Telemarketing to troubled homeowners - Part Two

Hi there,

In my last post on telemarketing, my views were that a phone number is valuable as a part of a total marketing campaign to troubled homeowners, but in my opinion should be used in parallel with other marketing vehicles such as direct mail.

As standard practice, we populate phone numbers when available, and the opertive term is when available. The availability of phone numbers is constricted because of the federal Do Not Call registry, and over 90 percent of households have registered for the do not call list. Phone numbers are further limited by the fact that landlines are increasingly becoming obsolete as more people use mobile devices. We are able to generate a meaningful amount of phone numbers, however, if we:

1) Target a densely populated area, or:
2) Select a wider area of coverage (counties, states)

In other words, we can take a bigger pool from which to draw those limited phone numbers from.

Certainly, no responsible list provider would advocate looking these people up at your own volition by thumbing through the phone book, and I'm not advising that you do so. Calling someone that is on the do not call registry can lead to hefty fines. You can learn more at the FTC's Do Not Call website. Yet my job is to be a springboard and share with you what other clients are doing, and some of them are tapdancing around the do not call list and looking them up anyway.

I sold a list to a mortgage broker that put in bluntly: "I don't care about the do not call list. I'm not selling anything. I'm keeping them in their homes." This sentiment has been shared by other clients who feel that helping people move on is somehow beyond the perview of the do not call regulations. Another client says that when someone invokes the fact that they are on the do not call list, he says that the homeowner had entered their contact details on a website, thereby creating a prior business relationship. A set of clients, in the foreclosure capital of the world - Nevada - even goes so far as using a computer program that automatically looks up phone numbers on an internet directory. I don't know how it's done and neither do they (they had a computer wonk write some sort of scripted program). That client says that homeowners that are in over their heads have enough to worry about than pursuing do not call violations.

Again, though, I do not advocate skirting the do not call rules, and if you elect to do so, don't come to me to collect any fine leveled!

Feedback is most welcome - you can reach me at 607-759-5058 or via email at jim@homesteaddata.net