In the third era of communication, the future of businesses around the globe will rely heavily on the way organizations present themselves to their audience.
With just about everyone owning a cell phone, it should come as no surprise that consumers have become increasingly selective about which calls they answer and when. Specifically, people’s sensitivity to potential scammers is extremely high.
The threat is perceived to be so high in fact that the US government is stepping in. They have just launched a new system designed to reduce the use of illegal caller ID spoofing on voice networks known as STIR/SHAKEN.
While everybody is at least acquainted with the term ‘spam’, its meaning is sometimes misunderstood. By spam, we refer to unwanted calls, emails, or text messages from an individual or company reaching out to a large number of people at once. As consumers’ peace of mind is paramount to most organizations, it is not uncommon for carriers to flag a call as spam. Even worse, enough flags can lead to a phone number being blocked out altogether. As if this weren’t enough, consumers often take steps to block suspicious numbers themselves through the use of highly efficient apps. All this, of course, affects legitimate businesses trying to do their job.
Particularly, being marked as spam can have dire consequences for contact centers. Along with affecting answer rate, decreasing agent productivity, and negatively impacting ROI, spam flagging can turn into a matter of brand reputation. As we often see all over the news it is not uncommon for scammers to hijack a business number and make fraudulent calls on their behalf.
Consequently, every contact center in 2024 has to be particularly mindful of these risks and implement a thought-out strategy to minimize disruptions.
Thorough monitoring and management of phone numbers
A major step in the right direction is relying on solutions designed to strategically monitor the contact center’s numbers, check their spam score, and record their performance over a period of time. Moreover, modern spam detectors can enable notifications every time one of the business’ numbers is flagged as spam – in turn allowing for early intervention and the prevention of more serious issues.
Adhering to ethical best practices
Sound ethical dialing practices can make a huge difference to your brand perception and respectability.
Simple things like keeping a no-call list, preparing thoughtful scripts for your agents, and choosing easy-to-identify, straightforward numbers for your business are likely to bring in fast results and positively impact your ROI.
Informing mobile providers of any mistakes
Being flagged or even blocked by a provider doesn’t have to mean your phone numbers are dead. Luckily, most carriers allow you to dispute unfair flags and blocks. This is one of the many ways a spam detector comes in handy, and might even lead to identifying whether one of your numbers has been hijacked by bad actors.
In these constantly evolving times, one thing is sure: the impact of brand reputation on businesses across all industries is only going to grow. Luckily, advanced technology is now available to make it easier for brands to reach their audiences whilst also boosting their ROI.
