Being Compliant When Telemarketing

As with any line of communication between a business and their potential customers, there are laws and regulations that must be adhered to throughout the telemarketing process. This is more so high in importance since the introduction of GDPR in May 2018 and should be taken seriously when undertaking various marketing methods, such as telemarketing.

Being compliant in telemarketing not only benefits the customer, but also benefits your employees by giving them structure and something to work in line with when making those calls. These regulations are in place to ensure that you and your business can have a knowledgeable, genuine and correctly targeted conversation with prospects, customers and whilst generating leads.

In this post we will be exploring some of the very basics in compliance that you should be following without out a doubt. Team Telemarketing are experts in telemarketing services and our team are fully trained and compliant to the standards and regulations expected of us.

There are six lawful bases that have been set out by the ICO when it comes to being complaint to GDPR standards. You must be in line with at least ONE of these standards to be able to contact a business prospect and access their personal data.

CONSENT

Consent: the individual has given clear consent for you to process their personal data for a specific purpose.

Clear being the optimum word here, you must have consent to contact customers and prospects that has been clearly communicated. Your customer must be fully aware of the nature of the sales and marketing calls you will be making to them, and must be made aware of and consent to their personal data being used across any marketing methods you may use to communicate with them. If you get consent to email a customer about a product or services, this does not mean you can use their personal data across other communication channels, like telemarketing, you must seek individual consent for all.

INTEREST

Legitimate interests: the processing is necessary for your legitimate interests or the legitimate interests of a third party unless there is a good reason to protect the individual’s personal data which overrides those legitimate interests. (This cannot apply if you are a public authority processing data to perform your official tasks.)

The regulation speaks for itself, there must be legitimate, engaged interest in your product, service and business from the individual for you to be able to obtain their personal data. This is beneficial for both your business and for potential customers because it encourages your business to only contact prospects that have shown some kind of interest in your industry or business. This successfully eliminates markets that don’t engage or have any interest in your products, service or industry.

However, in telemarketing this can be a very grey area when it comes to cold calling and is something that you will need to dive into much more specifically and with care. ICO also provides a handy ‘legitimate interests assessment’ (LIA) template, which walks you step by step through the process and allows you to document the provisions you have made in using legitimate Interest as your legal basis. Once complete, this document allows you to demonstrate that your business is acting responsibly and taking into consideration the impact of your processing activities. As your marketing campaign evolves, it is important that you continue to assess your use of legitmate interest and ensure that your reasoning remains valid.

THE BASICS OF COMPLIANCE

Whilst GDPR covers the complexity of data protection, there are some very basic do’s and don’ts when it comes to telemarketing and cold calling.

• Do not call households or businesses that are on the TPS, you should screen this as standard, however if you encounter a prospect on the TPS, you must delete all of their information and never call again.
• Easy opt out options and a very clear demonstration of privacy policies that explain what their data will be used for.
• Strict training for all employees on GDPR and a very clear zero tolerance on avoiding these regulations and compliance.
• Expert quality assurance and data management processes.
• Thorough training for employees on best practice for prospects and customers that do not want to be contacted including remaining polite and respecting their wishes.

If you are considering telemarketing as a marketing option for your business, instead of worrying yourself about GDPR and compliance, outsource with Team Telemarketing and let us worry about the rules and regulations for you. Our team of experts are thoroughly and continuously trained on compliance and GDPR, as well as best practice to ensure your customers and prospects are treated fairly and respected at all times.