Answering the call is the single biggest way of improving the ROI of your marketing. This, basic as it sounds, is where most businesses fail. If you are running a marketing campaign that includes a call to action to call you, or there is even just a phone number on the website you use, you must answer every single call.
To make the most of your marketing, you need to form a connection when your customer talks to you. In the age of AI, bots and falling consumer trust, human connection wins every time.
There’s a reason why lots of businesses send customers through a series of FAQs and chatbots - it’s hard to always have someone answer the phone. You need
people available 24/7, you need them to know what they’re doing, and the second they’re doing something else, then they miss calls. This is why thousands of businesses use answering services.
Here’s how to turn an answering service into the competitive advantage that makes your marketing ROI transform.
7 ways to boost your marketing efforts with an answering service:
- Answer every single call
The most critical part of boosting your marketing efforts. Whether your call to action is to call, schedule a demo, or register details, you are spending money to get people to your website, you simply have to answer when they call. Every missed call is both a missed opportunity and a cost to your business. If you want a better ROI on your marketing efforts, answer every call.
- Your customers are more than 9-5
Most teams work certain hours throughout the day, but is that when customers are looking for you? Your customers are busy people, when they have time to look at your business then you need to be available. When you’re boosting your marketing return, that one customer on a Saturday or at 11pm matters.
- Capture every lead
Once you’ve answered the call you need to make sure you capture the information you need. Someone that’s stopping another task to answer your calls needs to be able to switch to a different mindset almost instantaneously. They need to be both the representative of your company and know what information needs gathered to get the customer to the next stage of your funnel. Every missed piece of information is a cost to your business and makes the return on your marketing lower.
- Ask qualifying questions
As your team is capturing leads for follow up, how do you know which are the highest priority to follow up on? You need to ask qualifying questions. Are they in the right area for your business? Do they have the right budget? When do they want to start? Asking some simple qualifying questions is the difference between picking leads at random to follow up on and knowing your hottest prospects.
- Integrate your systems efficiently
Once your leads are captured and you know they’re a good fit, the lead also needs to be usable. Plan out your customer journey so you know what information needs to be where. Who needs the information from each new lead? Where do they need the information? How can we make sure the sales rep knows the key information so a customer does not have to repeat themselves?
You want a potential customer to know your business cares. A good answering service can get the right information to your sales people so they can follow up and know what the customer needs. Using software and CRM integrations, a new lead can be sent directly into your sales funnel and your sales reps will be able to focus on the top leads that will generate business.
- Be available on different channels
Today’s customers want options on how they talk to you. Lots will still call, but many prefer to use
live chat, or
social media. How do you make sure you can cover lots of different channels without your customer service costs going up significantly and wiping away the profit increases you’re looking for?
An answering service can cover multiple channels so your customers get a quick response wherever they decide to contact your business. Whether they see your advertising and call or message on social media, you can capture the lead and grow your reputation for being responsive and offering great customer service.
- Be human
This is the most important part of all. In a world where people reach robots, ‘press 1 for…’, or worse feel tricked talking to AI unknowingly, be human. Bots can’t form connections like people can, so have people answer every call. Build trust with your customers and show them you care about them. This might not make a difference to your ROI today, but for businesses that want to make money for years to come, building a reputation as a business that cares is an investment in your future.
How can AnswerForce help boost return on your marketing efforts?
All 7 of these ways to boost your marketing return are things you can do yourself. But they’re time consuming, hard to scale, and expensive to hire for.
AnswerForce is built to help take the guesswork out of customer service and be a cost-effective tool to grow your business. Thousands of professionals trust us to:
- Answer their calls and chats 24/7 every day of the year
- Be there after-hours, at the weekends, and on holidays
- Capture and qualify leads on every single call
- Offer consistently excellent customer service across channels
- Integrate into your CRM so your team has access to every single lead.
We strongly believe that people are the answer to boosting the return from your marketing efforts. All of your calls and chats will be answered by a real person, every single hour of the day. You get every single call answered, maximizing the return on your marketing, while customers get the human connection that builds confidence in your business. It’s a win-win.
