Robocalls are an everyday annoyance for the majority of Americans. In June, more than 4.3 billion robocalls were placed. The high volume of robocalls is affecting trust in voice calling, damaging the chances of businesses engaging with customers. Robocalls are not the only type of unwanted call. The category also includes fraudulent (scam) calls, as well as inappropriate sales calls (spam). However, most spammy and scammy calls use some robo-dialing or robocalling technology.
And then there’s the matter of lost trust. Say you’re trying to contact a potential new client. If that person doesn’t know your number, they may assume you’re a robocaller and refuse to answer. If you’re like many business owners, you may have experienced these sorts of problems firsthand.
In terms of their economic impact, robocalls are more than a nuisance. The FCC estimates that robocalls cost American’s billions of dollars per year. Business owners’ foot a large portion of that bill—not just in terms of minutes wasted, but also missed opportunities and diminished trust in phone interactions.
How? Well, imagine you’re deep into a project that requires your full concentration. You’re feeling focused; you’re in the zone. Then your phone rings. As a business owner, you can’t afford to miss a call from a prospect or existing customer. You don’t recognize the number, but it looks like someone from your city. So, you pick up the phone…
…only to hear spam on the other end.
Transaction Network Services survey revealed that three-quarters of Americans do not answer calls on their wireless phones if they do not recognize the number. That’s not surprising, given the combination of annoyance and risk with unknown callers. In fact, 78% of people are more willing to answer if the caller ID displayed the logo and brand name.
“Low call answer rates are wreaking havoc on the customer experience and businesses’ bottom lines,” said Bill Versen, president, communications market at TNS. “While progress is being made to reduce the nearly 79 billion robocalls Americans received last year, our survey shows that enterprises must get more proactive to restore trust in voice calling, and that starts with branded calling.”
Branded calling verifies calls and prevents spoofing, controls spam labeling and increases answer rates, increases agent effectiveness, raises customer engagement, delivers brand information and creates a branded moment before and after a call.
Consumers’ trust and willingness to answer branded calls are highest for health care providers and banks.
- Consumers would answer a branded call from their healthcare provider if the brand logo/name was displayed on the incoming call screen.
- Consumers would answer a branded call from their bank if the brand logo/name was displayed on the incoming call screen.
- Consumers would answer a branded call from a hospitality/travel provider if the brand logo/name was displayed on the incoming call screen.
For brands seeking to improve call answer rates and bolster the efficiency of calling campaigns, consumers are more likely to engage during traditional business hours.
- Consumers are more likely to answer a branded call that arrives during normal business hours than calls that arrive outside of business hours.
- Consumers trust calls from brands that come in during normal business hours more than calls that arrive outside of business hours.
- Consumers trust branded calls that come in during the work week more than those that arrive during the weekend.
While not everyone may answer calls, even if they are branded, increased branded calling can still help differentiate between legitimate business calls and unwanted robocalls – and improve the perception of inbound calling from legitimate businesses.
One of the biggest concerns heading in to 2022 is scammers posing as legitimate businesses. If you’ve gotten a call from someone regarding your car’s warranty, you’re already familiar with this one. In 2021, the top scam was fake auto warranties, making up 51% of all scam call attempts
Every time state and federal law enforcement officials think they have smacked down scam calls, the unwanted calls pop up in a slightly different place with a slightly different face.
One new trick is for callers to send messages straight to voicemail. The scammers argue that because they don’t cause phones to ring, they aren’t really calling at all. They also may buy or hijack lists of real phone numbers to trick spam-blocking software into letting the calls through. Law enforcement officials have asked phone carriers to make it harder for scammers to obtain real numbers, but those lists are legally for sale by third-party data providers, and ferreting out who is buying them is difficult.
