A career in telesales requires excellent communication and sales skills and customer service knowledge. As a telesales representative, you will spend most of your working hours persuading prospective and existing customers to buy products or services. Understanding the skills and requirements of a telesales position can help you determine if it is an ideal career for you. In this article, we discuss telesales, how it differs from telemarketing and the duties and skills you need to excel in a telesales role.
What is telesales?
Telesales is the selling of products or services through the telephone. As a telesales representative, you reach potential and existing customers directly by phone to encourage them to buy your company's offers.
There are two types of telesales: inbound and outbound. Inbound agents receive calls from prospective and existing customers while outbound representatives call leads to generate sales.
Telesales requires you to be patient, persuasive and persistent. You also need exceptional communication and phone skills, typing experience and the ability to thrive in an office environment.
The aim of telesales is to build repeat business through excellent customer relations. Telesales representatives contact customers to promote offers or to set up appointments to support field sales representatives.
Duties of a telesales representative
The duties of a telesales representative range from lead generation to direct sales and customer relations. An effective telesales agent will close leads and ensure customers are satisfied enough to continue doing business with their company. The duties of a telesales representative are:
1. Lead generation:
Telesales representatives play a vital role in generating leads for the sales team. They contact potential and existing customers by phone to inform them of their company's products, services and offers. Telesales agents also receive phone calls of people responding to direct marketing and advertising campaigns. They follow a script to qualify prospects ready to buy and those who may likely purchase their offers with enough persuasion. This prequalification process helps the field sales team to work faster and increases conversion rates.
2. Direct sales:
Besides creating awareness about products or services, telesales representatives also perform direct sales functions. Working with telemarketers and the sales team, they can use the data from previous sales to target customers for repeat business. Telesales agents can also ask promising leads qualifying questions which can help reveal their willingness to buy.
3. Take and process orders:
Telesales agents take and process orders to meet sales quotas. They manage repeat purchases, which provides opportunities to cross-sell existing customers. When customers place new orders, agents use scripts to offer additional products or services based on past purchasing behaviour. This helps to boost sales and profits and allows the sales team to concentrate on selling in the field.
4. Customer service:
Excellent customer service delivery is part of a telesales agent's duties. To encourage customers to continue buying from their company, agents call them after a sale to make sure they are satisfied with the product or service. They also collect, compile and update customer records in a database, making it vital to have excellent typing and telephone skills. Telesales agents also inform customers of new offers based on their preferences and needs. Part of their customer service duties is to provide accurate information about the company, its products or services, promotions and other details. This makes it crucial for telesales agents to have in-depth knowledge of their organization and its offers.
5. Conflict resolution:
Telesales agents must have excellent dispute resolution skills. Since they are always speaking with customers, they help to handle their grievances quickly before they become bigger issues. This allows customers to get maximum satisfaction from their purchases and preserves the company's reputation.
6. Activity reports:
An effective telesales agent will also create and update activity reports. The reports cover the number of calls, leads, customers, sales and other vital statistics that can help increase revenue.
7. Meet sales goals:
Telesales representatives need to meet monthly and quarterly sales goals according to the company's revenue targets. They must make a minimum number of calls and close a specific number of sales that moves them closer to their quotas.
Source: Indeed.com
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