DEL.ICIO.USThese days, telemarketing is a hot job
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Sunday, April 05, 2009
The economy has come to this:
Telemarketing, with its low-paid, little-liked, insistent-as-gnats suppertime intruders, is a hot job.
Phil Skinner/pskinner@ajc.com
Kimberly Simmons holds a meeting at the growing call center at Ryla Enterprises in Kennesaw.
Funny what 8.5 percent unemployment will do.
But don’t call the nation’s 4.2 million phone jockeys telemarketers anymore. They’re “agents” or “associates” with chippy demeanors and 401(k)s.
They counsel credit card customers. They smooth nerves ruffled by computer inanities. They even quote Scripture for the financially distressed.
And, more times than not, they don’t call you; you call them.
“The best job you’ve ever had begins here,” reads the sign above the double-door that leads into a thousand-cubicle call center at Ryla Teleservices in Kennesaw.
Janice Walker is a believer.
“Go to any first-grade class and ask the kids what they want to be when they grow up. You never get one person who says, ‘I want to be a customer service agent,’ ” said Walker, a Ryla manager. “But it’s a good industry to be in. The business is booming. This is the best place I’ve ever worked.”
Call centers — the industry prefers “contact centers” — flourish in the worst economy in decades. Ryla, one of Georgia’s biggest call centers, boasts a net increase of 810 jobs this past year.
Corporations looking to cut wage, health and retirement costs continue to outsource calling jobs. Customers, frustrated with getting operators in India and the Philippines, have triggered a reverse offshoring wave that’s bringing home thousands of jobs.
The nation’s skyrocketing unemployment ensures a job-hungry pool of talented workers for an industry with incredibly high turnover. Tens of thousands of jobs were added nationwide last year.
And the South, as with earlier manufacturing waves, has become the latest call-center destination.
“You do have growth opportunities in a recession, just like you do during a boom time,” said David Butler, executive director of the nonprofit National Association of Call Centers. “It’s a recession-resistant industry, but it’s not entirely recession-proof.”
Answering the call
Not a single overcaffeinated, nail-buffing know-it-all works at Ryla’s campuslike call center spread over three buildings in a Cobb County office park. Ryla’s nearly 2,000 “associates” dress business-casual and speak with deference.
Each cavernous building hums with hundreds of polite conversations, a susurrus of professionalism. Inbound customer service calls — cellphone upgrades, credit card balances, computer help desk questions — comprise 80 percent of Ryla’s work. Outbound surveys and sales calls make up the rest.
Ryla, started in 2001, won’t divulge names of corporate clients. Previously, though, the company handled calls for EarthLink, IBM, LexisNexis, AT&T and the Georgia Lottery.
Today, according to CEO Mark Wilson, wireless and financial service companies are Ryla’s biggest customers. Associates handle visa requests for the U.S. State Department and benefit enrollments for federal employees.
Two nationally recognized mega-churches hire Ryla to fill orders for religious materials and answer prayer requests. Agents scan computers for a list of church-sanctioned Scripture readings.
Revenues hit $24 million last year, Wilson said. He expects to more than triple that amount this year.
“We were a big success before the economy went into recession,” Wilson said. “There’s no reason to doubt it will be any different now.”
Ryla’s future, though, depends on keeping its employees. Retention is the industry’s Achilles’ heel. Ryla says only one-fourth of its employees leave each year.
Most agents stick around a year or two, according to a September 2008 report by the nonprofit International Customer Management Institute. Low pay, repetitive work, angry callers and better jobs drive them away.
But in a down economy, associates have fewer job options. And Ryla seems to work hard to retain them.
Salaries typically run $10-$12 an hour, the industry standard, but rise for more technical jobs. Ryla covers 60 percent of health insurance costs. It offers a 401(k) retirement plan, but it doesn’t match employee contributions.
Ryla offers “quiet lounges,” a subsidized cafeteria and homeowner workshops.
“It’s a relationship and not just a paycheck,” said Walker, who works the 5 p.m. to 2 a.m. shift. “I know that sounds corny.”
Ringing up revenue
Walker, 38, was hired by Ryla in January after she was laid off from another Atlanta telephony job. With 14 years of call-center experience, she was snapped up by Ryla. Walker sees many impressive résumés.
“We may not have gotten some of these folks coming in the door if things were booming in other industries,” she said. “Banking, mortgages, retail, car sales – people who’ve lost jobs in those industries are looking to get back to work.”
Tech-savvy Americans, who already pay bills or make plane reservations online, turn to call-center techies to solve more prickly problems.
“When they’re calling, there’s a screw-up,” said Alton Martin, a consultant. “So the person doing the call-center job needs more training, is probably a bit more educated and more mature.”
Taxpayer outrage also prompts federal and state governments to bring back jobs shipped overseas. Ryla is bidding on two formerly off-shore contracts.
“Jobs shipped offshore may save 50 percent in labor costs, but if a customer says, ‘I don’t like an Indian call center and I won’t do business with you,’ then it’s not worth the cost,” said Butler, who also runs the Call Center Research Laboratory at the University of Southern Mississippi. In all, the U.S. call-center industry notched $23 billion in sales last year. Revenues should hit $29 billion by 2014, according to industry consultants Frost and Sullivan. The South is poised to claim much of that growth.
While the West remains the call-center hotbed, Alabama, Kentucky, South Carolina and Mississippi were four of the fastest-growing states between 2000 and 2007, according to the call-center association. Georgia, with 141,000 operator jobs, grew by nearly 10 percent.
More Americans might soon hear Georgia accents. Ryla expects to hire an additional 500 callers soon.
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