Campaign Against Cold Calling
How can we stop cold callers and scam artists dead in their tracks? There is a way - Yes it's true! ‘How?’ you scream. Well read on...If you are reading this you must be one of the millions who are tormented by and often conned by cold calling.
It is a subject that can stir up anger in even the most timid of people, and a by-product of cheap global communication. Where it was once an occasional call from sales people trying to sell you double glazing or the occasional magazine subscription, it is now a constant source of interruption, irritation and even worry.
In a minority now are the polite sales folk offering useful services and information from local businesses. In their place are the hard selling call centre staff and scam artists. Both constantly bombarding you with sales calls or worrying problems that need to be sorted immediately.
At TCRM Corporate Headquarters we’re all pretty clued up about what sort of scams are out there, but we can see how easily someone could be taken in by these scams or at the very least worried about the perceived invasion into their home by these callers.
So what can we do about these constant cold callers? The solutions we’ve come up with is one that goes against the grain, but could solve the problem. When you answer the phone and you realise the kind of call it is, your instinct is to get off the phone as soon as possible. But, what if, for just one day a month you kept the caller on the phone as long as possible?
Cold calling is based on call volume. For every sale/victim there might be 20, 50 or 100 people who hang up. So the more calls they make, the more likely they are to succeed. So if we slow down the call rate, their success rate drops and cold calling becomes a non viable technique.
Now it’s not viable to keep them talking like this all the time (at least while we get so many cold calls), but if everyone were to pick a day of the month, such as their birth date, then between us all we can make a big dent in their call rates. The more people we get involved, the bigger that dent will be.
So, if you think the idea is valid all you need to do is:
1. Share this link via twitter / facebook / email / whatever else you can thinks of.
2. One day a month talk to whatever cold caller or scam artist that calls you. If you want a reminder when it's your day to answer the scammers will be building a web page that will drop you an automatic email. You will be able to register for the email reminder on http://www.bridge.org.uk/CampaignAgainstColdCalling (or as we call it, CAC) very shortly.
That's it. All of a sudden cold calling is suddenly an expensive way of getting sales and the scams just don’t work.
Brought to you by CAC.
Here are a few tips for dealing with the caller and helping to expose a scam:
- Ask them straight off if they are trying to sell you something. If they are legitimately trying to offer you goods or service, give them the opportunity to state who they are.
- If you are unclear who they are make sure you try and determine exactly what company they work for and on who’s behalf they are calling. Ask for their address and contact information. Even if you have asked five times, ask again if you are still not happy with their response. Recording this information could be helpful for others (and you can ask them to spell out everything).
- Remember that you can control the conversation. They are trying to get something out of you, so make them work for it. Then say no.
- Remain polite. Don’t put yourself in the wrong by being rude and abusive.
- Ask them how they got your number. Keep asking until you are satisfied with the result.
Here are "funnies" on the subject:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W75lsvrvTU0
The Campaign Against Cold Calling on Facebook
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