Why Calls Are Now Mainstream For Marketers

B2B companies, the logic goes, care the least about phone calls.

B2B companies care about form fills, RFPs, and ecommerce. Local businesses and call-centric businesses are the only ones that care about phone calls, so they say.

Well, turns out that’s just not true.

Even B2B companies care about calls. Consider this data from our October marketing campaigns:

• 1.6% of our total leads this month (so far) are phone calls. But those phone calls account for 19.2% of our total new accounts for the month.

Other months the data has been even more extreme. Calls disproportionately produce accounts and revenue. And, keep in mind, we’re not a call-centric company, we’re a B2B company.

The Mainstreaming of Calls

Google has validated phone calls, call tracking, and call analytics with several announcements over the years.

Calls matter now.

That much is indisputable. But, Google’s support and entrance into the call tracking space isn’t exactly a surprise. Google has been at the forefront of call research:

• It was Google who said that 70% of local mobile searches result in phone calls.
• It was Google that predicted mobile search would surpass desktop search and produce an overflowing deluge of calls.
• It was Google that started offering mobile click-to-call and call extensions for any AdWords ad.

But, Google alone isn’t responsible for the mainstreaming of phone calls. Other companies have conducted research as well. Consider the following:

• Calls convert to revenue 10x more frequently than form-fills
• 29% of calls convert to appointments, customers, or sales (only 2% of form-fills do)
• 71% of mobile searchers make phone calls to businesses
• Certain industries rely on calls almost exclusively for their lead gen and revenue
• Calls are lower in the sales funnel  than web leads
• 86% of businesses say calls are the best leads they receive

Calls are now mainstream for marketers. Call data and call intelligence is mission-critical for leading businesses, regardless of industry. The marketing world has been, and is, talking about phone calls.