Inbound Call Center Sales Techniques: Improve Your Skills

The ultimate goal of having your customers on the phone is to encourage them to purchase your product or service. That said, it takes careful effort and definitive skills to turn your potential customers into marketing-qualified leads.

Today’s sales world is growing lightning fast. Call centers and the sales methods they use must keep pace because the traditional cold calling sales techniques are no longer effective. Call centers have shifted towards an inbound sales approach, where agents contact warm leads who expressed interest in their product or service.

Companies can handle inbound call center sales on their own or they can outsource answering service to a third-party contractor. Most outsourcing companies such as SupportYourApp provide crucial assistance for other brands by delivering high-quality Support as a Service. Either way, an in-house agent or an outsourced call center agent must know the sales strategies in-depth to help companies stay ahead of the competition.

In this article, we’ll go through the most efficient strategies your call center sales team may employ to boost profits while also ensuring impeccable customer service.

Mastering the Art of Inbound Call Center Sales

Starting a sales-oriented dialogue with a customer is not an easy task, especially when it comes to inbound calls. With a variety of call center sales, such as inside sales call centers or telesales call centers, there are basic rules that work for each.

Inbound call center sales require extensive strategic planning and preparation if the company wants to grow its profit.

Improve your selling skills by using the following techniques for inbound contact center sales:

1. Know your product or service in-depth: Only by demonstrating a thorough understanding of your company’s product or service can a call center agent accelerate a customer’s purchase.
2. The opening is fundamental: The sales process starts from the very beginning of the conversation with a potential prospect. Call center agents should use a personalized approach, starting with greeting a client and thanking them for the call.
3. Customers expect a solution from you: Your clients are looking for more than simply a new product or service. They are looking for a solution to a specific problem, which your agents should identify and resolve throughout the call. Only then can the sale become a successful strategic decision for both parties.
4. Focus on building long-term relationships: Inbound call center sales are not only about making a profit. Communication skills are essential for call centers sales agents to build rapport with the customers by following the basic principles of customer service etiquette.
5. 360-degree customer view: Integrating the right tools and technology to obtain full information about your clients allows for personalized marketing and, thus, can promote sales.
6. Cross-selling method: This technique ensures a rapid increase in sales since your agent can offer more than one product or service in a way that your customers start thinking of it as a necessary purchase.
7. Streamline the process and reduce waiting times: With the help of outsourcing companies, your call center sales can work and serve customers 24/7. This means that the company is running sales around the clock with no hold times for the clients.

Closing Techniques for Inbound Call Center Sales That Always Work

Let’s move on to the final but no less important stage of the sales process at the call center – closing the deal. This refers to the steps taken by the inbound call center sales agents to reach an agreement on the sale.

There are many powerful techniques to close sales in the most profitable and effective way. Here we’ll focus on the most popular no-fail options:

1. Don’t sell a product, sell a solution that this product can provide.
2. Don’t overuse questions, use statements instead.
3. Pressure might work in physics, but not in sales.
4. Demonstrate deep knowledge and understanding of your product.
5. Let your customers visualize the benefits your product can bring to their lives.
6. Choose the right moment to ask for the sale, but don’t drag it out.
7. Take on the role of psychologist and reflect customers’ communication style.
8. Use the closed questions and learn to take “no” for an answer.

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How to Make Progress in Call Center Sales?

Companies should understand that call centers are the most direct way to build rapport with customers. Therefore, customer engagement is mainly done through call centers, which is why it’s a perfect chance to boost your sales.

Every client interacting with your company gives you the opportunity to learn and understand the needs of your target market so that you can sell them exactly what they need. There may also be an opportunity to up-sell products or services that significantly improve the customer experience overall.

However, making a giant leap forward in sales goes beyond following the most promising sales techniques and communication styles. The formula of success in call center sales is the qualities that your agents possess.

Top Skills a Call Center Sales Agent Needs

Sales and customer service are inextricably linked. Each customer inquiry or problem serves as an opportunity for agents to increase sales. Once the problem is solved, your customer service representative is the best candidate to close a sale.

The level of expertise of your call center agent determines whether or not your company makes a successful deal. This is why having a customer service team member taking over the sales is a win-win situation for customers and your company:

• Customers don’t have to wait to be transferred to another sales agent,
• Your company saves time and costs by not hiring and training a new person specifically for the inbound call center sales.

Call center sales agents have to meet the following requirements to accomplish the best upselling practices:

• Eager to learn and absorb new information quickly;
• Patient and adaptable team worker;
• Focused on customer satisfaction and business success;
• Analyses the problem and looks for the best rational solution;
• Excellent communications skills;
• Emotionally intelligent consultant.

Contact Center Sales: What’s the Difference?

So far, we’ve talked about phone calls and sales. But what about other communication channels that customers prefer even more in today’s digital environment? This is the job for a contact center that, as a rule of thumb, covers a much broader spectrum of ways to communicate with clients.

A multichannel sales strategy appears to be a much better alternative compared to inbound call center sales. However, each technique that we’ve discussed above needs to be tailored specifically for the channel where the interaction with a customer occurs. Because each communication channel is unique, contact center agents must develop additional skills to effectively adapt to different communication styles, speeds, tones, and methods of completing sales.

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Final Thoughts on Inbound Call Center Sales: How to Sell More or How to Sell Better?

While reading and analyzing this list of the most promising techniques for handling inbound call center sales, you might have noticed that they all share the common goal: providing a high-quality service or product along with superior customer experience.

Call center sales are not just a crazy pursuit of the number of successful deals. Instead, it’s a gradual and lengthy process that can only be proved successful when your customers are left with something more than just a purchased product. A rich customer experience is what builds your brand reputation and helps you effortlessly lead in sales in the future.