Agencies specialising in telesales
Discussion
Telesales is a very generic term that covers a plethora of jobs.
Is it receiving incoming calls and selling to those? Is it making outbound calls and selling a product or service? Is it making outbound calls to make appointments for field guys? Is it B2B or B2C? Are you dealing in concepts or commodities?
All require different types of people with different skill sets and ambitions.
Is it receiving incoming calls and selling to those? Is it making outbound calls and selling a product or service? Is it making outbound calls to make appointments for field guys? Is it B2B or B2C? Are you dealing in concepts or commodities?
All require different types of people with different skill sets and ambitions.
Can you not train from within then when confident and knowledgable you must put a tiered incentive scheme with regular reviews and regular meetings between internal and field to foster the "team" approach. A team bonus discussed at these meetings helps this as well.
The issue is when they are "forgotten" as this sort of job needs constant praise and evaluation to keep doing it.
The issue is when they are "forgotten" as this sort of job needs constant praise and evaluation to keep doing it.
OP, that's possibly one of the hardest sales environments out there. The people you need must be focused, well trained on appointment making and your expectation on shelf life for each person you hire must be for it to be short. Always ensure you have at least two at any one time, so when one leaves with no notice you have one to train the new person. You will never get telesales appointment makers sat in the same role for very long, because if they're good, they'll expect to move into more lucrative areas quite quickly and, if they're not very good, you shouldn't be employing them for very long. You'll know within a month or so if they're going to make it.
Properly incentivise your telesales people. Create a competitive environment that recognises achievement and nurtures talent. Pay well in return for results. You might, for example, pay them £15-18k a year basic, and then a percentage of the sale value if a deal comes off. You want a realistic OTE of £25-30k minimum. DO NOT pay telesales appointment makers per appointment made, otherwise your field guys will find themselves arriving at appointments with the office cleaners, or where they're not expected at all. If you want to incentivise on appointment numbers, do it quarterly on a collective team amount.
I left school at 17 straight into appointment making with Opticians, for a team of 4 field people selling a new concept. I did this for just over a year solid before moving up to a field position. It was probably the hardest period in my sales career, however it taught me to have a thick skin and to remain utterly focussed on the task in hand.
Whist recruiting people you've got to give them a sense of where this job might take them with you- something to aim for beyond telesales, and keep pushing that at them once they've got the job.
If you live in a populous area, I would advertise the position in the local press and perhaps attend some local school leavers/college jobs fairs. Sell the job as appointment making and an entrance to the world of sales.
Many, many apologies if I'm teaching you to suck eggs, however it's such an important function in a new, small company, I tend to get quite passionate about it.
Properly incentivise your telesales people. Create a competitive environment that recognises achievement and nurtures talent. Pay well in return for results. You might, for example, pay them £15-18k a year basic, and then a percentage of the sale value if a deal comes off. You want a realistic OTE of £25-30k minimum. DO NOT pay telesales appointment makers per appointment made, otherwise your field guys will find themselves arriving at appointments with the office cleaners, or where they're not expected at all. If you want to incentivise on appointment numbers, do it quarterly on a collective team amount.
I left school at 17 straight into appointment making with Opticians, for a team of 4 field people selling a new concept. I did this for just over a year solid before moving up to a field position. It was probably the hardest period in my sales career, however it taught me to have a thick skin and to remain utterly focussed on the task in hand.
Whist recruiting people you've got to give them a sense of where this job might take them with you- something to aim for beyond telesales, and keep pushing that at them once they've got the job.
If you live in a populous area, I would advertise the position in the local press and perhaps attend some local school leavers/college jobs fairs. Sell the job as appointment making and an entrance to the world of sales.
Many, many apologies if I'm teaching you to suck eggs, however it's such an important function in a new, small company, I tend to get quite passionate about it.
Output Flange said:
Can I point you back to the original question? I'm looking for a tried-and-tested agency.
If there aren't any then so be it.
Can I suggest you avoid the agency route, because they will expect to be paid a commission on the candidate's salary, and I would expect your turnover of telesales staff to be high. It is very inefficient to pay commissions on percentages of annual salary when the candidates are quite often unlikely to last a year with you.If there aren't any then so be it.
I would have thought you could advertise on Monster and the like, and the job centre (I'm not kidding), for not too much money.
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