As mentioned outsourcing market research services offers a variety of advantages to your company.  Accordingly, based on WHY you choose to outsource your market research will determine how best to do it, and achieve the desired results for your company.

1 – Outsourcing Market Research Services – Lack Of Resources

When your company does not have an internal research team, or cannot take on additional projects, outsourcing market research services is your only option.  So, how best to do this?

Selecting your company’s market research provider is similar to hiring other business partners.  Basically, your due diligence starts with a clear idea of WHAT your company’s market research needs are.  Then, begin the process of reference checks, interviews, initial meetings, etc.

Considerations

Here are some considerations in selecting your market research provider:

Think about the end of the market research process.  Especially consider what your company will gain from the market research deliverables.  For example, will it identify a new market segment, determine changes in an existing product, or determine whether to launch a new product/service?  Simply put, how will your company apply the market research data?

2 – Outsourcing Market Research Services – Cost Savings

Traditionally a company will consider outsourcing as a means to improve its competitiveness, performance and profitability.  Consequently, outsourcing market research services should be a consideration for your company.

One of the primary outsourcing benefits, not surprisingly, is cost savings.  While outsourcing to an external market research provider may have personnel costs similar to in-house staff, the infrastructure support costs are usually lower.  Additionally, few companies can track personnel research costs when combined with other business activities of an internal team.

These costs are especially significant for collecting market research data via telephone contacts and focus group surveys.  Basically, the market research provider can amortize these costs across its client base over a long-term basis.

Benefits

Your company benefits by paying only for the services needed for its research project.  Also, your research costs are transparent and can be negotiated on a transaction basis, usually a mix of market results (survey, questionnaire, interview) or labor-hour.

Finally, it is worth noting that external market research providers normally outsource their data gathering activities.  Basically, their key value-added is the expertise provided in structuring the market research project and analysis of the data gathering results.

3 – Outsourcing Market Research Services – Scaling Needs

Outsourcing market research services is often needed when a company’s needs change quickly.  So when you need fast or a new type of research, an external provider can scale resources more efficiently.  Also, for companies with limited research experience, these activities may be initially small, requiring a small budget and investment.

Start-up time for market research services is less than investing in an in-house staff.  Consequently, fast completion and review help determine whether outsourcing market research services are cost-effective, producing the required business results.

An external market research company can scale its services according to the demands of your business and budget.  For example, let’s say you want to start with a small pool of prospects and gauge the results first. Then, you can broaden your outreach as they can scale up their services.

In summary, outsourcing market research services facilitates scaling company resources to adjust to changing needs.   Consequently this allows for managing costs, reducing risks, and provides clear metrics of the results and return-on-investment.

DISCLOSURE: Nexus Teleservices is a Nearshore Outsourcing Market Research Services business provider.

BUSINESS-TO-BUSINESS (B2B)

Data Cleansing

This is a process used to ensure a company’s customer information database is consistent and accurate.  By removing inconsistencies from database records (as well as clearing inactive users), telemarketing service representatives (TSRs) are more likely to have the information needed to more completely and efficiently service customers.  This type of telemarketing activity may verify information such as an address, phone number, current account holder, account type, and desired level of service.

Customer Appreciation

It is important to understand that customers appreciate being contacted proactively if it serves their interests.  The key is their interests.  Your company needs to ensure that there is alignment between their interests and your reason for contacting them.

This type of telemarketing activity is performed to thank a customer for loyalty to your business and are not sales calls in the  traditional sense.  However as part of this process, the TSR can identify whether:

Charity Fundraising

Non-profit agencies use both outbound and inbound telemarketing calls for market awareness and to raise charity donations.  Agencies periodically conduct pledge drives through various marketing channels that result in an influx of donor calls, hence inbound telemarketing.  Outbound telemarketing is used for recruitment, cultivation and retention of the agency’s donor list.

Political Registration/Voter Participation

Political telemarketing services vary from voter registration, polling, Get Out The Vote (GOTV), voice broadcasting and campaign fundraising.   GOTV drives are the final stages of voter engagement campaigns where political groups are looking to drive as many supporters or registered voters to the polls.  Since there is limited time, political organizations need to rely on various tools to simplify and scale up to a high volume.

Market Research

Outbound telemarketing for market research is often used for product/service reviews and customer feedback. This is a highly cost-effective means for conducting large-scale market research and can cover vast geographical locations from a single base. TSRs conducting interviews can range from small executive level surveying to nationwide customer feedback questioning.

Sales Lead Generation

Whether B2B or B2C,  telemarketing sales lead generation is used to qualify a company’s prospects by adhering to strict qualifying criteria.  This model (often outsourced to a third-party call-center provider) represents the separation of cold calling and prospect qualification from sales appointment setting and the actual selling by the company’s internal or field sales force.

This division of the sales process allows a company to more effectively use their more expensive sales personnel to do what they do best: use their extensive knowledge, communication, presentation, negotiating and closing skills to convert prospects into new customers and deals.

New Customer Acquisition

Businesses need new customers for their growth and survival.  Using outbound telemarketing services to find, qualify and sign-up new customers is an effective direct marketing system.  Whether it is a TSR calling prospects from a dialing list or via a pre-recorded message using a computerized dialing system, there is no prior existing relationship.  It is often referred to as cold-calling or dialing for dollars.

Telesales

Once a company has identified and qualified a customer prospect (by whatever means), telesales is the process that sells your products or services directly to the customer by telephone.  Telesales converts those opportunities into business for your company.  Depending upon the market (business or consumer) and complexity of the product/service, the telesales process may entail one or a  series of telephone calls until sales success.

Collections

One of the types of telemarketing services that companies often require is the collecting of outstanding invoices payments from their customers.  This is important to maintain cash flow and working capital for a company’s development.

If the company list of debtors is small, this process of contacting customers via the telephone is handled internally by the accounting group.  If the list of debtors is large, however, this process is often handled by a dedicated tele-collections team or outsourced to a third-party provider.

Customer Reactivation

Using telemarketing services to reactive your customer base is one of the highest ROI opportunities a company can invest in.  At some point in the past, these inactive customers purchased from you or engaged with your company in some way. You’ve already spent the time, effort, and money to get them as a customer, so it is much more cost-effective to bring them back than it is to find new customers.

There are many reasons why a customer no longer uses a company’s products or services. Customer Reactivation telemarketing is simply designed to understand why they stopped being active and entice them to become active customers again.