Telemarketing (sometimes known as inside sales, or telesales in the UK and Ireland) is a method of direct marketing in which a salesperson solicits prospective customers to buy products, subscriptions or services, either over the phone or through a subsequent face to face or web conferencing appointment scheduled during the call. Telemarketing can also include recorded sales pitches programmed to be played over the phone via automatic dialing.
Telemarketing refers to the practice of contacting, qualifying, and soliciting prospective customers through telecommunications technologies, including telephone, fax, and internet communications. It does not encompass direct mail marketing.
Categories The two major categories of telemarketing are business-to-business and business-to-consumer.
Subcategories Lead generation, the gathering of information and contacts. Sales, using persuasion to sell a product or service. Outbound, proactive marketing in which prospective and preexisting customers are contacted directly, Inbound, reception of incoming orders and requests for information. Demand is generally created by advertising, publicity, or the efforts of outside salespeople.
Service Styles Call to Action, the implementation of outbound telemarketing to "activate" or elicit an action or response from prospects (i.e., entice prospects to visit a client's website). Appointment Setting, utilizing inbound or outbound telemarketing to create face-to-face or telephone appointments for sales purposes. Database Cleansing, the outbound calling of databases with the particular purpose to clean and prepare data (i.e. removing outdated and incorrect data) and contact details for future telemarketing campaigns. Surveys, the implementation of telemarketing (can be inbound or outbound) with the particular purpose of collecting data and information from specific target markets for qualitative research purposes. Telesales, telemarketing (inbound or outbound) with the specific intention of making an actual sale/transaction over the phone. Often includes the collection of credit card details over the phone for payment purposes, which allows for faster sales cycles and payment confirmation.
Procedure Telemarketing may be done from a company office, from a call center, or from home. It may involve a live operator voice broadcasting which is most frequently associated with political messages.
An effective telemarketing campaign often involves two or more calls. The first call (or series of calls) determines the customer's needs. The final call (or series of calls) motivates the customer to make a purchase. Prospective customers are identified by various means, including past purchase history, previous requests for information, credit limit, competition entry forms, and application forms. Names may also be purchased from another company's consumer database or obtained from a telephone directory or another public list. The qualification process is intended to determine which customers are most likely to purchase the product or service.
In business-to-business lead generation scenarios, telemarketing often targets perceived decision-makers who might be good prospects for a business product or service. The telemarketing approach is often combined with outreach via email or social media, typically referred to as a cadence. Calls are usually made by sales development representatives with the goal of this outreach being a subsequent meeting—often with an account executive at the vendor organization.
Charitable organizations, alumni associations, and political parties often use telemarketing to solicit donations. Marketing research companies use telemarketing techniques to survey the prospective or past customers of a client's business to assess market acceptance of or satisfaction with a particular product, service, brand, or company. Public opinion polls are conducted similarly.
Telemarketing techniques are also applied to other forms of electronic marketing using e-mail or fax messages, in which case they are frequently considered spam by receivers.
Negative perceptions and criticism
Telemarketing has been negatively associated with various scams and frauds, such as pyramid schemes, and with deceptively overpriced products and services. Fraudulent telemarketing companies are frequently referred to as "telemarketing boiler rooms" or simply "boiler rooms". Telemarketing is often criticized as an unethical business practice due to the perception of high-pressure sales techniques during unsolicited calls. Telemarketers marketing telephone companies may participate in telephone slamming, the practice of switching a customer's telephone service without their knowledge or authorization.
Telemarketing calls are often considered an annoyance, especially when they occur during the dinner hour, early in the morning, or late in the evening. A common complaint about telemarketing has been that the calls are a nuisance and a distraction. In 1909, one target of the unwelcome calls declared "My telephone is far more of a nuisance to me than it is a convenience"."Housekeeper Objects to Telephone Advertising", Telephony, February 20, 1909, page 227. However, some companies have capitalized on these negative emotions. Since 2007 several forums have sprouted and act as complaint boards where consumers can voice their concerns and criticism. In response, some telemarketing companies have filed lawsuits against these portals. The current legal system in the U.S grants such forums a certain degree of protection through "Communications Decency Act, 47 U.S.C 230" and California's Anti-SLAPP law.
Robotic telemarketing and ringless voicemail Telemarketing may also use robocalls: automated telephone calls that use both computerized autodialers and computer-delivered pre-recorded messages in a sales pitch. Some can simulate a personalized phone call through personalized pre-recorded messages.
Telemarketing has recently been advanced to implement a programmed women's voice as the operator instead of hiring a real woman to perform the task (see example of Samantha West). This attempt is unsuccessful. However, some scholars argue that such technological advancements reinforce commoditization of a woman's speech as a marketable entity and lead to "gendered hierarchy of communication".
Other tactics, such as ringless voicemail, can directly deliver a voice message directly to a landline's or cellphone's voicemail. Its original purpose was to provide a nonintrusive method of delivering valuable messages. There has been debate on ringless voicemail causing issues relating to "hijacking" of the voicemail by companies, which would disallow family and friends to access the voicemail.
Regulations
In some countries telemarketing is subject to regulatory and legislative controls related to consumer privacy and protection.
United States Telemarketing in the United States is governed at the federal level primarily by the Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991 (TCPA) (47 U.S.C. § 227) and the Federal Trade Commission's Telemarketing Sales Rule (TSR). The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) implements additional TCPA regulations under 47 C.F.R. § 64.1200 and derives further authority from the Telemarketing and Consumer Fraud and Abuse Prevention Act (15 U.S.C. §§ 6101–6108). Amendments to the TSR issued in December 2024 expanded the rule to cover certain inbound telemarketing calls related to technical-support services, effective January 9, 2025. In December 2023 the FCC adopted a "one-to-one" consent requirement for autodialed and prerecorded telemarketing calls and texts, but in January 2025, days before its scheduled effective date, the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit vacated the rule in Insurance Marketing Coalition v. FCC, holding that it exceeded the agency's statutory authority under the TCPA. The FCC subsequently repealed the vacated rule language. Many professional associations also maintain voluntary codes of ethics intended to promote responsible telemarketing practices.
Some jurisdictions have implemented "Do Not Call" lists through industry organizations or legislation; telemarketers are restricted from initiating contact with participating consumers. Legislative versions often provide for heavy penalties on companies which call individuals on these listings. The U.S. Federal Trade Commission has implemented a National Do Not Call Registry in an attempt to reduce intrusive telemarketing nationwide. Telemarketing corporations and trade groups challenged this as a violation of commercial speech rights.Miller, Jacqui Brown. "Mainstream Marketing Services, et al. v. Federal Trade Commission: Resources and Legal Analysis." ReclaimDemocracy.org. January 20, 2004. However, the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the National Do Not Call Registry on February 17, 2004.Text of the case and the decision. FindLaw.
Companies that use telemarketing as a sales tool are governed by the United States Federal regulations outlined in the TSR (amended on January 29, 2003 originally issued in 1995) and the TCPA. In addition to these Federal regulations, telemarketers calling nationally must also adhere to separate state regulations. Most states have adapted "do not call" files of their own, of which only some states share with the U.S. Federal Do Not Call registry. Each U.S. state also has its own regulations concerning: permission to record, permission to continue, no rebuttaling statutes, Sunday and Holiday calls; as well as the fines and punishments exacted for violations.
September 1, 2009, FTC regulations banning most robocalls went into effect.
Since many telemarketing calls now originate offshore, beyond the reach of US legal or regulatory agencies, the National Do Not Call Registry is usually ignored, as well as FTC regulations, and every possible number is called in an area code block. Some automated services are sophisticated enough to analyze the audio from the answering party, and if it determines that a human did not respond, will call repeatedly until one does or a limit is reached. This may be coupled with a fake Caller ID display ("spoofing") to mislead the call recipient into answering, or even thinking it is a local number calling. These are not actions of legitimate businesses.
Telemarketing techniques are increasingly used in political campaigns. Because of free-speech issues, the laws governing political phone calls are much less stringent than those applying to commercial messages. Even so, a number of states have barred or restricted political robocalls.
The National Do Not Call Registry has helped to substantially curb telemarketing calls to landlines and has also helped with the increasing trend for telemarketers to target mobile phones. As a result, there has been a greater push for mobile applications to help with unwanted calls from telemarketers, like PrivacyStar. These companies have helped to log thousands of complaints to the DNC Registry, since the inception of the registry itself.Matt Brownell, The Street. "http://www.thestreet.com/print/story/11439016.html." March 1, 2012. Retrieved August 27, 2012.
Following the enactment of the TRACED Act in 2019, the Federal Communications Commission adopted additional rules to combat illegal robocalls, including requirements for call authentication and mitigation programs by telecommunications providers.
In 2020, the FCC mandated the implementation of the STIR/SHAKEN caller ID authentication framework to combat spoofed robocalls. Major telecommunications providers were required to implement the system by June 3, 2021, and smaller providers were required to comply by December 10, 2021.
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