KMB Telemarketing Ltd
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16th Dec 2009 - KMB Telemarketing raises record amount for BBC Children in NeedKMB Telemarketing have recently appointed a Charity Co-ordinator, Abia Shaheen who along with her other key responsibilities has taken on the role of encouraging everyone to keep thinking about those less fortunate then themselves.
Recently Abia focused on BBC Children in Need and got everyone into the spirit by organising in-house events ensuring everyone kept donating by participating in various competitions - Guess Gary's Spot Kick, find Pudsey Bear, eating cream cakes (all in the name of charity of-course!) and having a Dress Yellow Day with all donations going to Children in Need.
All thanks go to the huge personal generosity of all our staff who kept digging deeper and deeper in their pockets! Over £300 was raised.
I am delighted to announce that Jacqui Crawley will become Managing Director of KMB Telemarketing Limited with immediate effect.
She will combine this new role with her existing role as Business Development Director. I will become chairman of KMB from the same date.
We are delighted that KMB has secured the services of such a talented, experienced and passionate executive for the key position of Managing Director. Her brief is to grow the business through developing existing and new key accounts, broaden the base of services and ensure our business processes develop and that we continue to focus on the delivery of consistently high quality service to all of our clients.
Nick Winks
4 November 2009
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1st Oct 2009 - National Customer Service Week - Monday 5th to Friday 9th OctoberWhat is National Customer Service Week?
National Customer Service is designed to raise awareness of customer service and the vital role it plays within an organisation. It is also an opportunity to say a big thank you to those who work in customer service for a job well done.
KMB Telemarketing has planned a week of celebrations:
Monday 5th October - Dress Down day in the KMB colours of blue, white and green.
Tuesday 6th October - 'Smile while you dial' day - the best smile wins a prize!
Wednesday 7th October 2009 - Our Team Leaders and Account Managers will swap jobs for 2 hours at the beginning of the day! Who gets the best results.....
Thursday 8th October - Bring a Buffet Day - KMB is having a company buffet lunch.
Friday 9th October - Dress Down Day. KMB staff have been invited to make a charitable donation to Cancer Research - our 2010 nominated Charity of the Year.
Throughout the week there will be a variety of incentives and prizes to recognise exceptional customer service within KMB.
To all our clients - please nominate your star performer via email to enquiries@kmbtelemarketing.co.uk
Recent events in the global economy have led many experts to highlight the importance of marketing in difficult conditions. However, while the benefits of direct mail and email have been touched upon by professionals, many have ignored the role telemarketing could play in such a climate.
While the channel may be looked upon badly by consumers who are not fond of cold calling, Paul Cross, Product and Marketing Manager at Thomson Local, believes it is a "highly successful" promotional tool.
He has claimed that telemarketing is useful for a number of reasons, such as the acquisition and retention of customers, outbound lead generation and the sale of products, particularly when selling business to business.
"It's very easy to track the success of your telemarketing campaign on a day-to-day basis by keeping a simple record of calls made, leads and sales," he explained.
"This makes it a marketing channel which is both measurable and accountable and its transparency enables you to see your return on investment."
Discussing what growing businesses should bear in mind when using telemarketing, Mr Cross said preparation is important and encouraged firms to have an introduction on hand that will ensure they outline information about the business clearly to consumers on the other end of the phone.
Open-ended questions also help to engage potential or existing clients in conversations, he explained, while a positive tone which hints at a sense of urgency can also boost interest.
The expert said: "People buy either from fear of loss or the opportunity of gain. If you can appeal to either of these motives then an appointment should follow."
He added that another way to increase the success of telemarketing could be to consider outsourcing to an external specialist agency, which he claimed is more cost-effective than many think and allows companies to focus on a "core competency".
Considering how telemarketing compares to other channels, Mr Cross claimed that the marketing technique "is relatively inexpensive and easy" for growing businesses to use, as firms do not need the specialist knowledge required with formats such as direct mail.
Finally, he added that companies currently using other channels to promote to consumers could gain major benefits from combining their use of telemarketing with them.
He said: "A cold prospect can be warmed up with direct mail or email, arousing interest and communicating key messages, before launching a telemarketing campaign to follow up and convert interest into actual leads and sales."
So while some may have doubts over the benefits of the channel, it appears there are several reasons why firms should certainly consider its use in the near future.
Business Strata.com
(Thomson Local)
There are a number of marketing methods that you can employ to generate new business or to create "leads". In fact, the ways of generating new business are almost endless. However, there are four methods that stand out as viable commercial options when considering the allocation of your marketing budget and as such, the vast majority of business people will find themselves choosing between them. Those methods are: Direct Mail Marketing, Email Marketing (or spamming), Pay Per-Lead Marketing and Telemarketing. As a business person, it's unlikely that you will care much as to who ultimately gets your marketing dollars and your decision will fundamentally be an economic one. In light of that, information on the effectiveness of each method is highly important, and if we're to be frank, all four marketing methods have suffered their share of criticism over the years. They are all, however, undoubtedly capable of driving your business in their own way. This article then, aims to help you decide amongst the most viable options by assessing the reputation and effectives of one, namely telemarketing.
Is Telemarketing a Victim of Its Own Success?
Telemarketing has been around for longer than most would think. It originally began to establish itself in the late 50's as telephone call charges began to drop. Since then telemarketing has been a consistent performer and as such, is a very popular lead generation format. This popularity, ironically, has been the motivation behind a lot of telemarketing's critics. Some have suggested that the telemarketing industry is saturated and that increased consumer awareness is responsible for diminishing ROI's in the sector. Both of these assertions, however, don't really stand up to scrutiny.
Let's firstly take the claim that the market is saturated; economically speaking, a market's saturated when supply meets or exceeds demands. If we accept that this is the case then, it would no longer be sensible to set up a telemarketing company, as there would not be enough demand for your services to turn a profit. Perhaps that's true but even if it were, it would tell us nothing about the effectiveness of existing telemarketing services. It's easy to fall foul of the market saturation argument; however, it is just another incarnation of Yogi Berra's apocryphal quote; "Nobody goes there no more, it's too crowded!" As a footnote to this point; if the proponents of the saturation argument are really suggesting that it's not the telemarketing industry that's saturated but the population itself; i.e. People just can't take any more marketing calls! Then the argument is again, erroneous. Quite simply, if you're conducting a b2b telemarketing campaign for an industrial food processor, you won't be calling newsagents. Likewise, you wouldn't call restaurants if you were marketing a new magazine. It's just ridiculous to assume that all telemarketing companies are calling the same people. So in reality, you can pretty much guarantee that telemarketers are targeting different businesses or in the case of b2c telemarketing, different demographics.
Secondly let's take the argument of increased consumer awareness. This argument is palatable because it flatters us; we are all consumers as well as business people and it's natural to feel that we're just too savvy to be wooed by wily telemarketers. Well, that's not what the figures say. Fortunately for telemarketers, we're just as easy to sell to as we've always been and there are a number of reasons why. We may actually be much more versed in dealing with telemarketing companies but they are also more experienced at dealing with us. With more sophisticated profiling software the industry has become more efficient and telemarketing agencies are able to target more effectively those who will benefit from a given product or service. Also telemarketing was originally seen as an in-house operation, due to market competition and the comparative advantage of specialist telemarketing services though, the industry is now mostly outsourced. This development of telemarketing specialists has done much to keep costs down and increase efficiency. What this means is that the popularity of telemarketing has actually benefited us by making the industry more efficient, quite like the reverse of the saturation argument!
What are the benefits of Telemarketing over other Lead Generation Models?
Key Performance Indicators
One of the great benefits of telemarketing as a way of developing business leads is that it's incredibly easy to keep track of how effectively your campaign is being managed. Unlike direct mail and email marketing, the results are measurable on a day to day basis. How many calls are made and the relationship of calls to appointments, sales or hot leads is very clear. This has a range of benefits but most importantly it means that problems can be identified very early on. It's not unusual for marketing scripts or material to need fine-tuning from time to time but with a direct mail or email campaign, as you only get one shot at the copy; getting it wrong can be disastrous. Because of the human aspect in telemarketing though, you are able to get instant feedback on how the script is working and experiment to find out what works best. This ability to make running repairs means you can increase your campaigns' efficiency and therefore save money.
Keeping abreast of Market Conditions
This relates to the feedback issue discussed in the previous section but more precisely, people usually see marketing as a one way street. Telemarketing companies, however, are able to gather a great deal of information about your sales prospects. So rather than blindly sending out material and hoping for a reply, a good telemarketing agency will be able to help you judge the market conditions. Often the best way of doing this is by questioning prospects who refuse the service, just a few questions at the end of the script such as; which supplier do you use or what deal have you been offered by your existing supplier? Allows you to better target and refine your marketing strategy, making you more attractive to future business prospects and helping you to keep on top of market trends.
Psychological Appeal
It's impossible to develop a relationship with junk mail. Not a particularly contentious statement but also not true of telemarketing. Especially in business telemarketing, smart telemarketers develop a rapport with the prospect and this is beneficial in its own right regardless of whether it turns into an immediate sale or not. Psychologically speaking, people are much more receptive to salesmanship if they have, or at least feel that they have, a relationship with the prospective company. In a great many industries, it's untenable to expect prospects to switch suppliers or make a big purchase immediately, which ultimately means that the point of sale is naturally a little way down the road. A great residual effect of telemarketing then, is that where marketing material (even if it's a great introductory offer) is easily forgotten, a well-developed rapport is not. So when the time to reassess suppliers or replace equipment does eventually come, you can pretty much count on the prospect remembering a person rather than a flyer or email.
Approved Index Ltd
New figures have highlighted how growing businesses could benefit from using telemarketing. Research from NetPartnering has revealed that more than half of value-added resellers regard the channel as the one which provides the best return on investment (ROI).
According to ChannelWeb, email marketing gained seven per cent of the vote, while email marketing was backed by eleven per cent of the firms polled.
Sarah Baister, account director for NetPartnering, said that while telemarketing was popular in the sector, it works best in conjunction with other channels.
"Companies must look to develop strategic marketing plans to ensure the initial leads developed by telemarketing activities do not fall by the ways," she added.
The comments echo the sentiments of Dr Peter Hughes of Cognition PR, who recently claimed that firms may gain an advantage if they integrate their promotional efforts with other company systems.
In a column for SME Web, he added that it would be particularly effective to use marketing in conjunction with sales, logistics and operations.
Businessstrata.com
Creating quality marketing campaigns in any format is often a difficult task, but it seems issues that were top telesales tips in 2008 are set to remain as important in the next 12 months.
Mark Swanson, director of business development for Tele Resources, told TMCNet.com last year that high levels of list management are key to the successful use of the channel.
Now, Protocall One, a consultancy firm that specialises in the industry, has echoed the comments in its predictions for the new year, adding that it could be particularly useful to survive the current credit crunch.
Faraz Khan, managing director of the firm, said: "In the current economic downturn it is inevitable that operations will be asked to deliver more for less."
According to the company, the introduction of customer profiling into marketing practises could help this, as it gives growing businesses the chance to actively encourage clients to buy products or services.
"This detailed work can definitely deliver returns for organisations deriving income from cross or up-selling during inbound calls or doing outbound telesales," it suggested.
Other issues highlighted by the company as potential areas of note for 2009 include efforts to improve efficiency by giving staff a unified system to work from and an increase in strategies encouraging consumers to make contact themselves.
The firm claimed such a move would "free" employees to "only speak to the customers whom they are genuinely adding value to".
However, while the body outlined several ways for businesses to improve their telemarketing, it also suggested the potential benefits of combining the channel with other forms of communication that are growing in popularity with a number of consumers.
"More forward-looking contact centres will invest this year in supporting the array of communications methods from email through to text and instant messenger that customers today want to use to make a service request," the firm explained.
Protocall One added that the move could pay "dividends within a few months in terms of customer satisfaction and reduced costs of contact".
So it appears that, as the financial climate continues to take its toll on a number of businesses both in the UK and across the world, telemarketing trends which were popular last year are set to remain important throughout this one.
However, it seems clearer than ever that integration could be the key to using it to its full potential.
Adfredo Ltd
KMB are delighted to announce that we have invested heavily in new state of the art call recording software which was installed last week.
The Oak Record 09 Voice Recorder key features which are of benefit to our clients are as followed:
- Extensive call criteria including date, time, duration, call direction, channel number, dialled number
- Customised LAN integrated applications with mixed analogue/digital ISDN configurations
- CLI/DDI enriched call detail records
- Secure, encrypted recording storage
- Call statistics/advanced system management reporting
- Voice over IP (VoIP) real-time listening and monitoring
- Caller's phone number (CLI) is automatically processed and linked with database information
- Phone book support allows importing of address database records
- CLI and dialled numbers are automatically cross-linked
- Encrypted/tamperproof recordings
KMB will continue to improve and invest in technology throughout 2009 as part of our long-term business strategy to continue to be one of the leading telemarketing service suppliers in the UK.
A third of marketers are unaware of new marketing protection laws that include posing as consumers on blogs to promote their brands, which could land them in jail or with a £5,000 fine.
In May 2008, the UK introduced the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations and the Business Protection from Misleading Marketing Regulations 2008 to protect both consumers and honest businesses from unfair trading and misleading commercial practices.
Over 60 per cent of marketers are ignoring the laws that ban 31 types of unfair commercial practices, such as fake blogs commonly known as 'flogs', which are created by marketing and public relations firms for the purpose of falsely representing themselves as a consumer to enhance the profile of a particular product or brand, according to experts from law firm Browne Jacobson.
The regulations also establish a general principle not to trade unfairly, use aggressive selling techniques or mislead consumers, helping to close loopholes that have previously been exploited.
Repeated complaints can result in a report to the Office of Fair Trading. In addition companies and individuals charged with an offence under the new consumer and business protection regulations could also face a fine up to £5,000 and imprisonment of up to two years.
Browne Jacobson head of marketing Fiona Carter says: "Our research reveals that very few businesses have taken steps to better understand how the new legislation may affect their business activity and yet around half were concerned that they or their clients could fall foul of the new laws."
Precision Marketing
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10th Nov 2008 - Freaky Fund Raiser!On Friday 31st October, KMB decided to have a Halloween themed dress down day to raise money for the British Heart Foundation. We raised £75 through donations from our generous staff and KMB also donated a £50 supermarket voucher for raffle at a local British Heart Foundation fund raising event which took place that same evening. The money raised in this event will be used to purchase heart related medical equipment in the Redditch area.
Thank you to all of KMB's staff who chose to take part, the money raised will make a big difference to our local community.
It should be at the heart of any business - giving customers what they want. Yet when customers complain, too often marketers fail to listen and learn. Not only do brands not hear what customers are saying, they sometimes seem to put obstacles in the way of giving feedback. But does it really matter? It could be argued that consumers can be wrong, as Henry Ford is supposed to have said: "If I had asked my customers what they wanted, they would have said a faster horse."
Many businesses are not focused on getting feedback because their priorities lie elsewhere. Richard Hill, planning director at advertising agency Touch DDB, says: "The growth of the business through volume of new customers and cross-selling to existing customers is often the key focus. This means that at their core, businesses are not motivated to deal with customer retention.
Loss-leading offers, a typical example would be the battle for telecoms and broadband. Acquisition-driven businesses, which largely put a disproportionate amount of effort into bringing new customers in with loss-leading offers, cannot then afford to offer adequate fulfillment and support to customers once they arrive."
As it is much harder to get a new customer than to keep an existing one, if talking to customers increases loyalty, it must be worthwhile. The list of top brands in the Marketing Week and BrandIndex, Best Brand Performers 2008, which was published in May, suggests that good customer contact increases consumer loyalty, with Amazon and Google - relatively new brands that strive to find better ways to meet customer needs - taking the top slots. Mike Welsh, CEO if direct marketing agency Craik Jones Watson Mitchell Voelkel, believes that inviting feedback is crucial in order to do this, as brands that are serious about feedback are those that deliberately make it easy to give in.
marketingweek.co.uk
ActionCOACH is the worlds number 1 business coaching firm. A Midlands franchise has been a client of KMB's since the beginning of 2008 and were so pleased with the success of their campaign, they have introduced KMB and our services to other ActionCOACH franchises in the UK. To read more about what they think of KMB, look at our testimonial page...
Growing businesses need a "plethora" of marketing channels to succeed in their promotional efforts, according to an expert. The Street's Jay Conrad Levinson has stated that while direct mail and telemarketing can be beneficial, firms will be more successful if they combine the techniques with other formats.
Writing on the business website, he added that companies should not class advertising as marketing. "Don't think that because you're advertising, you're marketing. There are more than 200 forms of marketing," he wrote.
"Advertising is one of them. If you're advertising, you're advertising. You're doing only one half of one per cent of what you can do."
Recent research by Millward Brown found that many businesses would choose to cut other expenditure on many other promotional techniques before reducing spend on digital and new media marketing.
The study, which was carried out for PRWeek and Manning Selvage & Lee, found that the mediums most likely to be cut were point of sale marketing and advertising.
Business Strata
Eggs come stamped with a use-by-date. Take one out of your fridge and eat it after that supposed expiry date and you are risking food poisoning. Egg producers - like all food manufacturers - use the date stamp to mitigate their legal liability in the event that their product does make you ill.
So should a similar device be used in the world of marketing data? Talking to all of the major data owners recently, it became apparent that they shared a common frustration - the failure of clients to make use of the names and addresses they had paid for within a reasonable period of time.
As a result, these data owners are often accused of supplying poor quality or un-responsive data. In their view, the fault lies with the user - everyone knows that data decays, so prompt action is required to make the best of it.
Nowhere is this problem more evident than in the world of lead generation. As marketers turn from batch marketing to near realtime warm leads, the pressure is on data owners to keep up a stream of prospects. But what is the point if their clients do not then make contact with these active buyers?
Precisionmarketing.co.uk
Vicky Box, Operations Director is pleased to announce that Paul Chambers and Sue Goodwin have been appointed Account Managers. Paul has over 12 years telemarketing experience, of which 9.5 years have been with KMB. Paul has extensive experience working with a variety of sectors, one of which is the education sector and he has used his expertise to help develop this key account. This promotion is well deserved.
Sue Goodwin joined KMB 2002 and has 6 years telemarketing experience. Over the last 6 weeks Sue has been managing Vicki Behan's accounts in her absence and Sue has risen to the challenge and managed these accounts effectively. Both Vicki and Vicky wish to thank Sue for all of her hard work. Well done.
We are also pleased to announce that Julie Bartley is going to continue in the role of Account Manager. Julie has over 20 years telemarketing experience, of which 7 years have been with KMB. Julie has helped Vicki Behan to manage the Briggs account over the last 18 months and Vicki said that "Julie has added a lot of value to the Briggs account and will be greatly missed, well done Jules"
We have ambitious targets and plans for the business and Paul, Julie and Sue will play an integral part in our future achievements.
More charities believe email and telephone marketing have more of a major role to play in fundraising stewardships than direct mail, according to a new report.
The interim analysis of the Relationship Marketing Stewardship Survey reveals 57 per cent of respondents believe telephone marketing has a major role to play in stewardship and is a medium that should be regularly used to communicate with a majority of donors.
Nearly 49 per cent of respondents believe that email has a major role to play, while only 44 per cent of respondents believe direct mail should be a key factor in fundraising stewardship.
The survey also reveals 56 per cent of respondents think there should be a common, excepted definition of fundraising stewardship and currently there is little consensus in the sector about what stewardship is.
Over 60 per cent of respondents think that thanking donors promptly and politely is an 'essential' part of stewardship, 13 per cent only see it as a 'building block of stewardship', while 16 per cent consider this to be a 'self-contained definition' of fundraising stewardship.
Relationship marketing director of development Gordon Michie says: "Once again I think what these topline figures indicate is the different concepts of stewardship that fundraisers hold and the different types of communication vehicle they think they'll need to deliver their own idea of stewardship. It will be fascinating as we drill down into these responses to discover what correlations there are between how fundraisers scored definitions of stewardship and how they rated communications methods."
Precisionmarketing.co.uk
The DMA is to submit its long-delayed proposals to the Government for the rethink of the Corporate Telephone Preference Service (CTPS).
The proposals are aimed at lessening the impact that the CTPS is having on B2B telemarketing, and were drawn up by the DMA's Contact Centre Council in October last year.
The DMA has denied stalling on the proposals, explaining that approval requires them to go through two rounds of evaluation by its governance commitee, which meets monthly under association chair Rosemary Smith.
The Department for Business, Education and Regulatory Reform (BERR), which has taken on responsibility for CTPS since its inception, is expected to take several months to evaluate, before potentially passing them on to communications regulator Ofcom.
B2B Marketing Online
Certainty.co.uk has been a client of KMB Telemarketing Ltd since February 2008. They are a newly established online will registry company and KMB have been their sole supplier of telemarketing. So to find out what they have thought of us and our service as they have grown, look at our testimonial page to read more...
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23rd Jun 2008 - New AppointmentWe are pleased to announce that the Board of KMB Telemarketing has appointed Vicky Box to the new position of Operations Director with immediate effect.
In this new position Vicky will continue to have overall operational responsibility as before.
Nick Winks, Managing Director says: “Vicky’s new status is recognition of the hard work and dedication she has shown to KMB over the past thirteen years as well as to the success with which she has accomplished all her roles over this time.”All of us at KMB Telemarketing wish Vicky continuing success in her new role
KMB Team Leader Natalie Middleton has just finished filming the latest series of "Come Dine With Me". Natalie says:
"It was a very surreal experience having cameras following my every move but it was good fun and I did my best. It will be interesting to see what the other contestants had to say about me out of my earshot when the show is aired!"
Natalie was upfront and honest on the show and hopes this comes across in the final edited episode aired in autumn 2008.
Gordon Brown has taken to cold-calling members of the public who write him letters, according to PR Week Magazine, the house journal for warring Labour spin doctors. Thought up by new strategy chief Stephen Carter, the initiative is intended to 'humanise' the Prime Minister as his personal ratings fall.
'Carter thought it was a good idea to have Brown call people personally' Daily Mail's source says. 'Stephen will choose a letter or email at random, have one of his team at Number 10 prepare a response, then get Brown to call'
Unfortunately, one of the first calls backfired. 'Brown made a phone call at 6am, without thinking. Luckily the person he called was a shift worker, so he was awake'
Daily Mail
If the Prime Minister is trying telemarketing to raise his profile, perhaps you should too!
New laws are to be brought in that will force businesses to follow a stringent code of marketing conduct or risk two years in prison.
The Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008 aim to protect consumers against unfair, misleading or aggressive marketing practices. Imitating a consumer to promote a business will become a criminal offence; the laws ban any commercial practices that fail to make a trader’s commercial intent clear.
Offences that can be punished by up to two years in prison will include faking credentials, such as displaying a trustmark without authority. There is also a ban on running a ‘closing down sale’ when the trader is not closing down.
There are further restrictions on the use of the word ‘free’. Describing a product as free is banned when the consumer will have to pay “anything other than the unavoidable cost of responding, collecting or paying for delivery of the item”.
Precision Marketing
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12th Mar 2008 - KMB delivers SMS successA new multimedia SMS marketing solution has been launched by KMB. This allows companies to make rapid contact with new & existing customers. Any size of campaign can be handled from 100 records to over 1 million records.
With rapidly changing communication technology people are accessing instant information through mobile technology, email on demand, Blackberry’s, multimedia, 3G & so much more.
To be in touch with this trend, KMB have launched SMS messaging for use in B2B & B2C campaigns product promotions particularly aimed at the travel market, at younger people and at small business users.
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1st Feb 2008 - KMB Staff NewsYou may have heard what our staff say about KMB, however, you may not have heard what happens once the clock ticks past 5.30pm.
KMB proudly sponsors the staff football team, who brave the bad weather every Monday night to do battle for KMB’s name! After a tough first season, the boys are back with a vengeance to strive for victory.
Each year KMB enters an all-female team in the “Race for Life”, supporting cancer research. Over the years KMB has raised over £1500 by sponsoring this event. There are also plans to take on the “Sport Relief Mile” this year so that the boys don’t feel left out!
We raise money on an ongoing basis for various charities including Jeans for Genes, Breast Cancer Research and The Lennox Children’s Cancer Fund.
KMB’s main event of the year is our annual Christmas party in December. Last year around 80% of the staff attended a no expense spared evening full of fun at The Abbey Hotel and they can’t wait for this year’s party!