What is an outbound call center?

The right outbound call center solution could be key to the success of your sales and marketing teams. Learn all you need to know about outbound call centers and the benefits an outbound contact center platform like RingCentral RingCX can provide.

  • Improve outreach with a dedicated outbound call center
  • Streamline lead generation and sales with RingCX
  • Maximize efficiency with AI-powered outbound calling tools
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Written by  Andy Watson
Senior Manager, Product Marketing
Reviewed by John Finch
VP, Product Marketing, AI Customer Experience
Updated: 13 November 2024

For many businesses, call or contact centers operate as the hub of their customer communications and sales and marketing efforts. The former are usually handled by inbound call centers where agents take calls from people who need help, working to improve customer experiences as well as nurture pre-existing relationships with those who call.

Outbound call centers, on the other hand, are those which are more commonly involved with sales and marketing efforts—although, it’s not always quite that straightforward. Let’s get everything cleared up with an ultimate guide to outbound call centers and contact centers.

A female contact center agent looking at lead info about Yanis Patterson including lead state, phone number, email, and address
A female contact center agent looking at lead info about Yanis Patterson including lead state, phone number, email, and address
A female contact center agent looking at lead info about Yanis Patterson including lead state, phone number, email, and address
The script function of RingCX
The script function of RingCX
The script function of RingCX

What is an outbound call center?

At its simplest an outbound call center is one focused on making calls for a business rather than receiving them.

What, though, do we mean by a call center and what kinds of outbound calls might a business make?

What is a call center?

A call center is a business department composed of agents who interact with individuals outside of the company—usually customers or prospective customers.

Traditionally, those interactions were all over the phone—hence the “call” in call center. Today, other communications channels—like live chat—are also popular. That’s why call center and contact center are often used interchangeably. When someone asks “what is an outbound contact center?”, they typically mean the same thing as someone asking “what is an outbound call center?

What is an outbound call?

As the name suggests, call center outbound calls are initiated from your call or contact center.

One common example is sales calls made by reps aiming to generate leads. Using a sales dialer can streamline this process, enabling reps to efficiently connect with prospects by automatically dialing numbers and managing unanswered calls, maximizing productivity and lead generation efforts.

The difference between inbound and outbound call centers

When it comes to inbound vs outbound call centers, the principle difference lies in the purpose and activities of each. Let’s look at inbound and outbound meanings in a call center, side-by-side:
  • Outbound call centers: While working in an outbound contact center, agents reach out to prospects, customers, and others—often for lead qualification and sales efforts.
  • Inbound call centers: An inbound call center, on the other hand, accepts communications coming into the business, managing the customer story to achieve the highest level of customer satisfaction.

Types of outbound call centers: Outbound call center examples

Agents who work in an outbound call center may connect with leads through a variety of methods and for a number of reasons.
Those will be determined, at least in part, by the type of outbound call center it is:

Sales-oriented outbound call centers

These call or contact centers are the most recognizable examples of outbound call centers.

They’re designed to generate revenue by direct outbound sales calls. Agents or sales reps contact prospects with the intention of closing a deal.

Lead generation outbound call centers

These call or contact centers are similar in that their ultimate goal is to aid sales. Lead generation activities, however, happen earlier in the sales pipeline.

Agents in this type of call center aim to draw new prospects to the company so you can sell to them later.

Market research and survey outbound call centers

Outbound calling isn’t always about sales. A market research call center is one where agents reach out to ask for peoples’ opinions or feedback—often via surveys.

Proactive customer service outbound call centers

You don’t always have to wait for customers to contact you with issues. A proactive customer service call center sees agents reach out to customers instead.

Perhaps a product update means one of the functions will work slightly differently. Your outbound contact center agents might get in touch with existing customers and users to let them know before it causes a problem.

A QA specialist and his manager is looking at the sentiment analysis of 900 calls and information of agent Kathryn Murphy
A QA specialist and his manager is looking at the sentiment analysis of 900 calls and information of agent Kathryn Murphy
A QA specialist and his manager is looking at the sentiment analysis of 900 calls and information of agent Kathryn Murphy
A couple of contact center agents making outgoing call while on a white desk
A couple of contact center agents making outgoing call while on a white desk
A couple of contact center agents making outgoing call while on a white desk

Why do outbound call centers matter?

So, what’s the importance of outbound call centers to businesses? Does it really matter if you operate one or not?

They’re good questions, and here are a few principal benefits of outbound call centers that may help to answer them:

They can help drive revenue

Outbound contact centers used for the traditional sales purposes are effective in reaching more prospects, closing deals, and driving revenue.

They can help you build better customer relationships

Proactive customer support via an outbound call center is good for your customer relationships. Reaching out to them to offer help or guidance—sometimes that they didn’t even realize they needed—shows how much you care.

It helps to build trust and therefore loyalty with your customers. Those are the foundations for longer-lasting relationships and increase your chances of turning customers into brand advocates.

They can boost productivity

Getting in touch with customers proactively can also be a boon for productivity. After all, forewarning customers of changes or potential issues means fewer panicked calls if things do go wrong.

What’s more, if you choose the right outbound contact center solutions they can integrate seamlessly with other tools to create more efficient workflows across your center. 

See RingCX in action

Video: RingCX | Effortless Customer Experiences with AI

The best outbound call center solutions: Outbound call center features you can’t do without

Today, outbound call center services are most often provided for via software-based solutions. The best outbound call center software is critical to meeting your organizational goals, whether they be in the areas of sales, customer service, or something else entirely.
RingCentral RingCX is an omnichannel solution which includes all of the following outbound contact center software features, and a whole lot more besides:

Dialer tools

Arguably the best outbound call center features are customizable dialer tools. Outbound software uses a variety of dialer tools to efficiently connect businesses and customers.
With a solution like RingCentral RingCX, these tools include predictive dialers, preview dialers, and progressive dialers:

Predictive dialers

These tools use a combination of data and algorithms to “predict” when an agent will finish their current call. In the meantime, they autodial new numbers to limit the amount of agent downtime.
Some calls end in voicemails, busy signals, or disconnected numbers, so the dialer also estimates the number of calls that will go through to keep agents busy and queues full. A predictive dialer improves efficiency and frees up agent time so they can focus on connecting with customers, not making more calls.

Preview dialers

The unknown can be one of the worst parts of cold calling. With a preview dialer, you can give your agents helpful information about the customer—before the call connects.
This preparation is invaluable to outbound call centers. Agents can see and understand all of the info you have on that particular lead before speaking with them. It gives agents time to adjust their strategies and mindset to increase the likelihood of getting the response they need. This support helps your employees feel and perform better, keeping everyone happy.

Progressive dialers

Progressive dialers address the most frustrating flaw of automated dialing: connecting agents to dead calls and voicemails. Rather than dialing more to make up for unsuccessful calls, this dialer focuses on the quality of the calls it makes.
By making fewer calls, it ensures that agents and customers always connect to a person immediately. Your agents will be able to spend more time having valuable conversations and less energy on calls that don’t provide results.

Customizable caller IDs

The number or other information that appears on a call recipient’s phone can make a big difference to how likely they are to answer the call. That’s why you want any outbound call center app to allow you to customize your caller IDs.
Adapting caller IDs to suit prospects or customers is an outbound calling best practice. With RingCentral RingCX you can set up caller IDs for campaigns or users, and manually select your chosen ID for calls, too.

Call recording

Call recording is another must-have of any outbound call center software. Sometimes, recordings may be mandatory for compliance purposes, and they can always prove useful for training.
A healthy database of recorded calls—both good and bad—is great for guiding agents to improve their own calls. Supervisors and managers can listen to the recordings, pick out strengths and weaknesses, and tailor training accordingly.

The best outbound contact center solutions help you build stronger connections

When you use RingCentral RingCX as an outbound contact center platform, you can reach more people, more efficiently. A choice of dialer modes ensures your agents get through more calls, while AI-powered assistance features support them in making those calls more successful.
The results of that are the kind of stronger connections that lead to deeper relationships, more sales, and higher levels of customer loyalty. All thanks to a platform that has you covered for inbound calling and digital engagement across channels, too. Not to mention that it can integrate seamlessly with RingEX to also handle your internal communications in the same place.

Outbound call center solutions and more

Get in touch today and see how RingCentral RingCX may be the perfect outbound call center solution for your business.

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