Company background
Established in 1989, Sheffield-based telemarketing business Ant Marketing began life as a small business working on small campaigns and appointment setting. The company expanded very quickly, growing from 20 staff working on a couple of campaigns to a business with four offices and approximately 1000 staff, now dealing with a cross-section of businesses.
Typically, Ant conducts large campaigns for companies in the UK and worldwide, delivering both inbound and outbound services and specialising in areas such as market research, appointment generation and list cleansing. Sales and marketing services are delivered to a range of sectors, including telecoms, utilities and insurance companies, as well as survey work for national government.
Like any successful business, Ant has objectives and growth targets. However, a year ago they felt that their technology was holding them back. They had more work coming in than their legacy systems could handle. Since then, they’ve addressed these issues and according to the Head of IT, Luke Sayers:
“The issues we had to face hindered us – our relationship with Telecom Applications was the beginning of a process that has seen us resolve these problems. Now rather than having to turn work away, we’re expanding and looking to open a fifth site.”
The Business Challenge
Despite the fact Ant operate in an extremely competitive sector where companies often face client churn, there are a number of other significant business challenges.
Employee churn has traditionally been an issue in the sector due to the demands of the agent’s job and the fact that many agents are relatively young. Recruitment of staff is therefore a major issue as companies have to keep up with the churn rate, but also provide intensive training - because outbound campaigns require a type of person with a certain amount of drive and personality.
A further major business challenge is the regulatory agenda, with compliance being a hot topic at the moment due to the media interest in the ‘silent calls’ phenomena. So-called ‘silent calls’ occur when automated diallers call a number without an available agent being ready. These ‘dropped calls’ are now subject to regulation by OFCOM (the UK communications industry regulatory body) with operators having to comply with a 3% dropped call rate. Ant’s previous dialler system wasn’t capable of keeping up with OFCOM’s old permitted dropped call rate of 5%, never mind the revised 3% rate!
Luke Sayers, Ant’s Head of IT, said, “Our old dialler solution wasn’t capable of adhering to even the old rules, let alone the new rules. With some degree of manual intervention we could keep close, but couldn’t actually manage it. That was one of the factors that influenced the decision to move over to the TouchStar dialler solution.”
Why did Ant choose Telecom Applications?
Ant already had a dialler solution, but was looking to upgrade and the compliance issue was a factor. However, the new dialler solution also had to be able to increase dialling speed and functionality.
The selection process involved looking at some huge solutions geared toward 1000 seat contact centres, but Ant felt that the nature of their clients’ business requirements – quick campaigns and rapidly changing criteria - meant that they needed a solution with more flexibility. Similarly, Voice over IP solutions were considered, but Ant had concerns that the UK doesn’t yet have the internet capabilities to deliver a guaranteed level of service. At that stage Ant started talking to Telecom Applications.
Ant felt that their previous supplier only provided the solution, whilst they were keen to grow, develop the system and add extra features. So, the value added service wrap that was offered was the clincher. Ant required more than just a maintenance package, as in such a fast moving sector there needs to be continuous improvement, so the initiative is not handed to competitors.
Ant has found that clients’ requirements are becoming more sophisticated and their old system wasn’t capable of dealing with it. They found that when they wanted their service provider to try and address these issues they weren’t forthcoming.
Luke Sayers said: “What really impressed us with Telecom Applications was their flexibility in terms of coming on board, listening to what we wanted and needed and understanding our business objectives. Their turning things round has reassured us and given us the confidence that we can change and get where we want to go.”
Our Solution
The three key things that Ant has experienced from the Telecom Applications solution are flexibility, scalability and reassurance.
Luke Sayers said: “TouchStar offered us lots of value adds. So now we have all these extra features - things which before seemed impossible are now no trouble at all.”
For example, with inbound work some of the functionalities mean that Ant can carry out complex IVR routings. So if someone is in a queue and they’re sitting there for 2 minutes, they can be diverted to an answer machine and Ant can get agents to call them back. Campaigns are shut down automatically at night and calls are diverted to an answer machine. These things are done automatically, so Ant know that they are not just compliant within industry guidelines, but going beyond them.
Telecom Application’s dialler solution, allows Ant to make live updates of the data unlike some solutions where the data has to be reloaded each morning. Ant has found this a massive help with compliance, as some clients ask them to TPS their data. Ant is now finding that they are now well beyond where they were with their previous dialler solution and they are benefiting from new functionalities.
Luke Sayers adds: “The guys at tell us we’re only using 10% of the system’s capability at the moment, so they see it as an ongoing relationship to help us use the bits that are most relevant to us and get the most out of the system and the relationship.”
Implementation
“There were issues that arose during implementation due to our previous systems and structures. It was a huge job to ensure that everything was configured and compatible, but Telecom Applications bent over backwards to resolve them. In fact they worked 24/7 to make sure that the implementation was right. On top of that, we needed to understand what we were doing – so it was a significant learning curve. The nature of our business means that we always have pressure from clients to deliver, so these things had to be done as seamlessly as possible and with the minimum interruption to service.”
“Telecom Applications worked incredibly hard for us - I’ve never known people be so dedicated in doing something. Our previous system would go down at least once a week for half an hour, as a minimum. We’ve now been operating since the completion of the installation at the start of June with three diallers and no down time at all. That is unheard of for us.“
“I can safely say that in every single area that we’d want an improvement, we’ve got it. It’s well beyond our expectations. In the past it was ‘how can we keep up, how can we dial more quickly and keep our customer happy. It always felt as if we were firefighting. Whereas, now we can offer the client enhanced functionality – value added services, at no additional cost.”
Luke Sayers, Head of IT, Ant.
Benefits of Telecom Applications dialler solutions:
- OFCOM compliance
- Faster dialling
- Enhanced functionality
- Limits downtime
- Suite of value added services (Non Geographic Numbers – such as 0845, Least cost routing, training, Hardware/software provision, help with staff recruitment, office furniture)
- Flexible and scalable – grows with you business
- Guaranteed level of service from a family run business
An important benefit of the TouchStar solution for telemarketing companies such as Ant, is OFCOM compliance. But with TouchStar, Ant are compliant with peace of mind, because the system is automated, so they know that they can always hit their drop rate target without having to manually manage the process.
Additionally Ant’s experience is that dial time is vastly enhanced. As Luke Sayers explained:
“We’re are miles up in terms of performance, speed of dial has gone through the roof. We had a customer who is a large insurance company and we ran their campaign on the previous system and we were struggling to hit target. With the new system we are nearly double our target. There have been other factors involved in that – like training and management, but the majority of that is down to the installation of the new system.”
Another factor that has made a difference for Ant is remote monitoring. Their clients can dial in and listen to agents calling their prospects. In the past, such processes could be hit and miss. Now they know which agent they’re listening to and can report back. This is reassuring for Ant’s customers – and allows Ant to deliver a higher degree of service.
With Ant’s old system if somebody called them back and requested to be removed from the data, it required somebody to manually go in and remove the details. Now they can call up and it’s done immediately via an automated process.
Another significant benefit is that agents experience less downtime, so their performance is better, they get through more calls and consequently they’re going to hit target earlier and earn commission. Though their evidence is only anecdotal at the moment, Ant believes that this will make a positive contribution in terms of reducing staff churn.
Besides enhancing the service that Ant delivers to its customers, Telecom Application’s solution means that Ant has felt a massive difference in the level of service that they are now receiving compared to their previous dialler provider.
Luke Sayers continues: “The level of service we receive from Telecom Application is totally different. We paid our previous dialler provider a lot for maintenance and we found that we only called them when something unexpected happened, as we’ve got people on site who understand how the system works. What we were finding was that we knew more about the system than them – so it begged the question, why were we paying all that maintenance. With Telecom Applications we’ve never come across a major problem like that, and we’ve got confidence that they will sort it - and quickly. Every query has been met with an instant answer or they’ve presented us with a range of options. The support is in a different league.”
“And, to say it’s cost effective is an understatement! Previously we were loath to increase our number of seats because we didn’t think we were getting value for money. We’re now already discussing extensions because we’re so busy with what we’ve got.”
“It’s increased our performance across the board – functionality…fantastic, uptime…fantastic, speed of dialling…fantastic, plus we easily meet the 3% drop rate.”
TouchStar Software Profile
TouchStar Software Corporation is a privately held developer of software-based telephone systems with international headquarters in Denver, Colorado. TouchStar Software has over 1800 systems installed worldwide – all of which enjoy around the clock customer support.
TouchStar Software is built on an open-architecture, Windows 2000 Server and Microsoft SQL Server platform, and state-of-the-art Dialogic SCSA telephony components, providing robust predictive dialling and blended inbound/outbound, ACD and IVR features that are now affordable and well within the means of growing businesses.
In the UK, TouchStar Software operates an exclusive reseller partnership with Telecom Applications Ltd.
Established in 1992, Telecom Applications delivers communications solutions for companies.
Our expertise lies in the delivery of OFCOM and DMA compliant contact centre solutions – and as specialists in outbound solutions. Telecom Applications goes beyond the simple provision of equipment for customers, delivering a value proposition with a broad range of added services. Telecom Applications’ contact centre solutions significantly improve agent productivity, the professionalism of your organisation and allow for seamless campaign management.
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