Is Your Outbound Sales Team Truly Data-Driven?

Struggling to boost the performance of your outbound B2C sales team? In high-volume call centres, the challenges of maximising consumer call outcomes are constant.

Agents need to hit their targets, navigate objections, and keep conversations on track – all while managing large call volumes and remaining compliant.

But, with the high cost of data lists, every call counts. Call centre leaders and their teams must operate at peak performance to drive success in a highly competitive industry.

So, what’s the biggest obstacle to success?

For many leaders, it’s the limited visibility into what makes (or breaks!) a successful call outcome.

Every team has its top performers—the ones with impressive close rates. The real challenge is unlocking their secrets and scaling their approach across the entire team.

Imagine if you could analyse exactly how your top agents overcome objections or turn negative sentiment into positive outcomes. Wouldn’t that make your job easier?At MaxContact, we’re here to help. Our speech analytics platform, Spokn AI, is designed to help B2C outbound sales teams perform at their best – at scale.

What role does speech analytics play in B2C outbound sales?

If you’re searching for a tool that can reveal exactly what’s working – and what’s not – during your teams’ outbound sales calls, speech analytics is the answer.

Speech analytics transcribes spoken conversations between agents and customers, into searchable text files. However, our speech analytics platform, Spokn AI, takes things further.

Our Success Intelligence feature uncovers key insights such as:

• Common objections
• Objection handling effectiveness
• Sentiment shifts
• Outcome trends across multiple calls

Success Intelligence goes beyond basic transcription. It provides leaders with actionable insights that highlight what’s working, and what isn’t, on your sales calls. By analysing calls at scale, leaders can focus on strategy and team development instead of time-consuming manual reviews.

How does speech analytics benefit outbound sales?

Let’s face it. Sales team leaders don’t have time to manually review calls. They need actionable insights, not hours of analysis.

Spokn AI provides better visibility into call outcomes, helping leaders pivot strategies when reoccurring issues arise. With better visibility and clarity, leaders can quickly address training gaps and maximise conversion rates.

For B2C outbound sales teams, this means fewer missed opportunities, better-equipped agents, and a measurable boost in ROI.

Uncover the secrets of top performing sales agents

Every sales team has its stars – the ones who consistently exceed their targets. The secret to team-wide success? Identifying what these top performers do differently and scaling their approach across the team.

Here’s how our speech analytics platform makes this possible:

• Track agent performance
  Spokn AI measures metrics like objection-handling, customer sentiment, and call outcomes. This allows leaders to pinpoint who excels and why.
• Build a blueprint for success
  By analysing the behaviors of top agents, you can refine scripts, create targeted training materials, and onboard new hires more effectively.
• Provide tools to support success

Insights from multi-call analysis mean you can benchmark performance across campaigns, ensuring every team member is set up to succeed.

Mastering sales objections with speech analytics

We’ve all been there. A promising sales call suddenly stalls because of a customer objection. Without the right tools, overcoming these moments can feel impossible for call agents.

With the right tools, agents can turn these challenges into opportunities. Spokn AI helps teams:

1. Categorise objections into need, time, trust, and cost.

Knowing which categories arise most often allows leaders to:

• Train agents on objection-handling techniques that work best.
• Address systemic issues, such as pricing concerns or unclear value propositions.

2. Refine strategies based on data insights

Adjust scripts, improve product positioning, or reshape training programs based on objection data.

3. Empower call managers with tools to support agent growth

Give call managers better visibility into how their call agents handle objections during calls. This helps call centre leaders provide specific and personalised feedback to their call teams, encouraging continuous improvement and growth.

Building better teams with data-driven training

Great B2C sales teams don’t happen by accident – they’re built. Speech analytics takes training up a gear by delivering insights that enable smarter coaching and development.

Here’s how it helps you build a successful call centre sales team:

1. Deliver personalised coaching
   Identify individual agent strengths and weaknesses, such as handling sensitive calls, articulating product knowledge, or countering objections effectively.
2. Training programs that work
   Use real-world examples from successful calls to shape training sessions. Focus on proven objection-handling techniques and ensure every agent has the tools to succeed.

Driving sales growth through insights

Driving consistent sales growth comes down to smarter insights and faster adaptation. Spokn AI enables this in many ways:

• Spot trends and adapt by identifying which products or services resonate most with customers.
• Gain competitor intelligence by analysing mentions of competitor offers or pricing, enabling leaders to respond with compelling counteroffers.
• Adapt to market changes by detecting shifts in customer demand through call data and adjusting messaging or strategies proactively.

Conclusion

Speech analytics is more than just a tool – it’s a transformative solution for B2C outbound sales teams.

• Gain post-call insights into agent performance and customer feedback.
• Scale best practices across your team to improve outcomes.
• Empower agents with actionable data to close more deals.
• Streamline training and coaching for long-term success.
• Adapt quickly to market and customer changes.

Ready to transform your contact centre’s performance? Book a demo today to see how Spokn AI and Success Intelligence can strengthen your outbound sales strategy.

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Every salesperson has heard them before:

❌ “How did you get my number?”
❌ “No, I’m not interested.”
❌ “I’m already with [competitor].”

Everyone who works in the industry knows that sales objections are inevitable. Particularly if you work in a high-pressure environment like a call centre where agents handle hundreds of calls every day.

It’s easy to view objections as a rejection, but a recent analysis of 800,000+ objections calls carried out by MaxContact from annoymynised platform data revealed that 39% can be overturned if they are handled well.

Objections should be viewed as opportunities. The chance to address concerns, show value, build stronger customer relationships, and move prospects closer to saying yes.

“When I first started in sales, the biggest challenge wasn’t hearing objections, it was knowing how to respond instead of just saying ‘Oh right, OK’ and ending the call.” – Business Development Manager, MaxContact

However, mastering objection handling doesn’t come down to persistence alone; it’s about having the right tools, techniques, and insights to guide conversations, understand prospect needs, and ultimately, improve conversions.

In this article, we’ll explore:

• Proven objection-handling techniques that empower sales teams.
• How AI-driven insights from MaxContact’s Conversation Analytics platform (including our success intelligence feature) can improve objection-handling strategies.

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It builds confidence within your sales team

When salespeople feel equipped to handle objections, they perform better. Our data shows that some objections are highly recoverable, for example:

• 46% of “No Immediate Need” objections were overturned
• 46% of “Lack of Time” objections were also successfully handled

This proves that when a sales team adopts the mentality that objections are hesitations, and signal the end of a conversation, they are more likely to find ways to adapt and refine their sales approach, instead of cutting their losses

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It improves conversion rates

Many objections aren’t a firm no; instead, they’re usually a sign that the prospect is missing key information and needs more clarity.

Our data analysis revealed that while “Not Interested” is one of the most common objections, occurring over 150,000 times. It’s also one of the hardest to overcome, with a 23% success rate.

Agents need to listen to and address these objections by being armed with a deep understanding of the right information to turn conversations around.

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It strengthens team performance

The most successful sales teams share best practices rather than keep them to themselves. They learn from each other’s handling techniques and replicate the best strategies across the team.

With MaxContact’s Success Intelligence feature, which is part of our Conversation Analytics product, sales leaders can identify patterns in objections. Leaders can see:

• Which objections appear most frequently
• Which ones agents struggle with
• Which top performers consistently overturn
• Coaching opportunities based on data, not assumptions

For example, cost-related objections account for 18% of all objections, but teams overturn almost 40% of them when they use strong value framing.

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It creates better customer experiences

Even if a sale doesn’t happen immediately (the majority don’t), a well-handled objection and respectful interaction builds trust, increasing the likelihood of a conversion further down the line.

Trust-based objections (which account for 22% of all objections) are among the hardest to overcome, especially “Lack of Trust,” which has just a 32% success rate.

A professional and respectful interaction can leave a positive impression, which means when things change in the future, they are more likely to consider you and get back in touch

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Objection handling techniques for sales calls

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1. Be prepared with a decent script

Why? A structured script helps your sales team be consistent and shows agents what good looks like. It is also easier to refine your approach and build agent confidence when handling objections.

Top Tip: You should regularly review and update your call scripts to mirror common objections. Refinements should be based on real-world responses and positive past outcomes.

Want ready-to-use objection-handling scripts? Download our Scripting Templates for Dealing with Difficult Customers to train your team with proven responses.

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2. Anticipate and address objections before the call

Proactively addressing potential concerns reduces resistance later in the conversation. Our dataset shows the most common objections are:

1. No Immediate Need - 151k occurrences
2. Not Interested - 150k occurrences
3. Lack of Time - 94k occurrences
4. Too Expensive - 69k occurrences

Top Tip: Do your research before the call and think about what their objections are likely to be. If you proactively address these pain points early in your pitch, you prevent them from derailing conversations later.

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3. Focus on building value

Cost objections make up nearly 70,000 conversations, but almost 45% of “Disputes Amount” objections are overturned when agents clearly demonstrate value. If you can confidently demonstrate how your product or service meets your prospect’s unique needs, it paves the way for a conversation with fewer objections to overcome.

Top Tip: Tailor your sales pitch so it addresses their specific pain points and priorities to make the benefits more relevant and persuasive.

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4. Uncover the real concerns behind the objection

Surface-level objections can often mask deeper customer concerns.

“Scepticism,” for example, occurred 50,364 times, with agents successfully resolving 44% when they probed deeper into customer concerns.

Listening, probing and clarifying explore the real motivations behind a “no.”

Top Tip: Use probing questions to encourage the customer to open up and really listen to what they have to say:

“What are your biggest challenges with your current system?”
“What keeps you up at night about this issue?”
“What does a good day vs. a bad day look like?”

Sales Specialist Insight: “Ask and then be quiet and listen. If you can keep the conversation going, you’ll build rapport, understand their needs, and have a better chance of addressing their true concerns.”

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5. Know when to cut your losses

It’s a skill in itself to realise that not every prospect is worth pursuing. At the end of the day, your time is a valuable resource, and some objections are genuine dead-ends, contractual commitments being one.

Our data analysis uncovered that “Contractual Obligations” appears less often as an objection but has a low recovery rate of just 35%.

Top Tip: Learn to recognise the signs that an objection is a hard “no” rather than a request for reassurance. Feel comfortable to politely bring the conversation to a close when it’s necessary.

Example: What does a ‘hard no’ sound like?

Agent: “I think our solution can really help you with [pain point]. Are you free for a quick call next week?”

Prospect: “Well, we’ve actually just signed a five-year contract with another provider, so we’re locked in with them.”

Agent: "Oh ok, sounds like you’re set for now, but I’d like to stay in touch in case your needs change in the future. Would you be happy for me to check back in with you in a few months to see how everything is going?"

Instead of pushing further, the agent sees that this isn’t a timing objection; it’s a contractual commitment. Instead they:

• Respect the prospect’s situation and don’t waste time.
• Keep the door open for future conversations.
• Avoid the hard-sell approach, which could damage the relationship.

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6. Understand it’s a numbers game

Why? Not every call ends with a sale, but persistence and efficiency are part of what drives success.

How? It’s important that sales agents don’t get hung up on rejections. Call volume and quality interactions are key, so the best thing to do is move on to the next prospect.

Top Tip: Use automated dialler software to improve connection rates and reduce wasted time. Skills-based call routing can also help to match the right agents to potential opportunities to match their knowledge and experience.

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Objection handling cheat sheet

How AI-driven insights take objection handling to the next level

Not every call ends with a sale, but persistence and efficiency are part of what drives success. Across all 803,000 objections, agents overcame 39% overall.

It’s important that sales agents don’t get hung up on rejections. Call volume and quality interactions are key, so the best thing to do is move on to the next prospect.

Top Tip: Use automated dialler software to improve connection rates and reduce wasted time. Skills-based call routing can also help to match the right agents to potential opportunities using their relevant knowledge and experience.

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MaxContact’s Conversation Analytics & Success Intelligence - Turning Insights into Sales Success

Traditionally, sales coaching relies on manual call reviews, which are time-consuming and only capture a small percentage of conversations.

But with Conversation Analytics and Success Intelligence, sales teams can now use post-call insights and AI-powered analytics to enhance objection handling across teams.

Here’s how it is used in call centres.

Speech analytics that goes beyond transcription

• Transcribe and analyse 100% of calls with speech analytics. Instead of analysing small call samples taken at random, you can search and analyse a higher volume of calls, so fewer objections go unnoticed.
• Identify trends in objections and understand the most common customer concerns within your sales process.
• Track sentiment and review call summaries to explore where or when conversations take a negative turn.
• Use AI-powered analytics to enhance coaching with data-backed insights that help agents improve faster.

Success Intelligence - AI that measures & improves objection handling

• Categorise and analyse objections and help agents refine their approach.
• Identify what top performers do differently to overcome objections and use it as a blueprint for coaching agents who struggle.
• Provide actionable insights based on performance trends and data, not just opinions based on limited call samples.

“Success Intelligence highlights your best-performing agents and allows you to compare them with lesser-performing agents to see where improvements can be made. Instead of just reviewing a handful of calls, we now have insights into every objection raised and whether or not it was handled effectively.”

Ready to handle objections in sales the smarter way?

Handling objections is more than just a desirable sales skill; it’s a competitive advantage.

The best sales teams:

✔ Use structured scripts and refined techniques.
✔ Stay adaptive and customer-focused.
✔ Use AI-driven insights to continuously improve strategies.

Want to see these techniques in action?

Book a free demo of MaxContact’s Conversation Analytics to see how AI-powered insights can improve your sales team’s objection handling

Many BPO leaders are under growing pressure to deliver consistent performance, all whilst operating in an environment that’s increasingly competitive and cost-sensitive.

One of the biggest challenges is not the lack of data, but knowing how to interpret it. BPOs often track dozens of metrics, yet they still struggle to understand whether performance is strong, weak, or simply average for the market. Without a clear point of comparison, it’s impossible to know where to focus improvement efforts, or how to demonstrate value to clients.

In this article, we explore how accurate benchmarking helps outsourced contact centres to:

• Assess performance more accurately.
• Identify meaningful improvement opportunities.
• Use data to drive better outcomes across sales, service and debt collection operations.

What is Benchmarking?

Benchmarking is the process of comparing your contact centre’s performance against industry standards or peer groups to understand how well you’re really performing.

Rather than viewing KPIs in isolation, benchmarking provides context. It shows where performance is competitive, where gaps exist, and which metrics matter most for your operating model.

There are two primary approaches:

• Competitive benchmarking: Comparing performance against similar BPOs or outsourced contact centres
• Process benchmarking: Comparing workflows against recognised best practice, sometimes drawn from other industries (used less frequently in contact centres)

The Benchmarking Challenge for BPOs

In practice, benchmarking is not always straightforward. BPOs often face inconsistent data, varying KPI definitions between clients, and limited visibility of reliable industry standards. Combined with the pace and pressure of contact centre operations, this makes it difficult to establish benchmarks that are both accurate and actionable.

Despite this, benchmarking remains essential for BPO performance and long-term competitiveness.

Done well, benchmarking allows BPOs to:

• Understand whether KPIs reflect strength or emerging risk
• Use objective data to support operational and commercial decisions
• Identify best practices and apply them consistently across teams
• Spot early warning signs, such as rising agent workload or churn, before they impact service delivery

Overcoming benchmarking challenges starts with a clear strategy: defining objectives, selecting relevant KPIs and measuring performance consistently over time. Our complete guide to call centre reporting metrics explains which KPIs matter most and how they should be read together, rather than in isolation.

What are the Top KPIs Contact Centres Prioritise in 2026?

MaxContact’s 2025/26 UK Contact Centre KPI Benchmarking Insights Report reveals a shift in how contact centres prioritise performance metrics. Rather than focusing on a single efficiency measure, decision makers are increasingly balancing customer experience, responsiveness and commercial outcomes.

Based on responses from 300 UK contact centre leaders, the three most focused on KPIs are:

• Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) – prioritised by 48% of respondents
• Speed of Answer – cited by 35% as a critical performance metric
• Service Level Achievement – selected by 34% of contact centres

Close behind these sit commercially focused metrics such as conversion rate (33%), first call resolution (33%), and revenue per contact (32%), reflecting the ongoing pressure to balance service quality with financial performance.

We explore why a blended approach to call centre metrics is the best way to measure call centre efficiency.

Of course, the metrics that contact centres report on, is also dependent on the industry they operate in.

Key KPIs for Sales and Debt Resolution BPOs

Understanding which KPIs matter most is critical for BPOs operating in sales and debt resolution. While both rely on outbound performance, the metrics that drive success (and the way they should be interpreted) differ significantly between the two.

The latest benchmark data shows that high-performing BPOs don’t track more metrics than their peers. They focus on the right ones and use them together to guide decisions, not just report outcomes.

Sales-focused BPOs

For sales-driven BPOs, performance is ultimately measured by revenue. But revenue outcomes are shaped by a combination of efficiency, lead quality and agent effectiveness.

The 2025/26 Benchmark Report shows that while sales volumes have softened slightly year-on-year, revenue performance is holding up, suggesting agents are working harder and conversations are becoming more complex.

Key KPIs for sales BPOs include:

• Conversion rate: Measures the percentage of contacts that result in a sale. Benchmark data shows a mean conversion rate of 16%, with nearly 30% of teams achieving rates between 20-29%. Improving conversion is less about increasing call volume and more about better lead prioritisation, agent coaching and script effectiveness.
• First-call close rate: Indicates how often a sale is achieved on the first interaction. The benchmark mean sits at 25%, down slightly year-on-year, reflecting a tougher sales environment. Falling first-call close rates can point to lead-quality issues or gaps in agent confidence and product knowledge.
• Average revenue per call: The mean revenue per call now sits at just under £230, although this figure is heavily skewed by top performers. Over 45% of sales teams generate less than £59 per call, highlighting a significant performance gap between average and high-performing BPOs.
• Calls to success ratio: Tracks how many calls are needed to secure a sale. A rising ratio often signals inefficiencies in targeting, messaging or dialling strategy, issues that cannot be solved by increasing activity alone.

High-performing sales teams use these metrics together to understand why performance varies between campaigns, agents or lead sources, not simply whether targets were met. We explore how sales teams follow data effectively in our article Is your outbound sales team truly data-driven?

Debt Resolution BPOs

Debt resolution BPOs face a different challenge: recovering outstanding balances while navigating increasingly complex and sensitive customer conversations.

Benchmark data suggests debt collection teams are operating in a more difficult economic environment, with performance under pressure despite consistent effort.

Key KPIs for debt resolution BPOs include:

• Right Party Contact (RPC): Measures how effectively agents are reaching the correct individual. The current benchmark mean is 27%, making RPC one of the most important early indicators of list quality and call timing effectiveness.
• Promise to Pay (PTP) rate: Indicates the percentage of contacts that result in a commitment to pay. The benchmark mean sits at 28%, broadly in line with last year, suggesting agents are maintaining performance despite tougher circumstances.
• First Call Resolution (FCR): Measures whether a payment or promise to pay is achieved on the first interaction. The benchmark mean has fallen to 37%, down five percentage points year-on-year. A meaningful decline that reflects more complex debtor situations rather than declining agent capability.
• Percentage of debt collected: A high-level indicator of overall effectiveness. The benchmark mean has dropped to 28%, down from 32% last year, reinforcing the need for smarter call strategies, better timing and more personalised conversations.

For debt resolution BPOs, these KPIs must be interpreted in context. Falling FCR or recovery rates may signal broader economic pressure rather than operational failure. But without benchmarking, that distinction is impossible to make.

The Role of Technology for Benchmarking Success

Benchmarking only becomes valuable when insight leads to action. This is where technology plays a critical role.

The 2025/26 Benchmark Report shows that 66% of contact centres are already using or piloting AI, with 60% planning further investment in AI and automation in 2026. This reflects a clear shift away from retrospective reporting and towards real-time performance control.

Modern contact centre platforms enable BPOs to:

• Optimise agent performance: Use real-time dashboards, coaching tools and conversation analytics to identify what high performers do differently and replicate it at scale.
• Improve customer outcomes: Balance efficiency with experience by monitoring metrics such as conversion, FCR and CSAT together rather than in isolation.
• Drive operational efficiency: Adjust dialling strategies, lead prioritisation and resource allocation based on live performance data, not end-of-day reports.

In a highly competitive outsourcing market, technology is no longer a differentiator on its own. The advantage lies in how effectively BPOs use data to benchmark performance, guide decisions and demonstrate value to clients.

Not Sure How You Measure Up?

The 2025/26 UK Contact Centre KPI Benchmarking Insights Report provides in-depth analysis of industry performance, with actionable insight for sales and debt resolution BPOs.

Download the report to compare your KPIs against UK benchmarks, identify performance gaps and understand what high-performing outsourced contact centres do differently.

Download your copy today