Back to telemarketing??

bns

New member
Nov 24, 2009
21
0
0
I have been approached by a long time resident and business owner to get any information I can on starting a telemarketing buiness with him in Sosua.

I have all the technical, labour, incidental etc costs and information.

From my research it seems that these types of companies on are a downhill slope .

One also starts to wonder about how one gets clients as well.

Is it still possible to start a company here and make a profit?

Any musings on the subject are welcome.
 

mike l

Silver
Sep 4, 2007
3,157
466
0
I have been approached by a long time resident and business owner to get any information I can on starting a telemarketing buiness with him in Sosua.

I have all the technical, labour, incidental etc costs and information.

From my research it seems that these types of companies on are a downhill slope .

One also starts to wonder about how one gets clients as well.

Is it still possible to start a company here and make a profit?

Any musings on the subject are welcome.

I wouldn't recommend opening one in Sosua unless you can get enough english speaking expats to work for you and that is just not going to happen.

I opened a small one in POP and hired the best english speaking Dominicans from a huge call center in Pop and the eight telemarketers could not make one sale in 30 days so I shut it down and only lost $10k

Finding clients that pay on time is another issue as I have heard horror stories from a few people who have small call centers with clients that won't pay.
 

MrMike

Silver
Mar 2, 2003
2,586
100
0
52
www.azconatechnologies.com
3 months ago I ended a 4 year run in telemarketing in the DR, turned my company over to some folks who thought they could handle the debt I had accumulated and so far, it does not seem to be going well for them.

I went through enough crap to write a book, and soon I think I will.

The weird thing about telemarketing is you are expected to extend credit to all your clients whether you know them or not.

When I started it seemed that about 20% of the people out there looking to hire telemarketers were scammers with no intent to pay you, ever, now it seems this figure is closer to 80%.

The people who have had success here are vertically integrated, this means they own the programs they are running, so there is no question of payment.

Remember that telemarketing is a payroll intensive operation, and the DR is the worst in the region from an employers standpoint as far as employee benefits and costs associated with payroll aside from the payroll itself.

Also over the last 5 years or so Telemarketing has become practically a crime in the USA. So much so that marketing companies are targeting much smaller markets such as Spain, Canada (I was even pitched a program once targeting some African country, I think it was Nigeria) just to avoid the liability of running afoul of the FTC by marketing in the USA.

You may think that you can get inbound programs to avoid issues with the FTC, but this is not as easy as it seems, you really have to pay your dues and even then its kind of like a garage band hoping to make it big, very few make it.

In short, don't do it. If you do, have an exit strategy. And don't do it in Sosua, for God's sake.

You need a place with a large population to draw your labor pool from, Santo Domingo should be your first choice, Santiago only if you have another reason to be here.
 

bns

New member
Nov 24, 2009
21
0
0
Thx, my initial impression was negative, but thought I would follow through for the exercise if nothing else. The technical part of it is touchy here as well.

Take care and thx again