Charities have used the power of the telephone as an effective channel to raise funds for many years. The phone is a powerful tool that gives charities a way to reach many potential donors. These calls can be made to previous donors or to those who have not previously supported the charity. There are standard components to establishing a successful fundraising telemarketing campaign; including the
- calling lists
- scripting
- rebuttals
- training
- data collection
- and donation funds capture.
One simple yet important, and often overlooked step can be securing a Local Caller ID phone numbers to use for the Caller ID display on the outgoing phone call.
What is a Local Caller ID Number?
Local Caller ID is a telephone number used as the Caller ID, which matches the area code of the Called party’s telephone number. Telephone fundraisers who use Local Caller ID as a strategy use about 110 unique area code numbers for a nationwide campaign. The local number paired with your charity name as a display name can increase answer rates by as much as 40%.
What is a Display Name?
Along with a local caller ID number you can display a name to the called party. CNAM is acronym for the “centralized” database used by phone carriers to store the Display Name their customers want displayed for each Caller ID telephone number.
This tool can go a long way when calling for fundraising telemarketing campaigns. Displaying the name of the charity to the called party gains a few seconds of trust. When your agent says “Hi, this is Kelsey calling with QVD Fundraising”, the called party already read “QVD Fundraising” on their caller ID display. They have read it and heard it and don’t have to ask “who are you calling from”.
How Do You Set Up a Local Caller ID Number?
Securing a Local Caller ID Number is very simple. After setting up your account with our company, you provide three simple things:
- Area code or state that you want the local number in
- Display name (up to 15 characters in length, including spaces)
- Toll-free ring-to number – this is the number that we will route any callbacks to the local number back to your fundraisers to answer your incoming calls when someone sees that they missed your call.
We have many tools to help you determine how many Caller ID numbers you need based on distribution of phone numbers you have in your fundraising campaign data.
How would using a Local Caller ID number improve my fundraising telemarketing campaign results?
Using a local caller ID number with name display, unique to the area you are dialing can improve answer rates by as much as 40% over using a toll-free number. No one answers calls from toll-free numbers anymore. A toll-free number across a household’s Caller ID Display screams “telemarketer”.
Why is Local Caller ID Important when calling for charities doing fundraising telemarketing campaigns?
As you can see utilizing a Local Caller ID number can go a long way in improving answer rates for your fundraising campaign. Improved answer rates means speaking to more potential donors in a shorter-period of time. Speaking to more potential donors means more donations and a lower cost of acquisition.
Why is Caller ID number hygiene important?
Crowd sourcing technology is being used on mobile devices to block calls from call centers. These companies look at how many times a Caller ID number called their customers (App users) and based on how many calls from a number in a certain interval of time are made, they will flag the call as “spam” or “telemarketer”. In other cases individual will share on blogs. So
- Look up your caller id numbers on google and make sure nothing negative is stated, and
- subscribe to a service that will scrub your numbers before they are assigned to you and ongoing frequently based on your calling volume (weekly, monthly).
Then replace those numbers that have bad marks. Just because your calling volume is high doesn’t make your calls illegal or not wanted. This is standard practice for most Enhanced telecom providers like Quality Voice & Data, Inc. legitimate calling has been caught up in the net to stop illegible robo calls.
By Kelsey Olsen, Director of Enhanced Telecom Services
Kelsey Olsen is the Director of Enhanced Telecom Services for Quality Voice & Data, Inc., a leading provider of Local Caller ID numbers, enhanced texting solutions and a non-ATDS telephone system. Kelsey takes great pride in leading a team that is responsible for setting up phone numbers with CNAM display within 15 minutes or less. In addition, Kelsey is an expert advisor for her clients that need successful Caller ID best practices. Kelsey can be reached at Kelsey.olsen@qualityvoicedata.com or 516-656-5122.