequately taken care of without sacrificing important time reaching out to prospective clients.

Voice messaging is another important piece of telephony software. It is not rare for sales agents to sit through many voice mail messages while dialing leads. With a voice messaging system this wasted time is eliminated. In order to work a message needs to be recorded by the sales rep. This message is then saved in the voice messaging system. When the agent gets a lead’s voice mail system, the sales agent can simply direct the dialer to continue to another call automatically, and leave that prerecorded message. While the telephony software completes this task the sales agent can continue on to another call.

This is not an exhausting list of telephony software solutions. There are many different tools available for the sales professional that sells remotely.

Great Telemarketing Software Options

Telemarketing, or telesales, is a form of direct marketing, where individual sales agents contact leads and solicit the prospective client to buy their products or services. It is a form of remote, or inside sales, which means the lead interacts with the company over the phone and not in person. To support this industry a wide range of useful telemarketing software has been developed. Telemarketing software solutions offer different usability to sales teams, and not all solutions are necessary to create a functioning sales operation.

A Customer Relationship Manager (CRM) is one of the most useful forms of telemarketing software. The CRM stores and tracks all of the data and processes associated with the sales process. A CRM allows many of the needed tasks associated with taking care of current or prospective clients to be automated.

A telephone dialer is another one of the most basic and useful telemarketing software. A phone dialer takes a list of phone numbers and automatically makes those calls for sales agents. It then patches those calls through to the available sales rep. Dialers are able to retrieve phone lists from a customer relationship manager, or it can be programmed in some other way.

Email or fax marketing software is another option. These give many options to a remote sales team. For example, a number that is not reached may be sent an email or fax message instead, ensuring that the lead receives some sort of contact. Also, a sales rep on the phone with a customer can instantly send an email or fax when they ask for more information. The agent is able to immediately follow up on his offer and not waste time fulfilling it later or potentially forget about it.

Another useful example of telemarketing software is web form callback. This software solution is intended to make sure that new leads generated by web forms from the company’s site are contacted within minutes of that form being submitted. This works by automatically creating a lead from a submitted web form, creating a task in the CRM for that lead to be contacted, and instructing the dialer to complete that task as soon as it can. With this tool an agent can be calling that prospective client back in minutes.

These are only a few of the many different telemarketing software solutions that have been designed for the expanding industry of inside sales. Each serves to improve the sales processes, and give more customer satisfaction.

Power dialers fix several problems of predictive dialers

Telephone dialers are software solutions that allow a sales professional the ability to call through a large volume of phone numbers in a business day. There are several kinds of telephone dialers, but they have several defining traits in common.

The purpose of a telephone dialer is to increase the number of calls made. Call centers and similar inside sales organizations frequently report an increase that is four times what they were calling previously. Because number of leads called increases the number of leads contacted. The end result is the number of sales closes increases and more money is made for the business.

To operate, every telephone dialer needs to be programmed with a list of phone numbers to call. Depending on your customer management software used along with the telephone dialer when each number is called more contact information on the lead may be presented to the sales agent on their computer screen. As numbers are called by the telephone dialer, the dialer routes answered calls to sales agents. This greatly reduces the amount of time individual sales representatives spend looking up leads’ contact information, manually dialing the phone numbers, and sitting through ring tones, busy signals, and answering machines.

The differences are in the amount of calls placed by the dialer at a time. Predictive dialers call many leads at a time. The ratio of how many people called is customizable, and different from call center to call center. The predictive phone dialer automatically calls whatever number of leads it has been programmed to, and then it analyzes the response. Busy signals, disconnected numbers, and voice mail messages can all be identified by the predictive dialer and the call is disconnected. Those that are answered by a live human are routed to a sales agent. While many leads are able to be called in this manner, there are a couple serious drawbacks. First, there is a pause when the lead first answers as the dialer attempts to identify whether or not there is a live person answering. Second, if more calls are answered than there are sales reps present then those calls are dropped.

A power telephone dialer addresses these problems. Instead of calling a whole mass of leads at once, the power dialer calls one lead at a time for each sales representative. While this means a slightly smaller number of leads being called compared to a predictive dialer (though it is still significantly more than manually dialing), the “telemarketer pause” and the risk of dropping calls are almost completely eliminated.

Online dialers provide all of the benefits of other phone dialers, but with less of the stress

Standard telephone dialers offer incredible power to companies who use them. The downside is they can come with the inconvenience of purchasing, installing, and managing hardware. Many companies require the purchase of dialer hardware, or design their software to only work with specific phone lines.

A less taxing alternative is a company who has designed a phone dialer that needs no onsite hardware. Often, this requires the purchasing, installing, and upkeep of that company’s software. With each added feature or business solution the amount of software that is mandated to be downloaded on the client company’s own computers increases.

An online dialer eliminates the hassle of both the acquisition of dialer specific hardware and the installation of dialer specific software. It is by far the most convenient way to use a dialer, and it has at least as much usability as other dialers.

A dialer allows a single remote sales professional to quickly make a large number of outbound calls. Dialers are ideal for call centers, telemarketers, or any business that sells a product or service remotely. Phone dialers are first loaded with a list of potential leads. Depending on the dialer it may either automatically call through each entry on the list at a preset pace or the sales rep may place the call with a click on his computer. Once a number starts to ring, or is answered, that call is immediately routed to an available sales agent.

An online dialer accomplishes all of this, but without requiring a remote sales company to purchase the previously mentioned hardware or software. An online dialer is able to do this because of the relationship between the purchasing company and the providing company. The provider could accurately be described as a host for the online dialer, and likewise the dialer could be called a hosted dialer.

Instead of needing specialized equipment, the online dialer requires three things: a PC, a phone line and with a phone, and an internet connection. All other hardware is kept at the host company and maintained by them. All software is hosted on the provider’s servers. Everything the client company needs is provided through the internet.

Online dialers eliminate much of the hassle of purchasing a telephone dialer. They also lower the initial capital need to invest in a dialer system. They still provide all of the important business solutions that phone dialers are none to provide. These include inbound / outbound call blending, integrated email and fax messaging with templates, real time data management and analytics, immediate response callback, and call transfer and recording. Online dialers provide the simplest way to receive all the benefits of using a phone dialer.

Who should use a CRM?

Any business who sells products or services would do well to use a Customer Relationship Manager, or CRM, especially for a business that sells remotely. Additionally, a CRM is an important efficiency enhancing solution for any organization that uses a call center. The purpose of a Customer Relationship Manager is to organize and track all of the processes and data associated with each lead and client.

A CRM automatically fulfills many of the responsibilities a sales agent would have to perform. The many software solutions designed to compliment the data and task management of a CRM increases the versatility of it dynamically. With supporting computer telephony integration software, a Customer Relationship Manager can instantly capture leads from web forms filled out and submitted by interested contacts via the company’s website. Coupled with a telephone auto dialer, a CRM will upload its list of leads and route those calls through to the best available sales rep for each call. A CRM can even quickly send templated email messages or leave prerecorded voice messages to the lead that the sales rep is contacting with only a single mouse click by the agent.

By acquiring the services of an outside company, Customer Relationship Managers can be provided for remote sales operations without the capital investment into software design or hardware purchase. Instead, all of the necessary components of the CRM are hosted by the providing company. These Customer Relationship Managers are referred to as hosted CRMs or online CRMs.

These hosted Customer Relationship Management tools often provide a very high level of customization within their programs, in addition to having an outside firm that can specifically develop software solutions for a particular business’ or organization’s needs. This includes options such as “drag and drop” functionality. This is a common software function, when applied to CRMs, allows CRM users to individually customize their CRM to their specific business model. The users can add new layouts and fields, customize size, color, and placement of fields, and do so at either the company or sales rep level. Data can be dragged and dropped in whatever position the sales agents want on the screen.

A hosted CRM provides remote sales businesses the tools needed to effectively use all prime business time by reducing wasted time and making the tasks associated with sales easier to accomplish. It is a worthwhile investment even for very small operations, and scales to be productive for much large businesses as well.

Customer Relationship Managers are powerful, but they need a supporting cast

Customer Relationship Managers are powerful players in the remote or inside sales world. These software databases record and store all of the important data on each lead and client for a company. They also track and enable all of the processes used to contact those leads, close sales, and keep their clients.

Customer Relationship Manager is often abbreviated to CRM. A company that is only using a Customer Relationship Manager but is not utilizing other telephony software tools is failing to get all it can out of its CRM. Many different telephony software solutions are able to integrate perfectly with a Customer Relationship Manager. Adding a telephony solution will help each sales agent make more contacts, close more sales, and increase revenue.

While there are many kinds of helpful software, the telephone dialer is the flagship of these telephone tools that support a CRM. Phone dialers are available in several variations, though most work on the same principles. Dialers call through a list of lead information automatically and route those calls through to a sales agent. Dialers pull this phone list from the CRM, which is able to generate these lists of leads automatically from forms submitted by the customer on the company’s website or from spreadsheets containing contact information that had been created previously. Without a dialer sales agents would be forced to call through each individual number in the CRM manually. They also would have to suffer through the long list of wrong numbers and busy signals that a dialer would simply avoid routing through to a sales rep.

These two telephony solutions, the CRM and the phone dialer, benefit from other tools available, such as a voice messaging system. This would allow a sales agent to leave prerecorded messages on voicemail machines. Instead of waiting to leave a message of his own he can then move on to the next call while the dialer and CRM continue to leave the message. Email messaging, inbound/outbound call blending, and up to date call analytics are other examples.

When using these software tools to instantly capture leads, route the calls to the agents, and provide the additional features to allow sales agents be more effective at following up more leads are contacted, more sales and closed, and more revenue is produced.