Nirvana BPO Case Studies - Telemarketing for a utility switch marketer

Voice Operations

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Telemarketing for a utility switch marketer

Client Profile
One of UK’s leading utility switch marketer.

The opportunity to switch suppliers was an attractive market with prices increasing monotonously. Loyalties to existing suppliers, often one that had served the family over a generation, were increasingly being questioned.

The client was one of the pioneers of the switch facilitator industry and had off-shored the process successfully. This was after validating their belief that the proposition was too compelling for British customers to be bothered with where the c all originated. Indian tele-c alling service providers could carry out the process at comparable effectiveness and at a considerable discount to British tele-callers.

Nirvana was one among several offshore and British service providers used. The client had entered into a contract with Nirvana, which used a hybrid compensation model, with a ‘fixed’ component, and a substantial performance based component. This approach to compensation clearly provided Nirvana (and other service providers) with the opportunity to improve yield. At first sight one would expect a successful market pioneer to have covered all bases to improve efficiency; Nirvana soon found out that this was not the case.
Process outline:

A client provided tele-c alling list of UK consumers of energy services.
Script, which encouraged c alled prospects to share their energy consumption values.
An internet based ‘estimator’ tool to establish quantum of savings based on energy usage values and postcode.

Nirvana, which deployed process engineering focused approach to deliver seemingly simple services, had a team with the remit to improve performance from a process point of view. This was in addition to improving performance via the coaching route, which was the remit of the team coach, and training teams deployed for ‘floor support’. The process engineering team was not ‘encumbered’ by the success of the existing business and went in search of further improvements.
The focus of the analysis was on:

The team went to work using a hypothesis based approach, the analysis looked to carry out the simple test:

Were geographical variation in benefits were significant?
Were the input lists, provided by the client, indiscriminate?
Does consumption levels have a major impact on benefits accrued and therefore motivation to switch?

Postcode based analysis by increasing resolution digit by digit.
Telephone area code mapping.
Past benefits significance thresholds for switchers – what is a fair threshold to use as a filter for utilizing further c all time/incorporate into the script.

The first two digits provided the most cost advantageous basis for eliminating less attractive zones.

The team determined that there were significant filters that could be applied to make the effort more efficient.
These pertained to geographical locations and usage bands.
It was possible to filter the c alling list to remove zones where prospects would not experience significant benefits.
There were consumption levels below which benefits may not be significant.

The impact of this information was two fold:
Nirvana achieved significant efficiencies by

Filtering out prospects in geographical zones, which did not provide compelling benefits.
C alls were efficiently handled to quickly establish consumption levels were indeed above threshold levels determined for that zone and incorporated into the CRM screens seen by the associate. In effect freeing time to address target prospect profiles.

Nirvanas benefited by ramping up to take a larger share of business and achieve better man-hour yields at lower costs. The client benefited by lowered list acquisition costs and increased throughput using fewer service providers.