Does anyone happen to know if there is a company out there who will take phone orders on my behalf?

I really don't want to take phone orders myself.... and I'd rather not have to hire someone to do it due to payroll, taxes, equipment, etc.

Ideally I'd like to find a service who could take phone orders and ship product for me.

Is this possible? Are there any companies that do this? Or am I just in la-la land?

I Came. I Googled. I Conquered.
Call Center Services - Telelink Call Centre

I've used PATLive in the past. They charge like $25/month and $3 per call. I haven't used them lately.

You probably already know all this but I'll just repeat it in case someone else doesn't.

The downside you'll have with most of those services is they only read the script so adaptive upselling isn't possible. Meaning if the customer says something that's not on the list of choices, chances are the sale has gone as far as it's going to go.

Contrast that with someone in-house that is trained on getting the most from your prospects and customers and they can quickly pay for themselves many times over.

And you know the downside which is all the headaches of having employees. Here in California it's a nightmare having employees which is why I favor contractors.

Cheers

Just to jump on this statement.

I've downsized and out-sourced most of our shipping operations.

We hardly ship out anything our here anymore.

I let my vendors do that.

I make less per order, but it's well worth it.

Never again... will I have a big warehouse, massive inventory and more then 1-3 employees.

Phil,

Yes, I had forgotten that. We have our print houses do the mailing and for physical product? Ouch.

What kind of stuff do/did you ship? Was it perishables?

Thanks

Nutritional supplements.

Now we only have a retail store. I let my vendors do my shipping for my 2 websites.

spinellisnutrition.com
highclassnutrition.com

So.... am I the one who has to provide them with a script?

Hi James,

Yes, they'll want the exact script they should read. Think college dropout who reads slow. That's who is answering the call.

You'll know how it works beforehand because you'll call just like a customer and go through the process to make sure it's exactly what you want.

The script is just the info you would put on an order form. It works best if it's just one product and any number of upsells.

Contact / shipping info, quantity, payment info, upsell question.

Then you can put an upsell like, "Most people who order the super-doohicky also order our mega-hoodicky which is only $299. How many of them would you like?" It's just a number as the caller's answer.

One clarification, when I used them it was basically $1/minute with a 3 minute minimum which goes fast with long scripts.

They can talk like they're a representative of your company, which in fact they are they're a contractor. So they can say things like, "Hello thank you for calling. I'm so happy to help you today. You're calling about the super-doohicky deluxe am I right? ... yes... That's great that you are taking advantage of our offer today. How many would you like us to ship today? ...2... We can do that no problem. Let me get your contact and payment information and we'll get that right out to you...."

You'll get an email with the full transcription of the call.

I hope that helps.

Cool. Thanks for the info. Strangely a friend was shocked that I wasn't taking supplements. If I do, maybe I'll quit getting injured so much in martial arts class. TY

FWIW, I personally have never used PATLive (we're one of those stupid companies that keeps 12 sales reps But I've only heard good things from business owners I trust that DON'T want to have employees.