Outsourcing
of Cold Calling

Cold Calling As the Key to Success

Hardly any method of acquiring new customers has such a bad reputation as cold calling. Almost everyone has had their own experience with it because they were called as part of an outbound campaign and usually associate this type of customer service with a rather unpleasant experience. Particularly in the B2B sector, clients have therefore come to believe that cold calling tends to be detrimental to their business.

Florian Götz, Assistant to the Managing Director of Ervin Germany GmbH, also had his reservations about cold calling. But with the help of Snubes' call center matching, he was able to find the right partner in October 2019 and has been a big fan ever since: of both his outbound call center and Snubes' service. After all, the linchpin of a successful outbound campaign is having the right call center at a company's side.

Ervin is the second largest international steel abrasive manufacturer, based in the USA and in Europe. The company has been family-owned since its founding in the 1920s and stands out for its B2B customer focus and relentless drive to develop the best process, and therefore the best product, for every process in steel blasting.

What Did Ervin Germany GmbH
Want to Outsource?

As the second largest international steel abrasive manufacturer, Ervin Germany GmbH's goal was to increase its market share in Europe in 2020. A potential analysis was to help evaluate new industries, identify potential customers and thus generate new leads. Since Ervin did not have sufficient internal resources for such a project, the company started looking for a call center. It was to work through telephone lists using classic cold calling, identify the right contacts, evaluate potentials and hand over corresponding warm leads to Ervin's internal sales department. So much for the theory, but can a call center handle this task just as well as the company's own staff? And where does one look for such a call center?

How Was the Right
Call Center Found?

Florian Götz, Assistant to Managing Director Europe at Ervin Germany GmbH, was the project manager and therefore responsible for the call center search. Turning to Snubes for this was the easiest approach for him, as the collaboration was not only free of charge for him, but above all saved time and effort.

With just a few clicks, Florian Götz was able to set his call center requirements on the Snubes platform. As a result, a selection of suitable service providers was created for his project using an intelligent algorithm that incorporates over 20 parameters and exclusive data. This resulted in a shortlist of five providers, of which Mr. Götz shortlisted two. After getting to know both call centers, the decision was no longer difficult and he was able to decide in favor of a call center from Berlin just three weeks after the invitation to tender. The provider was particularly convincing due to its specialization in outbound telephony and experience in the field of mechanical engineering and B2B.

What Added Value
Does the Right Call Center
Partner Offer?

The fact that the selected service provider cannot be seen as a classic call center, but much more as a sales consultant, was something Florian Götz was already aware of when deciding on the call center and made clear at the start of the collaboration. In a kick-off workshop, in addition to the technical and administrative requirements, the content, procedure and goals of the project were once again jointly defined. After a short pilot phase, the project could then start. The outbound call center carried out a market analysis for the Ervin company throughout Germany in order to measure the demand for steel blasting agents in previously unknown industrial fields and to identify unused potential. As a result, several hundred interested leads were passed on to the Ervin sales team and developed into new customers.

The steel blasting agent manufacturer Ervin defined return on investment as the most important KPI. The profit made from orders initiated by the call center should therefore be greater than the costs for the call center. Weekly reporting from the supplier to Ervin ensured the success of the campaign and allowed direct adjustments to be made if necessary. Due to the positive results and cooperation with the outbound call center, further projects have already been implemented together.

All Expectations Exceeded

Lean, simple, fast and practical was the service Snubes provided to Ervin Germany GmbH. Call center matching increased the probability of finding a service provider that could ideally meet the company's needs. As a result, a shortlist of suitable call centers was available just one day after the project's tender was launched. Just six weeks later, Florian Götz had not only decided on a provider, but was already able to launch the pilot project.

Conclusion

Despite the bad reputation cold calling had for Ervin, they found that this form of sales can be a surprisingly value-added channel for both customers and companies. All it takes is the right partner. Thanks to the smart features of Snubes' outsourcing platform, Ervin was able to find a customized solution and a partner with whom projects could be successfully implemented and with whom a long-term business relationship developed.