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Time to get on message with call recording

In 2008 call recording specialist Liquid Voice had its most successful year with growth of over 100 per cent in key areas of the business. Chris Berry, Business Development Director at the Leeds-based company, says the market is continuing to expand. "The wider business community now seems much more attuned to the idea of call recording. In a market where businesses cannot afford to make mistakes, organisations are using call recording as a form of indemnity in order to back up sale or purchase transactions," he said.

Liquid Voice attributes much of its growth to IP recording, both SIP trunk and IP end-point, which is a more affordable proposition to TDM recording, says the firm. Because of the software-only nature of this type of recording it reduces the cost of sale which Liquid Voice in turn passes on to dealers. "In terms of margin for resellers, we offer anything up to 45 per cent dependant upon annual value of call recording sales. Then in terms of the sale, we supply all of the collateral a dealer needs, pricing calculators to assist with specifying the products and attend demonstrations as required to support the whole process," Berry said.

However, he concedes that it is sometimes difficult for a reseller to be price competitive where PBX sales are concerned: "I can understand that resellers are sometimes reluctant to try and force too many additional products and services on top, despite the obvious prospect of additional margin. That said, where there is a clearly identified business benefit for a voice recording solution, especially one which could potentially offer efficiency gains or cost savings, it's certainly worth a try."

FSA legalisation requiring mobile phone calls to be recorded is inevitable and will force many companies to invest in new call recording solutions that can handle mobile phone call recording, highlights Mark Shane, Sales Manager at ICON. "This can be a burden for the SME. An alternative to replacing the existing FSA compliant call recording system is to use an FMC solution with the legacy call recording product. This makes the mobile phone part of the company's telephone system no matter where the user is, meaning that phone calls can be recorded for compliance or training purposes using the company's central call recording solution, just like the calls made and received on the fixed line extensions."

Chris Berry at Liquid Voice sums up the reseller opportunity: "More businesses see call recording as a must-have these days. In an economically frail marketplace, businesses can afford even less than before for transactions to go wrong. Call recording is increasingly recognised as a form of indemnity against mistakes with order processing and transactions over the telephone.

"Nowadays, call management is a bi-product of the call recording system so we invariably find it works the other way round. While not everyone is ready for call recording, we find that giving our resellers an affordable call management offering to ship with their PBX sales offers an ideal platform for them to up sell the call recording

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