Lets call 22 million people on the phone

Years ago, over a ten month period, I was a production and quality manager in an out-bound call center. We had forty-eight call stations that were programmed from an automatic dialer.  The calling campaign was programed to make calls from 6:00am to 4:00 pm, Monday through Friday, with an hour and a half of break time. The average time we were billed for each call was only about twenty seconds. We set approximately six qualified appointments each hour, or about fifty a day off this regimented cold-calling machine.

Equation

Forty-eight marketers, processing approximately three calls a minute, for eight and a half hours a day over a ten month period is 22,325,760 cold calls.

48 callers X 3 calls a minute for 60 minutes =  8640 calls per hour

8640 calls per hour X 8.5 hours a day = 73440 calls per day

73440 calls per day X 10 months (304 days) = 22,325,760 phone calls

This data tells us in order to set quality appointments from a cold calling list, approximately 1468 calls must be made for each quality appointment that is set. 

Cold calling list expected ratio is 1468 calls to 1 qualified appointment

Some might ask why on earth anyone would make nearly fifteen hundred calls in order to get one quality appointment. I did too. However, it was not the only calling campaign that was being launched for the call center. In a small office adjacent to the main call room, a few select, experienced marketers were making calls off signature cards. I noticed immediately that our success ratio was much higher when using a signature card that was signed, dated and returned from an interested customer. In fact, the ratio was between four or five to one, or a twenty to twenty five percent success ratio. Before I move forward, I want to make perfectly clear that I understand that this was just my experience and that other marketing firms may have a different result when using cold call lists and signature cards. However, I do believe that these number are a valid basis to form my opinion, I do not want to insinuate that the statistics I found will always be the only stats. The world of insurance marketing is a constantly changing world and I would never assume to have all the answers. Fortunately for me, I do however have an addition ten years of appointment setting under my belt to reflect upon.

Since my early days in appointment setting I have been part of countless calling campaigns. In fact, from my records, the only state I have not called to set appointments is Alaska. Maybe there is something in the cool, clean Alaskan air that repels the incessant ringing of the telephone, I don’t know. I do know that even as the business world changes and evolves to meet the new demands of customers, some things never change. For instance, one of the best ways to reach a customer is though a quality referral from a friend or a family member. Sadly we all do not all have a massive and endless supply of friends and family that spend their time selflessly promoting their insurance selling relative. No, we must strike out on our own and look for new and better ways to get the customers we desire. 

From my experience, a quality lead card marketing campaign, carried out by a reputable lead provider, is one of the most efficient and hassle-free ways to connect and write business with customers who are in the market and looking for insurance options. It certainly beats making 1000+ calls to folks who are not in the market, in order to get one qualified appointment.

Next time... 2 calls? 4 calls? 6 calls? A dozen?