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Low Cost Fax Broadcasting |
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Telesales for £9.97 Hour
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Call 0845 222 0053. |
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Voice Broadcasting for Under 2p
Send out phone
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| The Importance of Diversification |
| By: Henry Newrick |
Many years ago as a young man in New Zealand I learned a business lesson that has stayed with me all my life. At the time I was running a media sales organisation and we were dealing with numerous ad agencies. One of the premier agencies of the day had offices in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch and its biggest client was New Zealand's largest oil company. They had a strong relationship with the agency that had lasted over 50 years, and this oil giant accounted for probably 75% of the agency's business. One day, towards the end of the 70's, the client announced that after reviewing all the pros and cons they decided to call it a day because "we think it's time for a change". The agency never recovered. Instead of rising to the challenge they first shut the Auckland office, then Christchurch. Staff dwindled and within a couple of years Wellington was history and they were out of business. As I watched all this unfolding I determined that never, ever would I have 'all my eggs in one basket" as it were. Far too often I see companies with large turnovers, and ostensibly very profitable, go to the wall, not through any particular mismanagement but because the owners have built their business around one or two key clients - and when the client goes belly up, or has a change of heart, the supplier bleeds, often fatally. Since 1999 I have been running Team Telecom (Europe) Ltd (www.teamtelecomeurope.com). The company was originally founded with the idea of promoting word numbers ('vanity numbers' as the Americans call them) to the UK marketplace. In this respect the British are slow adopters. Soon thereafter we moved into non-geographic numbers generally, followed by fax broadcasting (www.promofax.co.uk), email marketing (www.emailblast.co.uk) telemarketing (www.promocall.co.uk) and then sales incentives (www.toptravelrewards.com). The philosophy behind this was simply that in the same way as a chair has 4 legs, so too does the business. If one leg goes there are three legs remaining and the business survives, giving time to replace the missing leg, With our phone numbers we have always charged a nominal line rental, as well as receiving a revenue share which helped cover overheads. Getting the line rental allows us to monitor line usage and to see whether the customer is still in business. Many of our competitors simply gave away 0870 numbers to any business that wanted them. "Here - you want 10 numbers - have 10". Their rationale was that they would receive the revenue share only and this would constitute their income. Sounds simple really! Give numbers away and wait for the money to roll in. And for some people it worked. On the downside, there was no control and no monitoring of the numbers. If clients went broke the numbers just disappeared into the ether with no effort being made to retrieve them. More often than not the number supplier neither knew, nor cared whether the client was in business or not. When they ran out of numbers they simply acquired another bunch. All in all it was an absolutely scandalous waste of a finite national resource. Hundreds of thousands of 0870 (and to a lesser extent 0845) numbers simply vanished. Now, we have a situation where in a few months time 0870 numbers are no longer going to be revenue sharing. So what's the outcome? Those sellers who gave numbers away will see their 'business' vanish. They no longer have any incentive to service their clients who are now abandoned. If clients of these 'sellers' need service (such as the remapping of their non-geographic number to another landline) they often find their original supplier has evaporated and they have no place to turn. How do we know this? It is because they come to us seeking help (which often we can't give if we have no relationship with the sourcing carrier). Prudent resellers will survive the changes and be able to continue servicing their clients because they have a strong business model such as we do. But for those who relied solely on revenue share for their income the future is bleak, not just for themselves but also their clients to whom they supplied non-geographic numbers. And the lesson for all concerned? Never ever have all your eggs in one basket. Henry Newrick Team Telecom (Europe) Ltd Team House 208 Church Road Hove, East Sussex BN3 2DJ Tel. 0845 FOR TEAM (0845 367 8326) Tel. +44 1273 719 272 Email: henry.newrick@telecomsolutions.co.uk Url: http://www.telecomsolutions.co.uk |
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