How can an accounting or corporate secretarial firm find clients by phone?
Start with a defined list of companies you would be glad to serve, call each decision maker more than once, and ask for a short meeting rather than a sale.
The work breaks into four parts: the list, the opening line, the call attempts, and the follow-up. Decide who owns each part before the first call is made.
Who should the firm call?
Call companies where a change in their situation makes your service relevant. A company must appoint a company secretary within six months of registration, according to ACRA, and the secretary must be a real person who is a Singapore citizen, permanent resident or otherwise meets local residency rules. A newly registered company that has not settled this is a natural prospect for a corporate secretarial firm.
For accounting work, useful groups include growing companies that have outgrown a bookkeeper, owner-run businesses with no finance staff, and companies in sectors where you already have clients.
Keep a record of where each number came from and when it was added. You will need it if anyone asks why they were called.
What should the call say?
The call should give your firm's name, one reason for calling, and a request for a 20 to 30 minute meeting. Do not try to explain your fee structure or compare filing options over the phone. The aim is a diary entry.
Write the opening in one or two sentences and test it on a colleague. A reason such as helping a newly incorporated company settle its secretarial obligations is easy to follow. A reason that lists six services is not.
Plan for four things: a gatekeeper who asks what the call is about, a prospect who is busy, a prospect who already has a firm, and a prospect who asks you not to call again. Decide in advance how each is handled, and record every request not to be called so it is honoured.
Should the firm make the calls itself, hire someone, or use a service?
You can make the calls yourself, hire a person to do it, or pay a service. Each has a different cost shape and a different risk.
Partners calling personally get the best conversations but lose billable hours, and calling tends to be the first thing dropped when client work piles up. A hired caller gives you steady effort, but you carry the salary, training and management whether or not meetings result. A service can charge per meeting booked, per hour of calling, or per number called. Per meeting pricing sounds attractive, but ask who decides what counts as a meeting and what happens when a prospect does not turn up.
Whichever route you choose, ask five things: can you listen to the calls, who is accountable for the campaign, how many attempts are made per person, what happens to your list afterwards, and what the reports show.
Do the Do Not Call rules apply to calls to companies?
Generally, telemarketing calls of a commercial nature that target other businesses are excluded from the Do Not Call provisions. This is stated on the Do Not Call Registry's own site, dnc.gov.sg. The position changes when the call is really about a person's own needs, for example personal tax or an individual's own investments, because that protection is lost once the call stops being about the organisation.
If any numbers on your list belong to individuals, such as sole proprietors reached on a personal line, check them at dnc.gov.sg before calling. Treat this as general information. The PDPC Advisory Guidelines on the Do Not Call Provisions and the Personal Data Protection Act set out the detail, and a lawyer can advise on your specific list.
Where does Greetsby fit in?
Greetsby is an appointment-setting service in Singapore. It calls the people on your own list and books meetings into your calendar. Calls show a Singapore number, and each person sees the same number every time. Each person gets up to 4 call attempts on different days, between 9.30am and 6.00pm, and every call is recorded so you can play back the ones that did not book.
You approve the opening and the reason for the call before anything starts. Greetsby books meetings only and gives no product advice. You check your list against the Registry before sending it and confirm that you have when you upload it. Anyone who asks not to be called again is not called again, and Greetsby passes that on to you.
Pricing is one flat price per batch: 1,000 numbers cost S$1,800, 2,000 numbers S$3,600 and 3,000 numbers S$5,400, which is S$1.80 a number covering up to 4 attempts each. You pay before calls start, with no contract and no monthly fee. Greetsby does not guarantee a number of meetings, so the first batch shows what your own list produces. To ask a question, write to hello@greetsby.com.
Questions
How many times should we call a prospect before stopping?
Decide the number before you start and record each attempt. Greetsby makes up to 4 attempts per person on a new list, on different days, between 9.30am and 6.00pm.
Do we need to check the Do Not Call Registry before calling companies?
Calls to organisations for the organisation's own purposes are generally outside the Do Not Call provisions. Check individuals' numbers at dnc.gov.sg, and take legal advice for your specific list.
What is a good time to approach a corporate secretarial prospect?
A newly registered company has six months from registration to appoint a company secretary, according to ACRA, so the early months after incorporation are a relevant moment to call.
Can an individual accounting or advisory representative hire Greetsby?
Greetsby works with firms. Financial advisory representatives cannot sign up themselves, and the financial adviser firm must be the one to appoint it.
Sources
- ACRA: Appointing directors, company secretary and other key personnel
- Do Not Call Registry: What the DNC provisions cover
General information for businesses in Singapore, not legal advice.