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Do Not Call Continued from page one list went into effect, many states, including Pennsylvania, developed statewide Do Not Call lists with the same purpose: to keep unwanted telemarketers from calling consumers at home. Millions of Pennsylvanians signed up, jamming the toll-free phone number and Internet Web site in the first few days. One Pennsylvania company that uses telemarketing regularly is Commonwealth Telephone Enterprises in Luzerne County. While telemarketing is a component of their marketing strategy, the company already had many of the policies outlined in the national list as its own procedures. Depending on the marketing campaign, CTE contacts customers based on geography, if the consumers are current clients, or if they are looking to add new clients. “The list has had a modest, if not minor, impact. Our company policy and customer approach were already aligned with the policies of the Do Not Call list for some time.We even have our own list. Our approach has been, and is today, very much in line with the FTC’s list.We had some administrative and tracking issues, but addressed those,” says Joe Mozden, senior vice president of sales and marketing for Commonwealth Telephone Enterprises. Maria Brannon, operations manager of Telemarketing Resources Inc. of Scranton, says these new lists have only made her staff more efficient with their telemarketing efforts.“We do not contact people who do not want to be contacted.We do work all over the state; for lawyers in Philadelphia and several newspapers, even companies in California, but we have strict guidelines,” she says. One problem with the list, according to Brannon, is that people think they are on the list and they aren’t.“The system is automated, so wrong area codes are associated with wrong prefixes; when someone thinks they are on the Do Not Call list, and we call them, we have to listen to them explain that they are on the list. When they are that adamant about not wanting to be called, we explain to them how to correctly get their numbers on these lists,” says Brannon. While virtually all of the telemarketing firms in the Scranton and Wilkes- Barre areas have shut down or moved The Faces and Places of Telemarketing ■ The median population of the towns and cities where outbound call centers are located: 26,532. ■ Twelve percent of the towns and cities with call centers also are communities that have been designated by the federal government as labor surplus areas or empowerment or enterprise areas qualifying for federal benefits and incentives to keep businesses and their employees in place. ■ Another view of telemarketers is their national mean annual wage of $20,285 compared to the national mean annual wage of other sales professionals, which is $31,535, and the national mean wage of all workers, which is $37,005.5 Source: The Direct Marketing Association, www.the-dma.org While virtually all of the telemarketing firms in the Scranton and Wilkes-Barre areas have shut down or moved since the Pennsylvania list went into effect, Telemarketing Resources Inc. is here to stay. 48 • NORTHEAST PENNSYLVANIA BUSINESS JOURNAL • SEPTEMBER 2003 since the Pennsylvania list went into effect,Telemarketing Resources Inc. is here to stay. “We’re the last company left… we employ over 30 people.That tells you how we do business, the relationships we have with the companies we do work for and the integrity of our workers. Nobody is losing his job here.The owner is working very hard to make sure that everyone here keeps his job,” says Brannon. So why is it that so many consumers hate being called by telemarketers? The answer, according to an area psychology professor, is rather simple. “These calls are an invasion of privacy. They are totally uninvited and are a nuisance.They typically interrupt family time and important conversations, usually over dinner, because that is the time of day when most telemarketers make their calls,” says Charles LaJeunesse, Ph.D., professor of psychology at College Misericordia in Dallas.“In the early days it was chronic, with people calling constantly and many of the products were distasteful.That’s where the negative image first started for the telemarketing industry.” After a while, according to LaJeunesse, consumers started fighting back, and telephone companies began to help, offering services such as Caller ID, so homeowners could screen a call before answering.Today’s technology, such as a new program offered by CTE, is much more sophisticated. An alternative to signing up for statewide and national lists,“Block ’em” prevents unwanted, unidentified telemarketing calls from getting through to a consumer’s home phone.“If a telemarketer calls your house, and you have this service, and it recognizes the number as being a telemarketer, it automatically adds your phone number to that company’s personal ‘do not call’ list,” explains Mozden. Customers talk back As much as people complain about advertising — all the junk mail, spam and telemarketing calls — they really do want to be in the marketing loop, says Michael R. Solomon, in his book, “Conquering Consumerspace: Marketing Strategies for a Branded World.” (www.amanet.org/books/catalog). Rather than “passive pawns at the receiving end of a sales pitch, consumers are control freaks,” says Solomon. “We enjoy the feeling of power that comes from having input into what we do, see and buy — even if it just means getting to vote on a candy flavor,” as Lifesavers demonstrated several years ago when the company threatened to eliminate the pineapple flavor in its popular candy and more than 400,000 people rallied to “save” it. Studies show a correlation between good health and feeling in control, he says.“We want to be involved, we want to know if we’re having an impact and we hunger for the validation that comes from making the ‘correct selections.’” Fast Facts — Telemarketing and Blast Fax FCC Changes Fax Rule Again Regarding Established Business Relationships The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) last month announced that it was extending the Aug. 25, 2003, deadline for companies to get their customers’ prior written permission before sending them commercial faxes until Jan. 1, 2005. The FCC’s August 18 order “extend[s], until Jan. 1, 2005, the effective date of our determination that an established business relationship will no longer be sufficient to show that an individual or business has given express permission to receive unsolicited facsimile advertisements.” Previously, the FCC — as part of its recently announced changes to the Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991 (TCPA) – had changed TCPA rules so that all commercial faxes were prohibited unless the sender had the recipient’s prior written permission to send the fax — even if the sender was faxing a consumer or business with whom it had an existing business relationship — beginning on August 25. For the FCC’s order, go to hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC -03-208A1.doc. New FCC rule regarding voice mail The Direct Marketing Association (The DMA) is giving notice to members of a new Federal Communications Commission (FCC) rule that impacts marketers who employ a “live” operator to leave either a personal or a pre-recorded commercial message on prospective customers’ voicemail when the person is unavailable. The Association is urging members affected by the change to contact FCC staff immediately. The FCC’s recent amendments to the Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991, which were announced on June 26 and took effect on Aug. 25, 2003, included a little-noticed provision that prohibits for-profit companies from leaving commercial messages on non-customers’ voicemail. In particular, the Commission’s rules now forbid almost all uses of prerecorded messages — even to reach people who are not on the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) National Do Not Call Registry, which opened its doors on June 27. Moreover, the new FCC rule forbids the use of a prerecorded message even when the message does not constitute “unsolicited advertising.” For example, the most significant change from the FCC’s previous rules is that prerecorded messages that invite customers to call back in order to meet with a potential vendor of goods, property, or services are now banned. Consequently, any entity – such as insurance companies, mortgage companies, resort timeshare providers, home improvement contractors, personal health and self-improvement – that previously used prerecorded messages in an effort to generate interest from prospective customers can no longer do so unless it fits within one of the five narrow exceptions listed below: 1. Made for emergency purposes; 2. Not made for a commercial purpose; 3. Made for a commercial purpose but does nothing more than leave a name and call-back number; 4. Made to a person with whom the caller has an existing, established business relationship; or 5. Made by or on behalf of a tax-exempt organization. Source: The Direct Marketing Association, www.the-dma.org Statistics — Direct Mail and Spam Weight of paper in U.S. municipal solid waste in 1980: 55 million tons Weight of paper in U.S. municipal solid waste in 1999: 87.5 million tons Number of trees it takes to make a ton of paper: 24 Weight of catalogs and other direct mailings in the U.S. municipal solid waste stream in 1999: 5.6 million tons Rate at which bulk mail was recycled in 1999: 22 percent Number of garbage trucks it would take to haul away all the unrecycled junk mail in the U.S. to landfills and incinerators each year: 340,000 Typical weight of 4 elephants: 17.8 tons Amount of bulk mail delivered annually by each of the U.S. Postal Service's 293,000 letter carriers: 17.8 tons Amount of time the average American spends opening bulk mail over the course of his or her life: 8 months Percentage of bulk mail that is thrown away unopened: 44 percent Money spent by U.S. companies on direct mail in 1993: $27.3 billion Money spent by U.S. companies on direct mail in 1998: $39.3 billion Tax dollars spent to dispose of junk mail: $320 million Pieces of bulk mail sent by U.S. nonprofits in one year: 12 billion Amount donated to nonprofits in response to those bulk mailings: $50 billion Source: www.newdream.org SPAM STATISTICS In 1999, the average consumer received 40 pieces of spam. By 2005, Jupiter estimates, the total is likely to soar to 2000. ■ America Online estimates that spam already accounts for more than 30 percent of e-mail to its members – as many as 24 million messages a day. ■ Seventy-four percent of customers believe that their ISPs should be responsible for fixing spam problems. ■ Seven percent of ISP churn was directly attributed to spam. ■ Thirty-six percent of e-mail users would switch ISPs in order to reduce the flow of spam they received. ■ Twenty-four percent of users would be willing to pay an incremental for spam blocking. ■ AOL alone receives 250,000 spam-related complaints every day. ■ Nearly $2 of each customer's monthly bill can be attributed to electronic junk mail and other forms of spam. Source: www.anti-spam-software.com
NORTHEAST PENNSYLVANIA BUSINESS JOURNAL • SEPTEMBER 2003 • 49 Alone continued from page one By Stephanie Phillips Taggart They are everywhere you look — marketing messages. Today, they are even popping up where you least expect it — the bottom of golf holes, supermarket floors, cell phones, taxi cab roofs, fresh fruit, on the boxer shorts of a prize fighter and even on urinals. Messages displayed on novel mediums are called “off the wall” or nontraditional forms of advertising. This type of marketing is gaining popularity, and many advertisers say it helps them stand out among the advertising glut of traditional media. But just how effective is nontraditional advertising, and is it worthwhile for advertisers to pursue? Michael P. Beiter, general manager of Lamar Advertising, an outdoor advertising company,Williamsport, says that although off the wall advertising is effective, it is not for every advertiser. “Often times national advertisers or local large advertisers are the ones to information and target us. I don’t think most of us mind much of that.” But debate continues on where public knowledge ends and privacy begins. Privacy advocates gather steam to regulate the gathering and sale of information to curb the onslaught of spammers and other uninvited solicitations. An overwhelming response to signups for the “Do-Not-Call” list reveals the public’s cry for relief from unwanted telemarketing solicitations. According to Forrester Research, 90 percent of consumers want the right to control how their personal information is used. “If you have a magazine subscription, there is a good chance somebody is buying your name,” says Gaetan Giannini, president of G2 Integrated Marketing with offices in Laurys Station and Stroudsburg.“It’s a good way to target market. If you get Golf Times, it’s a good chance you golf.Any time you fill out an application or a survey and don’t specifically say this information is confidential and cannot be reused, you have in effect given the OK to do it.” Privacy concerns are a gray area. The question becomes: where does use become abuse? While marketers provide helpful information, sometimes their methods can be intrusive or annoying. “I value my leisure time at home and often get a barrage of phone calls from telemarketers,” says Dean Hosier, marketing manager for PenTeleData, an Internet service provider in Palmerton, Carbon County.“However, I’ve accepted some of these offers from various companies. These personal forms of communication with the consumer have been proven to be very effective forms of advertising.” Effective or not, statistics show an estimated 74 percent of Americans support a “do-not-spam” registry. Advocates know enforcement may be elusive, so the burden rests on each of us to take steps to ensure our own privacy. “In many cases you have reputable companies giving the consumer an ‘opt out’ option on receiving future e-mail,” says Hosier.“In other cases, you have companies or individuals using mass mailing tactics whereby when an individual opts out, they have now actually given away their real e-mail address, adding to the consumer’s current problem.” In addition, viruses and worms can be used to pull arbitrary information from your computer, and spammers and hackers use such tools to harvest e- mail addresses. E-mail addresses can also be pulled from newsgroup posts, so it pays to weigh your options carefully. “As in most things,there is a trade-off regarding how much a person values his privacy and how convenient he wants his online experience,”says Chris Kruslicky, information security specialist for PenTeleData.“Those who choose convenience will have their online actions noted by marketing firms,such as the famous case of DoubleClick,and more recently via any number of Spyware products’ ‘phone-home’features.Those who choose not to have their online activities recorded will need to be diligent about things like Internet/browser settings,and forego the special offers and online contests that require personally identifiable information.” Another controversy in the privacy battle includes the use of ‘cookies’ — and they’re not chocolate chip. “Generally speaking, what the cookies are telling a Web site is where you have been,” Ed Redding, general manager of R&D Communications, Pine Grove, Schuylkill County.“A cookie remains from the site you previously visited. So the next site essentially gets a view of your browsing and shopping habits and, in some cases — depending on the sophistication for that particular Web site — the site can serve up pages of information that are sensitive to the places where you’ve been.” Privacy advocates consider cookies spying, but marketers disagree.“What merchants and marketers are trying to do is nothing more than a good retail clerk would in the store: get a sense of what you’re looking for,” says Redding.“It could be painted as being insidious but it’s really (what) people have always done in business to answer customers’ needs.” But debate continues. “I think that all legitimate business people have no interest in, and there is no use this type of marketing, because it won’t be effective unless a brand has been previously established. Don’t put the cart before the horse, so to speak. You want people to have familiarity with your product to avoid confusion,” he said.“When you are doing something off the wall, it is good to add on to the traditional media people use. Start with newspaper, television, outdoor, radio and direct mail advertising and then, if there is any money left over, you can use nontraditional media.” Fred Bertino, president and chief creative officer of Hill, Holliday, Connors, Cosmopulos Inc., a Boston-based advertising firm stated in an Inc. magazine article entitled “Upstarts: Nontraditional Ads,” that nontraditional advertising should be used as a supplement to traditional advertising, because the smartest brand-building campaigns express one core idea across many points of consumer contact. However, if “out of the box” marketing is used as a supplement, the additional TELEMARKETING STATISTICS US Department of Percent of the Number 2000 Labor Estimate of the Working Population Unique Census Number of People Engaged in Cities & Working Employed in the Outbound Town 2000 Census Pop. State in Tele- Telemarketing which State Population Non Agri. marketing for a fee Telemk. ALASKA 634,892 100,500 350 0.35% 3 ALABAMA 4,454,356 1,900,200 3,260 0.17% 14 ARKANSAS 2,692,090 1,156,800 5,040 0.44% 15 ARIZONA 5,307,331 2,239,600 12,870 0.57% 15 CALIFORNIA 34,501,130 14,658,700 40,040 0.27% 148 COLORADO 4,417,714 2,198,700 13,340 0.61% 28 CONNECTICUT 3,425,074 1,679,300 3,390 0.20% 14 WASHINGTON, DC 571,822 402,372 2,330 0.58% 1 DELAWARE 796,165 417,400 260 0.06% 4 FLORIDA 16,396,515 7,193,600 44,850 0.62% 80 GEORGIA 8,383,915 3,893,900 11,140 0.29% 30 HAWAII 1,224,398 551,000 790 0.14% 1 IOWA 2,923,179 1,463,100 10,880 0.74% 57 IDAHO 1,321,006 567,300 2,590 0.46% 6 ILLINOIS 12,482,301 5,931,400 17,060 0.29% 90 INDIANA 6,114,745 2,896,100 10,220 0.35% 25 KANSAS 2,694,641 1,363,800 3,170 0.23% 17 KENTUCKY 4,065,556 1,827,400 3,950 0.22% 16 LOUISIANA 4,465,430 1,929,700 6,940 0.36% 7 MASSACHUSETTS 6,379,304 3,294,300 10,330 0.31% 43 MARYLAND 5,375,156 2,454,000 12,170 0.50% 31 MAINE 1,286,670 611,700 4,190 0.68% 26 MICHIGAN 9,990,817 4,543,100 9,900 0.22% 46 MINNESOTA 4,972,294 2,659,900 9,080 0.34% 28 MISSOURI 5,629,707 2,687,600 10,300 0.38% 32 MISSISSIPPI 2,858,029 1,125,400 1,210 0.11% 10 MONTANA 904,433 393,600 580 0.15% 12 NO CAROLINA 8,186,268 3,879,400 6,680 0.17% 29 NORTH DAKOTA 634,448 331,500 2,950 0.89% 19 NEBRASKA 1,713,235 912,400 7,000 0.77% 29 NEW HAMPSHIRE 1,259,181 627,100 1,700 0.27% 10 NEW JERSEY 8,484,431 4,007,100 11,030 0.28% 80 NEW MEXICO 1,829,146 760,500 3,330 0.44% 9 NEVADA 2,106,074 1,073,000 2,110 0.20% 6 NEW YORK 19,011,378 8,538,000 26,710 0.31% 68 OHIO 11,373,541 5,516,100 14,140 0.26% 56 OKLAHOMA 3,460,097 1,519,800 9,100 0.60% 16 OREGON 3,472,867 1,581,200 4,580 0.29% 15 PENNSYLVANIA 12,287,150 5,647,400 21,370 0.38% 83 PUERTO RICO 1,390 1 RHODE ISLAND 1,058,920 484,800 1,880 0.39% 6 SOUTH CAROLINA 4,063,011 1,829,200 4,260 0.23% 12 SOUTH DAKOTA 756,600 380,800 1,190 0.31% 10 TENNESSEE 5,740,021 2,706,000 7,930 0.29% 19 TEXAS 21,325,018 9,559,500 48,570 0.51% 75 UTAH 2,269,789 1,067,000 4,020 0.38% 15 VIRGINIA 7,187,734 3,504,100 10,820 0.31% 33 VERMONT 613,090 296,600 320 0.11% 6 WASHINGTON 5,987,973 2,650,500 6,250 0.24% 24 WISCONSIN 5,401,906 2,827,500 8,970 0.32% 25 WEST VIRGINIA 1,801,916 730,900 5,340 0.73% 14 WYOMING 494,423 249,400 1,250 0.50% 3 Source: Direct Marketing Association, The Faces and Places of Outbound Teleservices in the United States economic justification for, any invasion of privacy,” says Redding.“In and of itself, the recording via cookies is not very important and certainly no invasion of privacy. But a person who has become sensitized to the issue, or who may be a recent victim of identity theft, may find that an egregious invasion. Privacy is in cost in these nontraditional mediums will be staggering, suggests Bertino, pointing out that advertisers who use “off the wall” advertising usually have excessive marketing budgets. Dennis Sullivan, president, Nextt Media, a full service advertising agency located in Williamsport said that although the cost of nontraditional advertising varies from campaign to campaign, creative mediums don’t necessarily mean big dollars. “You can still be creative and innovative and stand out using a less expensive avenue than traditional forms of advertising,” he said. No matter how expensive or inexpensive this type of “off the wall” marketing can be, spending any amount of money may be worthwhile if it works. “Nontraditional advertising is here to stay, because it works. If it didn’t work, no one would spend the money to place the ad. As long as it works and has an influence, marketers will be placing their mes- the eye of the beholder.” The Small Business Administration (www.sba.gov/ privacy.html) provides a comprehensive model privacy policy. Its final words provide useful insight for consumers and business alike:“Be informed.You are the best qualified to protect your own privacy.” Advertising’s extreme sport: ‘off the wall’ and ‘in your face’ ad placement Off the wall continues on next page Advertisers are coming up with ever-more inventive ways to reach the consumer. Photo by Bob Urban
Page 1 and 2: By Kathy Ruff T HE R EGION’ S A W
Page 3 and 4: DEVELOPMENT DIVISION 320-330 Stewar
Page 5 and 6: NORTHEAST PENNSYLVANIA BUSINESS JOU
Page 7 and 8: Tips for efficient debt collection
Page 11 and 12: Nation’s top specialty retailers
Page 13 and 14: Publication examines work, play By
Page 15 and 16: Scranton Chamber of Commerce seeks
Page 17 and 18: The ‘bang’ of broadband NORTHEA
Page 21 and 22: Training driven by managers Chief e
Page 23 and 24: Congress seeks way to pay for Medic
Page 25 and 26: Technology, biological care top lis
Page 27 and 28: ‘CreateAthon’ donates talents t
Page 29 and 30: Use exit interviews to gather feedb
Page 33 and 34: Get powered up! Electric The right
Page 35 and 36: More new construction in downtown H
Page 41 and 42: Mericle hosts event at Hanover Indu
Page 43 and 44: There’s renewed interest and new
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Page 47: Dairy plant’s business model: buy
Page 51 and 52: Now you can update your listings ea
Page 53 and 54: By participating in the Gallery of
Page 55 and 56: Continued from page 53 Internationa
Page 59 and 60: Economic Development Corporation to

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