Publishers test potential for overseas telemarketing

Folio: The Magazine for Magazine Management, Sept 1, 1991 by Karen Burka

The 1992 unification of the European Economic community is spurring some forward-thinking publishers to use international telemarketing to test foreign readership and advertising markets.

Foreign businesses seem receptive to telemarketing calls from the United States, says Mary Paganelli, executive vice president of Lester Telemarketing. "The fact that we're the U.S. lends a powerful sense to the telephone call," she claims.

According to Paganelli, whose firm provides telemarketing services in 30 languages and 75 countries, initial testing is being done by business publishers to qualify subscribers in accordance with Business Publications Audit of Circulation standards, as well as to conduct market research.

Doug Lee, directory development administrator for Thomas Publishing Co., publisher of Register of American Manufacturers and the manufacturing tabloid Industrial Equipment News, says his company decided to use telemarketing to test the viability of a new directory in the United Kingdom.

"Our statistics showed that in the U.K., people are more receptive to telephone calls than direct mail," Ire maintains.

Thomas used a 5,000-name test list, compiled from English business directories and professional membership lists, to reach decision-makers at each company. When interest was indicated, the callers also set up personal meetings with Thomas representatives at a later date.

Although the results of the campaign are still being studied, Lee says the company is satisfied with the test and will consider more international testing in the future.

Faced with a tight deadline, CMP Publications Inc. used a telemarketing campaign to gauge potential in England, France and Germany for its computer trade magazine Unix Today.

According to Jeff Demarest, CMP's computer group research manager, the campaign was based on a 1,500name sampling drawn from CMP subscriber lists and rented lists.

"We gave the service bureau the script-which needed to be translated-and the lists. The results were returned to us in three weeks, Demarest recalls.

Panning for foreign gold, however, is not without its difficulties. Cost can be prohibitive for an international project. Although expenses vary by country, Paganelli says, the cost of international telemarketing is double that of domestic campaigns-averaging $60 per hour. In addition, clients pay the long-distance telephone bill.

Another real concern for publishers is a lack of foreign business lists and the poor quality of the ones available. Many service bureaus ask clients to supply their own lists- usually international subscribers from a house file, foreign publications or names compiled from foreign business directories.

"Part of the goal of our international campaign was to test the quality of the list itself," Thomas' Lee explains. "If you've rented a foreign publication's subscriber list, it is difficult to know how accurate the names really are. "

And, although American marketers look at Europe as a common market, each country has separate and varying degrees of restrictions. For example, ,Lee cites Germany as one country with a strict set of telemarketing regulations. "You can't come right out and solicit an order over the telephone," he explains. "Therefore, you have to work around that by offering to send more information or arrange a follow-up visit."