Telephone Consultation

We have our own in-house telephone call centre which is an integral part of the success of the company. The call centre operates from 9am through 9pm, six days a week and enables us to offer a telephone interviewing service that has been part of our overall service since 1991.

With a dedicated call centre manager and two full time supervisors, the call centre now has a capacity for 25 telephone interviewers, all of whom are fully trained to Market Research Society standards.

The call centre often produces up to 3,000 surveys a week and only deals in outgoing calls. SMSR use Adaptive software including predictive dialler and Management Tools which ensure high quality and high productivity to guarantee deadlines are always met. All are run through a CATI system produced by SNAP Software.

Our newly installed Avaya telephone system runs through a digital network ensuring a high quality signal and clear two-way communication between the interviewer and the respondent. The system enables seamless onsite call monitoring and recording facilities.

The call centre is based around the the concept of ‘empathy’. This is achieved by having specific groups of interviewers who interview like-for-like respondents. For example, we have a young persons team, an older persons team and a BME team. This allows for the interviewer to ‘empathise’ with the respondent and illicit a more meaningful response.

The call centre is used for all general public and business research and for focus group recruitment. We believe telephone research is now one of the most effective methods of achieving a representative and robust sample and is extremely cost effective.