Damian James' Blog: 17 August 2009 - Calling for quality

Date: 17 August 2009

Damian James is Head of Transport Provision for Bracknell Forest Council and a technology champion

I have ranted about sales calls previously on this blog as I have seen a dramatic increase in the number that I have been getting this year. This is still occurring as more companies are feeling the squeeze but I now want to talk about the quality of some of these calls.

Bearing in mind that this telephone call is likely to be my first introduction to an external organisation that are trying to attract my business wouldn't it be sensible for companies to invest in decent sales staff. Most of the direct contact work seems to be outsourced to call centres where as soon as you answer the phone you can hear the buzz of a room full of telesales staff. This is then followed by the usual stick to the script stuff with the intention of trying to secure an appointment for some sales rep to come and see you.

The thing is though this puts me off. If you want further details the staff normally can't give it to you as it's not on the script. Quite often I don't get enough information over the phone in order to decide if there is potential in the product this company are trying to get me to buy. At this stage I normally get fed up and say I'm not interested.

What really gets me though is the lack of professionalism that I get on some calls. It does make you wonder about when companies tender for outsourcing their cold calling sales business whether they have actually listened in on any of the calls. I would make this a condition of the tender process. If you want my cold calling business I want to listen in to a random selection of calls to make sure I'm getting what I am going to be paying for.

Perhaps then when the calls come through we might be a little more receptive to the whole process.

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