MARKET REVIEW
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It’s a lot easier than you think
A
ccording to tradition, resellers have been slow to embrace call recording, deterred by the notion that selling, installing and maintaining
call recording was so time consuming that margins fell to an almost unprofitable level. But the reduction in cost and rapid developments in call recording technology means that resellers can secure significant profit margins while offering end users a solution with real value add benefits such as training and performance monitoring, sales and marketing, better business automation and improved customer relationship management. “By conveying these business performance benefits effectively to existing and new clients, resellers could be opening up new and higher revenue streams while seeing a significant increase in customer retention,” commented Lee Essex, Product Manager for CTI Group.
The combination of lower costs, improved technology, simple installation and user- friendliness has meant that both resellers and end users are reaping the benefits of call recording. Additionally, new regulations are being introduced into a number of vertical markets beyond the financial services industry that historically drove sales of call recording applications. As a result, CTI has
seen a significant expansion in the number of sectors and organisations that are using call recording. “With regard to the banking industry, the channel needs to be speaking to its financial sector clients now about the Financial Services Authority’s announcement to add mobile phone calls to its call recording regulations,” said Essex. “This legislation will lead to a number of organisations being required to implement or upgrade their existing call recording system, paving the way for resellers to offer a proven value-add commodity.”
Proactivity pays off
Resellers must be proactive about call recording when speaking to both existing and potential customers. With the increase in legislation, it’s easy to rely on organisations that require call recording for compliance reasons but CTI feels that resellers would be missing out on a number of additional commercial opportunities. “Resellers should be speaking to any organisation that has a customer service function about the benefits of call recording,” added Essex. “As a tool for training and performance, customer relationship management and sales and marketing, call recording has never been more beneficial and affordable. It is important that dealers equip their staff with knowledge of the benefits
and feature set that call recording can offer any business. By ensuring that sales staff can communicate with clients about how features such as speech search and analytics can benefit an organisation’s customer service and bottom, they will be increasing their own sales.”
In the early days call recording was not for everyone – customer mindsets, higher procurement costs and no regulatory influences meant that call recording was a niche sale. But that’s all changed, affirms Oak’s joint CEO Phil Reynolds, who now recommends call recording to every single business. “Call recording technology is affordable for every business, and every business can benefit from having their calls recorded. It’s not only that FSA and PCI guidelines demand call recording for certain business types, improved customer service is now a greater imperative and call recording helps businesses to deliver,” he said.
Old barriers to call recording sales have crumbled. Affordability has weakened customer resistance and systems are much easier to sell, install and maintain. “As long as sales people are focused on solution sales call recording is an easy sale, and it’s easier to install than a phone system,” said Reynolds. “Resellers already have the skills so normal product training is
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