DO I NEED A CALL CENTER?

Every direct marketer needs a call center of some sort. The real question is should I do it myself or hire a call center. Since situations are different for every company it’s hard to give black and white answer. You have to consider some key points.
Do you sell to Businesses or to Consumers? How many calls do you generate or expect to generate? When will the bulk of those calls come in? Do you need 24/7 order taking, or just during 8-5 business hours with a voice messaging after hours? Or, can you handle 8-5 hours in-house and then outsource during the evening hours. E.g. If you have a television ad or infomercial running during the evening, you need to have someone ready to take calls. If you are running mail order advertisements or using direct mail you can state in the ad the hours to call or offer toll free fax-ordering, then after hours voice mail may work for you.

If you want to take orders in-house, remember you have to have someone ready to answer the phone, if you are a small company you may think you are saving money by doing it yourself, but in fact it could be taking time away from the things that are more important. Of course, it could be the opposite, your products may need someone very knowledgeable to answer the questions raised by callers.

If this is the case, you have to consider the cost to train the operators at a call center, or if they can answer the majority of questions from information you provide that the operators can access. In some cases, you may be better off taking the calls in-house and out-sourcing other functions.

Some call centers also take overflow work. In most cases this is when you have a small in-house call center but during certain times of the year or for special promotions you need more help, so instead of adding more employees for a short time you contract with a call center to have extra overflow calls rolled over to them. 

Similar to this would be forwarding a phone line to a call center to answer calls just at night.

HOW MUCH WILL A CALL CENTER COST? 

Different call centers have different pricing structures. In most cases you can expect to pay a set-up charge. This set-up charge would fluctuate by how many products you have, and how much, if any, training operators must have. Other upfront cost could include: Toll free number activation, Voice Talent, IVR Services (Interactive Voice Response), Credit Card Processing Set-up, and any special programming needed. Some call centers have a minimum flat fee that covers so many hours of set-up time, if you go over this time you pay extra by the hour. While others charge a straight hourly rate and whatever time it takes to set-up your job…that’s what you pay.

The next costs will come in operator phone time, billed by the minute. And toll free line use, billed by the minute by your long distance company. Most call centers will have a minimum number of minutes that must be used in a month. The minimum amount of minutes may be billed at a higher per minute charge and additional minutes billed at a lower per minute charge. Companies that don’t have a monthly minimum may have a higher set-up fee, and companies will a low set-up fee may charge a higher per minute fee.

An industry average says that it takes 3 minutes to process a telephone order. The true ordering time will depend on the type of product being sold and it’s complexities and how much information is gathered at the time of the call, and if any up-sell is part of the program.

COMMON CALL CENTER TERMS 

“Abandoned Call” Also called a Lost Calls, or Dropped Calls.  These are calls received in a call center but the caller hangs up before reaching an agent to take the order. (Usually due to caller impatience.) Lost calls can be tied to “Average Delay” before a live agent answers.

“Average Delay of Calls (ADC)” Also called “Average Speed of Answer (ASA)” This is when a customer calls in and reaches an automated message thanking them for their call and asking them to wait for the next available operator. The average delay is figured by dividing total waiting time of all calls by the total number of calls. If this Average Delay is too long, the amount of “Abandoned Calls” increases. 

Automatic Call Distributor (ACD). The is a specialized telephone system used in incoming call centers. It is a device that can be programmed to; automatically answers calls, queue calls, distribute calls to agents/operators, plays delay announcements to callers and provides historical reports on these activities. 

“Agent” The person who handles incoming or outgoing calls. Can also be a: Customer Service Representative, Telephone Sales or Service Representative, Customer Service Professional, Account Executive, etc...

 “Automated Greeting” Where calls are answered by a personalized greeting or message customized for your company and then the call is routed to the most available operator for prompt service.

“Blocked Call” A call that cannot be connected immediately because; one, no circuit is available at the time the call arrives, or two, the “Automatic Call Distributor” is programmed to block calls from entering the queue when the queue backs up beyond a defined threshold.

“Cost Per Call” Total costs (fixed and variable) divided by total calls for a given period of time.

“Cost of Delay” What it costs you to queue callers waiting for an agent or operator; assuming you’re paying for a toll-free service, or, if your call center bills you for the time that a call is delayed. (If a call centers “Average Delay of Calls” is long, and you are getting billed for it, you lose twice, once because you will have a higher abandonment rate, and twice, because you are being charged for the time they do wait before hanging up.

“Fax on Demand” A system that enables callers to request documents, using their telephone keypads. The selected documents are delivered to the fax numbers they specify.

“Overflow” What happens when there are too many calls for the available operators to handle efficiently. These calls flow from one group or site to another. Some call centers specialize in taking the overflow calls of other call centers. Software handles the whole thing.

“Private Branch Exchange (PBX) ” A telephone system located at a customer's site that handles incoming and outgoing calls. Automatic Call Distributor (ACD) software can provide PBXs with ACD functionality. Also called private automatic branch exchange (PABX). 

“Queue & Queue Time” A void space that holds callers until an agent becomes available. Almost without exception there is a running message playing, thanking the caller for calling and holding, telling them what’s coming up, etc. “Queue Time” is the same as “Average Delay of Call.” In general, “Queue” refers to any line or list of items in a system waiting to be processed. (Like standing in line at the bank.)

“Received Calls” A call detected and seized by a trunk. Received calls will either abandon or be answered by an agent.

“Service Level” The percentage of incoming calls that are answered within a specified time frame: “X”# of calls were answered in “Y”# of seconds." The lower the seconds the better.

“Service Level Agreement” Agreed upon performance levels reached between the user and the provider of a call center service. A service level agreement specifies a variety of performance standards that need to be adhered to by the call center.

Talk Time. The time an agent spends with a caller during a transaction. Includes everything from "hello" to "goodbye." 

Toll-Free Service. A telephone number that enables callers to reach a call center out of their local calling area without incurring charges. 800, 866, 877, and 888 are toll-free numbers. In some countries, there are also other variations of toll-free service. You have your carrier point the toll free number to ring on specified line. You get a Toll Free Number from your long distance carrier, you pay a per-minute charge to your long distance carrier when the line is used. (Make sure you have the long distance carrier that has low rates and small billing increments.) 

Trunk. Also called a Line, Exchange Line, or Circuit. This is the main line where all inbound calls arrive and are first identified and sent to switching systems or to an “Automatic Call Distributor” that then routes the calls to an agent/operator or into a queue. A telephone circuit linking two switching systems.  

“Up-Sell” This is the process of selling more products to the person calling than they expected to buy when they first called. E.g. Said by agent to customer at time of order: You can get (??) more for only ($??) more. Or, Would you like a cutting board with that new knife set?

Voice Response Unit (VRU). Also called Interactive Voice Response Unit (IVR) or Audio Response Unit (ARU). A device with speech recognition that captures information from a caller through them keying numbers on the phone or by a verbal answer. When integrated with a database on a computer, callers can interact with the database system to check current information e.g., account balances, order status, etc., all without speaking to a person.

For a bigger glossary of direct marketing terms, please visit the NMOA Direct Marketing Glossary at: http://www.nmoa.org/Library/glossae.htm

BOOKS ON CALL CENTERS:
-- Designing the Best Call Center for Your Business, by Brendan B. Read, CMP Books
-- Encyclopedia of Telemarketing, by Richard L. Bencin & Donald J. Jonovic, Prentice Hall