Top Tips For Improving The Performance Of Your Outbound Sales Teams
With Clare Baker, Australia and New Zealand Country Manager at eGENTIC
Show Notes
Clare Baker is the Country Manager for Australia and New Zealand at eGENTIC.
She has 25 years’ experience in sales, both as a BDM (Business Development Manager) and in sales management. Most of that time, she’s worked in the outsourced contact centre industry, with many clients across a wide range of industries.
Today, she shares how to lift the performance of your outbound sales teams.
Clare’s Top 3 Tips:
It all comes down to the environment. So make sure you create one that’s set-up for success (13:37).
Make sure that your Team Leaders have been trained in how to coach and understand their individual agents (13:47).
Make sure the calling lists give agents the best chance of success, by making sure the people they’re calling actually want or need what you’re selling (14:15).
You'll Learn:
Clare’s controversial advice which will help your team leaders best understand their team, so they get the best from them (04:05).
A couple of easy ways team leaders can recognise the success of agents (05:20).
The 2 common gaps Clare sees in lower performing centres. Plug these, and success is assured (07:12).
What Team Leaders are often saddled with, which gets in the way of them growing sales (08:14).
Clare’s great ‘Haystack Metaphor’, that will help you ensure your agents remain motivated (08:53).
The one thing Clare’s noticed that makes the world of difference in agents being fired up (11:44).
The simple question that will guide you in how to improve outbound sales (12:18).
Connect with Clare on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/clarebaker1/
Transcript
Blair Stevenson (00:00)
Welcome to the Secrets to Contact Center Success podcast, connecting you with the latest and greatest tips from the best and the brightest minds in the industry.
I am Blair Stevenson, founder of BravaTrak. Our Agent Motivation System helps contact centres lift performance by 11% in 7 months, guaranteed.
Today I'm joined by Clare Baker, who's the Australia and New Zealand Country Manager for eGENTIC. Today, we're talking about what works to drive results in outbound sales centres.
So Clare, welcome along. Great to have you.
Clare Baker (00:32)
Hi, thank you for inviting me. It's lovely to be here.
Blair Stevenson (00:35)
You're welcome. So just as a starting point, just tell us a little bit about your background and your expertise.
Clare Baker (00:40)
Yeah, sure. So I've got over 25 years' experience within the sales environment. That's both as a BDM (Business Development Manager) and in sales management, both on the phone and in the field, both here and overseas. So I've managed teams in Australia while based in New Zealand.
I'm originally from the UK, as I'm sure the accent can show, but I moved here to New Zealand in 2001. And I've worked with many industries, many different sectors, and the outsourced contact centre world - which is where I've spent most of my life - has allowed me to work with some really amazing businesses.
Blair Stevenson (01:16)
Yeah, very cool. Thank you. So a huge amount of experience. You work for eGENTIC, we can see in the background. So just tell us briefly about eGENTIC and what you provide to companies.
Clare Baker (01:27)
Yeah, sure. So eGENTIC is a permission-based lead generator. We use digital media to find consumers for businesses to talk to, on a permission basis. If businesses need to reach out to mass consumers, we can find them, and we can make sure that they're calling the right people by segmenting the data.
For example, through our lifestyle surveys, we can find out things like age and where they live, and make sure that if a company's going to call them, they're not calling - for example - an 18 year old to sell funeral insurance. We can segment that data, to make sure they get the best possible chance of success.
Blair Stevenson (02:09)
Very cool. So in short, you provide leads in volume to your client companies. What sort of numbers are we talking about in terms of kind of the lead volumes?
Clare Baker (02:19)
Yeah, sure. We can provide anything from sort of 200, 300 leads a month, up to scaling to those bigger businesses that just want to get through and talk to as many people as possible. So 3,000 to 4,000 leads a month.
We have about between 12,000 and 15,000 people go through our surveys - that's both here and the same number in Australia - go through lifestyle surveys every month. So lots of opportunities to get in front of people.
Blair Stevenson (02:47)
Yeah, definitely. So obviously your clients need an outbound contact centre to follow up those leads, and as it is in the way of the world, there's going to be a continuum, in terms of how well those outbound contact centres operate. Some, no doubt, are exceptionally good, and convert a lot of leads. Some, no doubt, aren't so good.
So I'm just curious, what have you noticed successful outbound sales centres are doing to help drive results?
Clare Baker (03:26)
Yeah, it's a really, really good question and will help segue into your business as well. It actually comes down to a couple of things, but the main thing is the team leaders. The team leaders that are listening to the calls, that are coaching their staff, they need to know how to effectively coach. They need to be able to understand their individual agents.
Different agents react differently to different situations. So these people need to be really switched on with their staff, and making sure that they know what drives them, what motivates them, what doesn't, and if they're having a bad day, how do they deal with that?
And the effectiveness of the team leader to be able to deal with that, is absolutely critical. It's all well and good for the business leadership to sit there and say, "Well, we need this many calls. We need this many results." The team leaders need to be able to, obviously, focus on that, but really get involved with their team, and make sure that they're understanding what makes them tick.
If it means taking them off the phones for a period of time, leadership will panic. But do that, so that you can then drive those results when they get back on the phones. Really, really understand your team.
Blair Stevenson (04:40)
Yeah, I agree. It's exactly the same in inbound service centres as it is an outbound sales centres. I just want to pick up on something. If you think about some of the key things you'd be expecting or noticing a high-performing team leader to do, what would be one or two of those key things that they do throughout the day or throughout the week?
Clare Baker (05:05)
Yep. So the team leaders would be taking their team off the floor, coaching them, listening to calls, picking up on certain little things that might work for one agent, but not work for another agent.
They would also be celebrating success in a way that works for the individual team members. Because some team members want the recognition, some team members just want to be able to go, you know, "Can I go home and 10 minutes early?", or whatever it happens to be, whatever works for them, whatever makes success for those agents.
And I think it's about those team leaders, making sure that they identify that, they learn their team and regularly are doing those things, creating the culture for a good sales environment.
Which is, obviously, as I said before, celebrating success in the right way, but also understanding that they're all humans on the phone, and that sometimes they're going to have good and bad days. And it's making sure that they identify those times, and deal with them regularly and as they happen.
Blair Stevenson (06:11)
Cool. So it's really about making time for their agents, for their people.
Clare Baker (06:18)
Yeah, absolutely. And as leaders in these environments, we also need to make sure that we allow the team leaders that time. We're always so driven by the results - and rightly so, we all need to take our salaries home - but we need to make sure those team leaders feel empowered, and able to do what they need to do to drive the best results from those agents.
Blair Stevenson (06:41)
Cool. And I totally agree. I mean, one of the challenges I see often is that team leaders simply don't have the time to lead their agents in the way they really need to.
If you think about now the centres that aren't doing so well, there'll be a few things that are in common in terms of some lower performing centres you've seen. What would be those things?
Clare Baker (07:12)
I think a huge one would be the team leaders not having time - not having time to coach - not maybe having the skills to be able to coach. And then it would also be around treating each of the agents the same, because they are all different, they're going to see the results differently, they're going to want to be treated differently.
And then sometimes I can see the leadership not allowing some of the things to happen, that that need to happen. And they need to, again, I'm going to come back to that 'empowered' word, because the ones I see not performing are where team leaders aren't empowered to do the job that they're supposed to do.
Blair Stevenson (07:55)
Ahh, so when you say they're not allowed to do some of the things that they need to be doing, what would be an example of that?
Clare Baker (08:01)
I guess where 'not being allowed' I'm meaning in a time factor. So they've got so many other things that are put on top of them - and the business needs them, totally understand that.
So it's about finding that balance between the team leaders being able to be effective team leaders, versus being data analysts and reporting gurus. They can all do that, but is there a better place for that to be done, to allow them that time to be with the agents?
Blair Stevenson (08:36)
Yeah. That's a good point. And from my perspective, what you're calling out is this issue of quality and quantity in terms of coaching. They don't have time to do it, but also they're not necessarily that good at it. And both need to be in place.
Clare Baker (08:53)
Absolutely. Absolutely. Just one other thing, I have a great metaphor. Well, I think it's great. And it's around haystacks, and it's about identifying whatever campaign that you're on - and I'm mainly talking sales campaigns, of course - identifying the size of your haystack and the size of the needles that are hidden in the haystack.
So if you've got a sales campaign that is a huge haystack with tiny, tiny needles, it's going to take an awful lot to sift through that, to find those needles. Same number of needles are in there, as opposed to a tiny haystack that's got great big needles in it where they're easy to pull out.
And each team leader needs to be able to understand what haystack that campaign fits into, and then identify that with the agents. So that if they're sitting - especially in an outsourced environment - if they're sitting next to somebody who's got a small haystack with big needles campaign, they're sitting there with a big haystack and little needles campaign, not to feel disgruntled or upset by the fact that these big needles are coming out all the time for their neighbour.
It's just the nature of the campaign that they're working with. And leadership needs to understand that. And, obviously, team leaders need to be able to then identify that and share it with their team.
Blair Stevenson (10:16)
Yeah. So what you're saying is that campaigns have different conversion rates. And people need to understand what those are, because otherwise it's demotivating if, as you rightly say, you're on a lower converting campaign as an agent, when you see other people really nailing it, but they're on a higher converting campaign.
Clare Baker (10:38)
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. But even on a lower converting campaign, they're still nailing it if they're finding those needles in there.
Blair Stevenson (10:45)
Exactly. Cool. So everything you've mentioned so far has been a leadership issue. What about the agents themselves, particularly in those higher performing contact centres?
Clare Baker (10:56)
Yeah. It's interesting, because all the years that I've done contact centre recruitment, I don't have a winning formula for the right person to get on the phones.
I've interviewed many people where I've gone, "They sound brilliant, their CV looks great. They're just fantastic. Let's get them on the phones." And then they don't perform versus people that come and sit in front of you and you go, "Okay. But we need staff, so let's give them a try." And you put them on the phones and they just sail, and they're just brilliant.
I don't have the winning formula for which of those work. I'm sure there are some other people, some contact centre recruiters that maybe could help me, but I don't have that.
But the one thing I do know, is that sales come easier if you've got some authenticity with the branding that you're selling. So for example, in the charity space, if an agent has some connection with the charity that they're working with, then the authenticity is better and they get better results. So that's the only thing that I can say works.
The rest of it, from my point of view it's, "Let's give everyone a chance." And then make sure that we - I'll come back to coaching again - make sure the team leaders coach as much as they can, to enable each of those agents to succeed, and then when the team leaders go to sleep at night, have they done everything that they possibly could to make this person succeed?
Telephone sales is not for everybody, but we need to make sure everyone's given the right opportunities and the right coaching to succeed. And then if it's not for them, then there's other jobs around the contact centre or elsewhere that'll work for them. But otherwise, we need to sleep at night as leaders and say, "That person has had every opportunity to succeed. We've given them everything."
Blair Stevenson (12:58)
Agreed. Agreed. When you talk about authenticity, it recalls to mind for me that it's really about purpose, isn't it? That there's a purpose fit. "This is the sort of organisation I want to work for because of the purpose of the organisation or the mission of the organisation."
Let's wrap up. What are your top three tips for contact centre leaders, for how they can lift the performance of their outbound sales teams? And I'm pretty certain you're going to repeat some of the stuff you've talked about, but it's worthwhile just hammering home those last points. So top three tips.
Clare Baker (13:37)
Tip #1 (13:37)
Yeah, it all comes down to the environment. So making sure that you've got an environment that's set up for success.
Tip #2 (13:47)
Team leadership, making sure those team leaders are well coached, they know what they're doing. Don't put somebody who's not been trained on how to coach other people. They might be good on the phones themselves - which is fantastic by the way, because you've got a really good starting point there - but make sure that they've had the training on how to coach, and make sure that they really know how to do that, and how to understand their individual agents.
Tip #3 (14:15)
And then I'm going to have to say the last one, of course, has to be around the data and leads. I have to mention that. So obviously, set your team up for the best success by making sure that the calling lists - whether it be leads or that it be data - whatever you're making them call, make sure that they're given the best opportunity for that, by making sure that the people they're calling actually want or need what you're selling.
Blair Stevenson (14:43)
Good tips. Fantastic. Thank you very much, Clare. Really appreciate it.
Clare Baker (14:48)
No worries. Thank you very much. It's been a lovely, thanks.
Blair Stevenson (14:50)
All right, for listeners, you'll find a link to the show notes in the episode description below.
And if you'd like to connect with Clare on LinkedIn, you'll find a link to her LinkedIn profile in those show notes too (https://www.linkedin.com/in/clarebaker1/).
Further, if you'd like to follow me on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/stevensonblair/) or connect with me on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/blair.stevenson.980), you'll find links to my profile there as well.
Well, that's it from us today. Have a productive week.