Billboards for Phones: Taking Back the Phone Channel from Scammers
Can branded communication make customers trust phone calls again?
Illegal robocalls and scam calls are plaguing consumers, increasing call avoidance behavior and pitting businesses against scammers in the phone channel. However, branded communication technology is helping businesses take back ownership of the phone call to elevate the customer experience and protect brand reputation successfully, discusses Thomas O’Banion, head of demand generation at First Orion.
Businesses in every sector face competition. Today, businesses are also competing against fraudsters and scammers to get consumers to answer their calls. That is stiff competition, considering the massive year-over-year growth in scam calls is increasing consumer distrust in the phone call.
Branded communication technology, specifically branded calling, is essentially a billboard on a mobile device. It allows enterprises to label outgoing calls with their name, logo and the reason for calling. This branding solution is becoming a critical business enabler in an environment where scammers, spammers, and other nuisance callers are hurting the phone experience.
Branded communication technology is injecting trust back into the phone call, helping companies connect with the right person at the right time to enhance customer experience and brand reputation.
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The Impact of Scams on Consumer Experience
A 2022 Mid-Year Phone Scam Report which surveyed more than 2,100 mobile subscribers, revealed the pervasiveness and impact phone scams have on the consumer experience. The report indicates that U.S. mobile subscribers received over 100 billion scam calls during the first six months of 2022, which projects over 80 million successful scam attempts resulting in cumulative financial losses as high as $40 billion.
The survey also found that 53% of respondents received more scam calls in 2022 than in 2021. As the problem of illegal robocalls and scam calls continues to plague consumers, the nearly universal response is call avoidance. When an unknown number appears on a call screen, that call is likely not answered.
Business calls that go unanswered are lost opportunities for making connections, closing sales and building customer loyalty. Playing phone tag in attempts to reach customers leads to more calls, time and money, negatively impacting the bottom line.
Contrary to popular belief, Caller ID (also known as CNAM) does not appear for everyone. In fact, less than 10% of mobile subscribers have opted-in to Caller ID. That leaves the majority of consumers receiving calls from businesses that appear as 11-digit numbers they don’t recognize.
Tackling Consumer Distrust
Lack of context for incoming calls coupled with the massive rise in scam and spam calls have conditioned consumers not to answer calls from unknown numbers. This combination has created distrust in consumers’ relationship with phone calls, making the phone channel inefficient for legitimate businesses trying to connect with customers.
Carriers rely on CNAM to correctly ID calls that are reaching mobile subscribers. However, with the number of different CNAM providers carriers use, there is no guarantee that a business’ name will appear the same across all the providers. If the name that is being pulled from a database is unidentified or wrong, there is a greater chance that consumers will perceive the phone call as spam and let the call go unanswered.
Even as the threat of spam and scam calls continues to condition consumers to ignore calls from numbers they don’t recognize, voice is still a preferred communication channel. While this call avoidance helps consumers dodge scams, the downside is the potential of missing an important call. A recent survey revealed that 78% of people reported missing an important call as a result of not answering a call from an unknown number.
Content-rich and branded solutions were developed to help companies increase engagement, deliver superior customer experiences, and protect brand reputation. When consumers know that the call they are receiving can be answered without the fear of being scammed or phished, trust in the brand increases and experience is enhanced.
That enhanced experience can boost a business’s bottom line. According to Deloitte, customers who enjoy positive experiences are likely to spend 140% more than customers who report negative experiences. Plus, delivering positive customer experiences can reduce the cost of serving customers by up to 33%.
And that can be the difference between ending your year on a high note or coming up short of your goals.
This can negatively affect brand reputation when a client or customer does not answer a phone call or misses an important message because of an unrecognized number. A 2021 Brand Impact Report found that 85% of people believe that an unknown number makes a business appear illegitimate. The survey also revealed that branded communication technology could increase engagement, with 72% of respondents indicating they would feel comfortable answering their phones again if brands properly identified themselves.
Solving the unknown number issue and taking control of how calls appear delivers an outstanding customer experience at every step of the customer journey, from awareness to consideration to purchase to loyalty.
The technology not only brands phone communication on the front end but also brands businesses after the call is over. Branded communication labels a company’s number with the name of the business and the reason for calling in the Android and iPhone call history. With branding appearing in the call log, customers have a reason to call back because they know who’s on the line.
Building on the Billboard Effect of Branded Calls
The “billboard” effect of branded calling increases customer engagement as the call comes in and even after the call.
Beyond increasing engagement rates, which today are a key competitive differentiator for companies, the technology also provides analytics to refine and improve calling programs and strategies.
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Using branded communication technology, companies can access metrics such as total treated calls, answer rate, decline rate, and engagement rate. Enterprises can gain actionable insight by taking a deeper dive into data, analyzing metrics like calls per individual, success rate, and heatmaps that reveal the states where calls are working the best.
Today, in the United States alone, approximately 97% of adults own a cellphone, which translates into roughly 300 million handsets. At the other end of those handsets are consumers who want to know who is calling and why. They want the phone channel to be the domain of trusted experiences and not the domain of scammers offering extended vehicle warranties or offering to solve a problem with their insurance in exchange for personal information or a fee.
Branded communication technology is the “billboard” companies need to build their brand reputation and take back the phone channel from scammers by injecting context and trust into the phone call. The ROI is in better consumer experiences, increased loyalty, and enhanced brand reputation.
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