Many people use the terms cold calling and telemarketing interchangeably. However, there is a difference between the two terms, which should be known to telemarketers if they want to make their marketing strategies effective.
Telemarketing lists can also be optimally used if you know the slight differences between cold calling and telemarketing.
THE NATURE OF OPERATIONS
Cold calling is an unsolicited way of contacting your potential customers. This contact can either be physical (door-to-door marketing) or telephonic. In cold calls, you don’t know the profiles of your potential customers therefore you need more persuasion skills to sell your products.
On the other hand, telemarketing only involves telephone calls and is not limited to reaching out to potential customers. Customers can also contact marketers.
Let’s get into the details of two types of telemarketing to understand its difference from cold calling.
INBOUND TELEMARKETING
In inbound telemarketing, customers call telemarketers to know more about the products and services that they’ve come to know recently through an advertisement.
OUTBOUND TELEMARKETING
In outbound telemarketing, telemarketers call current and former customers to inform and sell them products and services. Telemarketers also cold call potential customers with the help of telemarketing lists to persuade them to buy products and services.
Outbound telemarketing is an insistent method to expand the existing consumer base of the business.
BELIEF IN COMPANY’S BUSINESS
For successful marketing, it is necessary that the marketers believe in what they are selling. This is another yardstick through which you can differentiate between telemarketing and cold calling.
Cold callers are generally hired on a temporary basis. In fact, most people choose the profession as an odd or temporary job. Hence they are not really interested in finding the details of what they are selling.
On the contrary, telemarketers are formally employed and are provided with briefings about the product that they are to sell. Knowing more about the business instills belief in telemarketers about the products and services which are going to be marketed.
SELECTION OF CALLERS LIST
This is another area where you can find differences between telemarketing and cold calling. In cold calling, marketers start to make unsolicited phone calls without doing the necessary homework. Most of the time, they use simple telephone directories to get a list of prospects they are going to call. The chances of conversions with this strategy are minimal to say the least.
Recent operation of telemarketing, however, has become more specialized in its way of selecting prospects. They usually do it with the help of telemarketing lists. These lists are compiled and formed especially for the purpose of telemarketing targeted products to targeted customers, and comes with different subcategories.
Telemarketing lists help focus marketing campaigns on outbound telemarketing with higher chances of success.
Due to its undefined pattern, cold calls have given a bad name to telemarketing. Knowing more about telemarketing properly can help you to reap more of its benefits.
