Study Finds Many Companies Are Missing a Good Outbound Strategy

While outbound often gets a bad rap – many of us associate outbound marketing with annoying calls about our car’s warranty – the truth is that it’s a critical element of a complete customer care program, provided it is done at the right time, with the right approach, and the right content.

A new study by Forrester (News - Alert) Consulting entitled, “The State of Outbound Communications in 2022” found that respondents’ top business goals include a focus on improving the customer experience and that outbound communications are closely tied to achieving those goals. The study was commissioned by Neustar, a TransUnion company.

The research found that 87% of the business and IT executives surveyed across nine industries agree that the phone is the most important outbound contact channel, but many respondents noted that they face significant obstacles in reaching customers. These include spam tagging, mislabeling as “unknown caller,” inaccurate CRM data, fear of fraud, and communication channel siloes. Aligning the voice and digital channel strategy is more critical than ever.

Many companies are not doing outbound correctly. Nearly three in four survey respondents said that the type of message and priority were the determinants of the outbound communication strategy. Only 40% consider customer preferences and behavioral data analysis in channel selection, and 34% said their solution provides up-to-date contact information for clients.

In reality, good outbound needs to be driven by the customer experience, not the company.

“While many respondents said they’re confident that they can orchestrate an effective multichannel strategy, the majority admit their voice and digital channels are separate. Less than half are currently leveraging contact strategies to help them orchestrate a multichannel approach,” said Robert McKay, Senior Vice President at Neustar. “Those respondents that have adopted contact strategies that leverage behavioral insights of their customers and their calling habits have seen many benefits, including increased answer rates, improved right-party contacts, greater operational efficiency, an heightened customer experience and revenue growth.”

Edited by Alex Passett