Have you used outsourced appointment setting firms?

Appointment setting firms that have an equity stake in the project through pay for performance models provide a more defined product,service and result. If specific criteria are not met the client is not invoiced.

Whether you are targeting complex high dollar/long cycle prospects, new market penetration, targeting nich markets and accounts or struggling to hit quota, pay for performance models provide tangible ROI.

Understand the impact of executing internally vs. outsourcing....

Take an unbiased look at the state of your existing process. In particular, pay special attention to your opportunity costs.

An interesting stat from IDC states that for every $5 million in potential revenue the opportunity cost is $3600/hr in lost revenue. This means for every hour your rep is engaged in activities they are not proficient in such as cold calling, appointment setting, reporting, repetitive tasks etc...your opportunity costs are in the thousands! Outsourced lead gen/appointment setting solutions will help your team to reach full potential.

Be strategic in your mix. Relying on inbound leads is a more reactive approach. Have a healthy mix. Incorporate outbound demand gen that positions you with a proactive component.

Balance equals full engagement. Engagement translates into conversations that allow the selling process to begin.

Good Luck,
Michael LoPreste

Over the years, we have worked with a clients that previously used appointment setting firms and experienced lackluster results. Mainly due to the meetings not being qualified, no real opportunities, etc. Also because they went with the low-cost vendor that wasn’t as fluent in their space as was mentioned above. That doesn't mean though that appointment-setting in itself isn't a highly successful model, you just have to structure it around opportunities so the meeting isn’t where the opportunity is discovered (hopefully) but a next step to further an opportunity that has been identified.

In our case, our clients sell deals over 500K. So we took the approach of appointment-setting as an accelerator for reps to engage with an active opportunity we identify. We chose not to offer appointment setting as it's been traditionally viewed as an activity-based deliverable with the meeting as the objective. Also, there are plenty of very large opportunities that aren't quite ready for a meeting, that information needs to be captured and acted on. A solution that takes a more holistic approach to pipeline building would include meetings, nurturing, and impromptu conversations from time to time. If you are able to integrate at that level with your provider you would see improved results.

Having scheduled meetings as part of your lead generation activity will likely add cost, but if it is commensurate with the size of the deals you are pursuing then it will actually increase ROI of your programs. A scheduled meeting ensures your reps are talking with the account. It puts more accountability with the reps since they have improved access to the prospect. Many programs break down at the hand-off stage where reps aren't able to pursue the prospects with the same frequency as the outbound reps are able to. In that case, meetings keep the opportunity progressing and your team actively involved in the discussion so it doesn’t cool off from playing phone tag.

For some reason, people think i am going to not support outsourced appointment setting. There is a great blog post on this on Michael Brenner's B2B Marketing Insider Blog: http://www.b2bmarketinginsider.com/demand-generation/be-a-hero-choose-appoint.... In particular, check out the comments. Here is my view on outsource appointment setting, the advantage is measureable Results -- Period. If you understand your conversion metrics, you are in luck. You can create predictable revenue and cost back the CFO. I believe you should use outsource appointment setting for:

1. Niche Targets -- I really like it for this. If you need to reach that specific targets, you'll be fired by the time you wait for inbound marketing to kick in.
2. Ramping up new Reps in a Region -- You can buy 10 meetings and get the guy/gal going.
3. Evangelistic high level sales from expensive bag-carrying reps -- I know that sounds long, but its true. If you're job is to just get high-powered reps in front of specific people, this is for you.

Here is where I think they don't work:

BANT-centric markets -- if there is enough activity in your market to require strict lead definitions, outsource appointments are not for you. As a matter of fact, if you try to get psychographic qualifiers from outsourced appointment guys, they probably won't take the job. (ex: Timeframe, etc). They can only qualify on demographic qualifiers.

These are good points. I would like to add two more:

Recognize that an appointment is not interest. For companies that want to get a sales rep in front of a potential prospect at any cost, appointment setting can work. The downside to this is that the sales rep has to stay engaged whether there is a potential opportunity next quarter or next year. You have to decide for your own company if this is going to happen.

Also recognize that you get what you pay for. If you pay $350 - 650 (or more) for an appointment, the appointment setting company needs to set a minimum number of appointments per week to make money. While there are guarantees, carefully measure the percent of appointments that yield real meetings. If it is 50% (which in our surveys is optimistic) then the cost per qualified appointment is $700 - $1300 (or more).

Thanks for the insight, Craig.

Craig,
As the VP of Sales for an appointment setting company (eCoast) we find it works best for companies who sell primary off-line. For example, many of our customers are channel partners/IT Solution Providers.

In terms of marketing ROI, appointment setting is very trackable. However, if your solution is not over 25K achieving an ROI may be a challenge.

To Dan's point....

Appointment setting should involve some level of BANT prior to setting the appointment (unless with a target account).

Further, many companies have been burned by "lead generation" and take comfort in a "pay-for-performance/share the risk" type model appointment setting lends itself to.

Appointment setting works when the teleprospecting function is able to communicate back and forth with sales during the process and if they are able to deliver a marketing qualified lead (MQL) which by definition should be qualified using BANT or whatever qualification method you are using. It is growing ever popular with our clients as they will only fund what they can measure to the point made earlier. As for knowing what the ROI is for any given marketing tactic - not so many know what to expect, especially in the b-to-b technology channel where partners, for a myriad of reasons, drop off in terms of adoption. What seems like a successful campaign, can often be thwarted because it was not properly marketed to the partners who would engage in the demand creation process. If marketed properly, because marketers can predict measureable results -- X number of appt's per sales rep, etc., these programs are getting more and more traction - at least from what we see as we engage with our clients in the channel.

Outsourced appointment setting was very helpful for me. I had very long list of shark tank leads for house painting, around 1500. Through the appointment setting service I was able to get 60 solid leads. These 60 high potential leads created an extremely positive ROI . I would definitely recommend the strategy depending on what the nature of your business is. I got in touch with several companies through http://www.businesstelemarketingservices.com/appointment-setting-services.html and gained a lot of insight on appointment setting through them.

Yes, a company called Partner Source Minnesota, they do Appointment Setting and Lead Generation.

They did a good job for us as we only needed a company for 3 months finding leads for our Tech company.

Here's their website: http://www.thepartnersource.com