There are millions of unknown calls made per week to US consumers and of those calls, only 11% are answered*. Consumers receive calls from unknown numbers and don’t pick up the phone for a myriad of reasons: fear of scams, privacy concerns, and more. This is a problem for organizations using outbound calling as part of their telemarketing strategy.
Enter: Branded Calling and Branded Caller ID.
Branded calling allows organizations to display their business’s name and phone number on the called party’s cell phone so they know the call is coming from an actual business rather than a random caller. Branded calling helps marketers increase connection rates, build customer trust, and more.
The impact of unanswered calls
Unanswered calls can severely impact your organization’s telemarketing efforts. When consumers do not pick up the phone because they are unsure of who is calling, your telemarketing efforts can suffer.
Unanswered calls impact an organization in various ways:
- Reduced answer rates, which key performance indicators show lead to reduced customer engagement
- Decreased employee satisfaction from too many outbound calls, but not enough connections, which translates to reduced conversion rates and missed goals
- Lower customer satisfaction rates from constant phone tag that damages the customer experience
- Wasted advertising spend from customers who request a call but are wary about answering an unknown call
- Increased acquisition costs from multiple dials and low answer rates, which increase operating expenses
- Reputation and brand damage from consumers who may believe that unknown calls are spam, even if they are legitimate
- Potential spam labeling from consumers mistakenly reporting calls as spam
Benefits of branded calling
With branded calling, your organization can elevate customer trust and overall customer experience with enhanced transparency and maximized brand awareness.
When consumers know who is calling them, they are more likely to actually answer the phone. With the potential for more people picking up the phone, your organization will soon see increased connection rates and ultimately, higher conversion rates and revenue.
When consumers are picking up the phone more often, it means it takes fewer dials to reach them. This increases productivity and ultimately lowers operating costs for your organization.
The benefits of branded calling also impact your internal organization. When more consumers are answering the phone, employee satisfaction increases due to goal attainment and decreased turnover rates.
What branded calling means for your organization
Implementing branded calling has the potential to have a huge impact on your business. Only 11% of consumers answer the phone when only the phone number is displayed while 33% of consumers answer the phone with a brand name and number displayed*. With branded calling, your organization can drive answer rates up to 3x higher.
Branded calling by the industry
Let’s further break down what branded calling could mean for your organization:
- In the hospitality industry, 71% of people would answer a branded call from a hotel, airline, or cruise line if they had scheduled or were planning a trip**
- In the healthcare industry, 84% would answer a call from a healthcare provider (doctor, pharmacist, etc.) if the company name was displayed on their incoming call screen**
- In retail, 80% would answer a call from a delivery company if they were expecting a shipment**
- In the financial industry, 77% would answer a call from a financial institution if the brand name was displayed**
Put branded calling into action
In today’s competitive sales landscape, telemarketing remains a top outreach strategy and powerful tool for reaching new customers and generating new leads. However, overcoming the impacts of unanswered calls remains a top challenge for organizations who are trying to build consumer trust, enhance brand awareness, maintain compliance, and ultimately reach revenue goals. Branded calling has the power to uplevel telemarketing success for your organization.
To learn more about why branded calling may be right for your organization, contact Gryphon today.
*TNS
**“Exploring the Demand for Branded Caller ID eBook”, TNS Commissioned Survey July 2023