2012 was a an exciting year for Procall Solutions during which we strengthened our management team, re-engineered core business processes and re-imagined our service offerings for the market.  Now that 2012 has passed, those all seem like distant challenges.  Truly, those are routine growth and development measures for any company to stay competitive, and Procall is no exception.

With the arrival of every new year, in addition to tending to those ultra-important business capability tests, comes the opportunity to elevate our game, and provide outstanding service for our customers and those that communicate with their brands.  This is what makes a company great....especially those in the business of providing customer service.

We have designed our business around providing high quality customer care, sales and order management and business process outsourcing for the legal, financial services, pharmaceutical, insurance and health care industries.  And each year we strive to make our contact management services an integral part of our customer's mission critical campaigns.

Let us know how we can help you elevate.  We're ready....it's your CALL!!

clientservices@procallonline.com

Partnering with call center providers experienced in pharmaceutical and medical device sales is critical to building and maintaining relationships with health care providers.   Staffed with the right talent, call centers like Procall Solutions can more efficiently “visit” your customers, deliver critical knowledge on your product, and effectively build your brand.

As a collaborative partner, Procall Solutions industry experts will help design the program that’s right for you and your product.  As an extension of your marketing and outside sales efforts, inside sales is an integral component in the sales cycle.  White spaces, vacant territories and even underperforming territories are all prime candidates for the flexibility and speed with which our team can drive results.

After operating in disaster recovery mode for the last 36 hours, operations at Procall's Philadelphia contact center have been fully restored. 

Thank you to all of our valued clients and their consumers around the country for patience during megastorm Sandy. 

Procall's highly trained staff of customer service representatives, inside sales teams and business process outsourcing agents are hard at work to seamlessly handle this transition.


 

This Pharmaceutical Conference was attended by several senior level executives who used this forum to network and learn from other pharmaceutical colleagues and vendors on how to build inside sales teams and diversify pharmaceutical sales strategy. At ProCall Solutions we feel  the  technology landscape continues to evolve and transform - medical device, animal health, biotech and pharmaceutical companies must learn to adapt and incorporate these new and emerging technological advancements into their product and educational promotion.

There are several case studies and best practices on how to best implement multi-channel approaches in terms of sampling, launching in domestic and international markets as well as how to integrate new processes into the creation of small to large or existing inside sales teams. To successfully build and develop a multi-channel inside sales and marketing approach within the healthcare industry will require marketing and sales executives to fully understand: 1) The level of innovation allowed within their corporate culture, 2) Mutual Financial Interdependence, 3) Commitment by their internal IT team or subcontracted IT or Contact Center vendor, and 4) A paradigm shift to allow extended periods of time to prove ROI analysis. These areas are essential to understand in order to overcome barriers to implementation.

At ProCall Solutions we manage to stay ahead of the curve by customizing and building upon these industry best practices in terms of executing inside sales teams, understanding the compliance, legal, aggregate spend, social media practices, as well as many other regulations needed to reach a widening customer base utilizing multi-channels approaches and strategies. Ultimately, companies employing these strategies will be able to lower costs and improve overall sales success.

Procall Solutions proudly announces a new partnership with Social Media HQ. Social Media Headquarters is a full service social media and inbound marketing company that provides online marketing services, consulting and education to working professionals, non-profits, government organizations and companies of all sizes that are looking for ways to better engage their customers. Please visit our new partner at www.socialmediahq.com and imagine the possibilities for building and managing your brand.

Together, Procall and Social Media HQ will work to handle all aspects of online marketing, including relationship building, brand management and social media monitoring for clients on a global level. Social Media HQ brings extensive experience in sales, entrepreneurship and internet marketing to the partnership, and Procall provides the knowledge and expertise in communicating directly and indirectly with your consumers.

Whether you already have an online marketing plan and just need help with implementation, or you are merely beginning to develop your message, Procall and Social Media HQ can assist you build your online conversation.

The Multi-Channel Sales Innovation Summit provides senior level executives with a forum to network and learn from leading experts on how to diversify your inside sales strategy. As the healthcare and technological landscape continues to transform, healthcare industries (pharmaceutical, biotech and medical device) must adapt their selling techniques to meet the emerging demands in customer preferences and incorporate new technological advancements.

Be sure and attend September 24/25th session in Philadelphia and learn how an inside sales team can help grow your business.  Gary Stair, our VP of Business Development will be participating on a panel discussion September 24^th about The Evolution of Pharmaceutical Sales and Strategies to Integrate Emerging Technology.

Click on the link for further details and registration information.  http://www.exlpharma.com/event-home/3331

If first call resolution isn't one of the most important metrics for the contact center, it certainly is for our clients and the person requesting help.  We have been conditioned for years to manage efficiency and productivity in the contact center...from the agent's perspective.  But if we're really impacting efficiency, we will keep the callers productive at their own jobs, and on-line with our center for as short a duration as possible, while still effectively resolving the issue (or placing the order, etc..).

It's first call resolution that matters to those with whom we communicate.  Do it once, do it right.  In order to accomplish that though, we must first understand their needs.  But in today's highly connected world, that important communication can happen in many ways, through many channels.

Click-to-Chat has been in contact centers for a while now, but remains one of the most effective tools to make interactions quick, complete and easy.  Not to mention, it is not as intimidating to the "caller" as he/she has the ability to control the flow of information, and the opportunity to end the chat if it is either unsuccessful or turns into an unwanted sales pitch.

Procall Solutions can design the right solution for you and your users, keeping both first call resolution and customer satisfaction high.


 

"People Do Not Want To Be Sold" is a statement that everyone in the sales business has heard and it is so out of context that it drives me crazy. While true in it's naked/lack of context meaning most people would agree with the statement....but how many of those people would agree that everything they have in their person was sold to them. People want to be sold to....just not negatively or without regard to their needs.

Hear Procall VP Business Development Gary Stair  talk about this statement and dissect it on it's head and hopefully convince that in it's full context this is an absolutely inaccurate comment.  Please join us for a great provocative show!  Click on the link below to go to a recording of the show.

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/aharrell2000/2012/05/01/people-dont-want-to-be-sold

What are your thoughts on the future of the "Sales Profession" - Positive or Negative?

Positive - I feel the aspect of Face to Face sales will never fully go away, and I don't want it to ever lose its engagement importance. I still firmly believe people like to comparison shop and engage in dialogue with a person (face to face). However, internet sales, contact centers, inside sales will see significant increases over the next decade - especially in pharmaceutical, medical devices, animal health, legal claims, etc. Primarily, since many of us have very busy lives and if there is a vehicle (via the phone, click to chat/talk, video detailing or social media) for us to get a specific answer to a question(s) or do our preliminary shopping "at a distance" - these inside sales/contact center can help us understand differences, provide resources and fulfill many transactional types of services

What do "Customers" really want?

Simply to have their needs understood, wants accommodated and concerns addressed...and ultimately to be completely satisfied with their purchase. It's not rocket science! We are all customers - we buy and we sell everyday - we are own Brand, so to speak. We want to be understood, accommodated and addressed in a positive, trusting manner so we feel good about what goes on around us an in our interactions with others. So many times, we "the customer” have felt misunderstood, not appreciated or given the respect" of the people we interact with on a daily basis. So if we simply focus on doing the right, doing our very best and not worrying - I feel we would all be much better customers.

Are more companies becoming "Customer centric" and is there a heavy concentration on the "customer is first" mentality?

When I was completing my MBA, I focused on researching a few companies: Nordstrom’s, Lowes and Starbucks. I also believe several companies are now trying to figure out how to give their customers what I call "the Nordstrom's experience". Now I had never been in a Nordstrom's until recently, so I now know what the feeling of "this experience is". Many of your listeners can relate to this....Several years ago...when you were looking for something - let's say in a Home Depot, Macy's, Best Buy or even a Sam’s Club - You were told - what aisle it was in - example: "Hardware, aisle 8 left hand side, midway down the aisle". Now what happens....the sales person WALKS you to the item, even if it is in a different section several aisles away. This customer centric focus or style builds upon the customer is first mentality and also engages the salesperson/customer in a brief dialogue relationship building experience. The customer actually feels cared about, needs address, wants accommodated and hopefully concerns address - plus a loyalty factor is beginning to be established. And this loyalty factor is HUGE - as many people will PAY a little more for this extra effort and sense of caring for me - the customer!

From the heading I'm sure your immediate response is "That's Ludicrous" how can failure be more beneficial than winning? Without failure you do not have winning....without winning you do not have failure.....my contention is we can gain exponentially from failure. This is a different way to look at success/winning but I think many of you would agree that what you learn and develop from failure makes winning so exulting...because we know what it took to get there!

Click on the link below to listen to the recording of Procall VP Business Development Gary Stair discuss his thoughts on this show that aired on June 19,2012 on Blog Talk Radio....you will NOT want to miss this insightful and informative show!!

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/aharrell2000/2012/06/19/why-failure-in-sales-is-more-important-than-winning

Do we as sales professionals concentrate too much on our "Failures" versus looking at each event as an opportunity?

We do concentrate and over analyze things in our daily lives...partially because we think of any failure or reason why someone doesn't agree with as a personal attack or personal failure. The best way to learn from our failures is to…Personally review what happened: 1) Ask questions to gain clarity and 2) Role play the scenario with a mentor or colleague. The role play tactic is the best tactic to implement - prior to the meeting and after the meeting – You will always come up with ideas on how to improve for the next time - regardless of whether the meeting was a sales success or sales failure.

Ultimately, if we took every sales misstep or failure personally - we would be total wrecks. We have to be able to get back up on our feet and keep charging forward...and stay focused on doing the right thing, doing our very best and not worrying!

Everyone agrees remaining positive is an important characteristic......is it realistic? Should more preparation be conducted if potentially failure is right around the corner and is "Failure is more important than "Winning"?

I can't speak for everyone.....only myself. However, prior to any selling situation I guess I know internally if I have a chance at winning or not. A lot of it has to do with the amount of work I have put into the preparation of the sale versus just "winging it". I truly believe thorough preparation, research, understanding your customer and walking in their shoes prior to the sales - makes a huge difference in your ability to experience Sales Success or Sales Failure.

I think we CAN learn a lot from our sales failures - IF we take the time to recap what happened in the selling process, personally regroup, add those new learning’s/best practices to our process and execute them quickly. The most valuable teachings/coaching/learning’s I had early on in my sales career came in two ways:

1) I had a manager who helped ME review what happened in the call. He also helped ME build plans for the next call based on what I learned. He didn't give ME the answers - he helped ME recall what happened so I could quickly write it down. This process instilled in ME the ability to do it on my own when he wasn't around....

2nd) I still to this day - role play the meeting, presentation, the interaction, the dialogue and if at all possible in advance in the room or venue where I am will be delivering the content. It gives me the sense I have done it before and this role play process builds confidence.

While it's important to monitor enough calls and interactions to provide a sufficient sample size, it's not about the volume.  Like anything else, it’s about the quality of measurement.  A strategic performance improvement process depends upon many facets of an agent’s competencies, and should evaluate their contribution to the program’s overall success.

The employees themselves expect some level of constructive criticism, and more importantly, some positive reinforcement of the good work they do every day.  So we can learn a lot from just understanding what an agent expects in terms of their own development and growth potential.  They want to feel like they are providing value, and hopefully that we know they are committed to quality customer relations.

As employers, we want to know that we are getting a return on our investment in those agents, and that our customer’s expectations are being met every day.  While QA programs are an investment in themselves, we win when we develop agents that are able to service the customer more effectively, perhaps be more effective in a sales call, and most importantly reducing errors and re-work. 

If we can track and measure a cost of quality, such as through first call resolution, we can then measure the effectiveness of our QA and coaching programs.  The more the agents improve their skills, the higher the rate of first call resolution….and a clear ROI on the QA process. 

Effective monitoring, coaching and agent development is a real-time process, and a grass roots effort.  But the results will be evident in long term success and customer satisfaction.

There's a lot of talk about the "cloud" these days.  And there's just as much uncertaintly as to where business fits into the cloud.  But the question isn't about business.....it's about your business.  The cloud can mean lots of things and can bring many benefits, depending upon how it can change your technology infrastructure.

Another way to think about what "the cloud" really is can be anything that is outsourced.  Sure, the common definition is technology that is hosted on somebody elese's servers, in some data center in cyberspace.  It's outsourced, meaning not managed by your company.

So isn't outsourcing of other functions essentially putting your business process in "the cloud?"  Whatever function you don't want to manage internally, like customer care, order fulfillment, sales management, etc.., can be sent into the vast cloud of someone else's capacity.

No different is the work that Procall Solutions does for our clients.  Procall is a cloud-based provider of contact management solutions.  Our skilled agents are our "servers," but unlike the afforementioned, they are real people that speak the same language as your customers.  How powerful to have an english speaking cloud to give you and your customers an advocate...and the details don't have to be managed by you.

Cloud contacts....give it a try with Procall Solutions!!


 

In June 2000 Procall solution became an important new addition to Team PDC. Procall was a leading provider of call management services to the Philadelphia business community. The inclusion of Procall in PDC’s family of businesses expanded our capabilities while providing another top-quality service to our directory distribution customers.

Now more than 10 years later, Procall has grown to become an integral component of PDC operations. On the commercial side, Procall has a long history of providing high quality call center support to a variety of customers, including pharmaceutical, insurance, and consumer products companies, as well as direct marketing and sales organizations. Procall provides call center support not only in English, but also in Spanish, French, and even Portuguese. The company has also evolved into a major player in providing vital support functions to PDC’s directory distribution operations.

Learn more about Procall and PDC in the latest issue of the PDC Pride