Volie Rally: Dealership calls labeled as spam?

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Welcome back to another Volley rally. Today I'm going to turn the tables a bit and I'm going to host and. And we're going to talk a little bit of dealer identity. I get a lot of people on demos. Ask me what that is. And Jake, how did we land on dealer identity? What are we trying to solve? What happened?

We kept running into an issue where our Volley customers would say, and we kept hearing this from a lot of different clients. And all of our customer success reps kept running into people complaining about their calls coming up as spam. Hey, you know, I'm using Volley to make calls to my customers. And, you know, your platform is making me spam Spam call my customers. And what it comes down to is we looked into it and it was one of those things where it wasn't our fault, but it was our problem because customers were using our platform to make. To dial their customers, and they were coming up as spam. They thought it was a Volley issue, and it wasn't. But then it kind of became our problem to solve.

Yeah. So what do we do about it?

It's. It's pretty simple when you come down to it. We partnered. Volley has partnered with a company called Numerical to bring this service to automotive. Numerical is one of two companies who can truly do this. And, and, and so we partnered with them, we brought the service to Automotive, and Dealer Identity is. Is this new, new service and can solve this for you. So how we actually do it is pretty simple. But before we get to that, I kind of want to explain why calls are coming up as spam. So there's been a lot of. A lot of regulation from the FCC around illegal calls, robocall spam calls, and it's all coming from the place of trying to protect the consumer from unwanted communication. In 2021, the federal government received complaints from 5 million customers about spam calls. So as we sit here and think, okay, well, how could they be doing this and blocking my business? I mean, that is. That's where they're coming from. They're not looking at it from the perspective of the business owner. But what's unfortunately happened is legitimate businesses are having their calls flagged as spam. As your telephone companies, your providers are working to comply with these new regulations and the Trace Act. So what happened is they've defined two different labels, a spam label and a fraud label. So if spam is supposed to be for unwanted calls, fraud is more so for actual illegal calls. And they know then, on the other hand, that they're flagging legitimate calls, legitimate businesses with the spam label. It's just what it comes down to. There's a wide variety of reasons you could be flagged as spam. And it comes down to two main reasons, is consumer complaints. And then every carrier has algorithms that are analyzing every call that hits their network. And they're looking at tons of things based off of your calling habits, like how many times are you dialing customers in a day, what time are you calling them, call duration, tons of things that we don't even know about. Because if they told everyone all the secrets, then people would be able to game the system and that's not what they want. Right. So that's really why calls are being flagged as spam. Various reasons relating to your calling habits in addition to consumer complaints. Now what do we do about it? So, like I mentioned, we partnered with this company called Numerical to bring the service to Automotive. What we can now do, and the missing piece, if you want to go ahead and try to solve the spam problem on your own, is, is Verizon doesn't know who you are at and T doesn't know who you are, and there's no recourse for them to. There's no way for them to figure out who you are. There's tons of businesses out there, tons of people who want to be verified and have them know what is going on. And in Verizon, AT&T mobile, they just do not have the resources to properly verify you. You know, if you want to liken it to the new Twitter verification that you got to pay for to get your tweet seen, it's kind of the same thing. The carriers do not want to. In the name of complying and protecting the consumers. The carriers do not want to connect calls that they do not know is coming from a verified entity that does not have that stamp, if you will. So first and foremost, we vet you as a legal entity and what this means is you'd consider it a background check. But we verify with the state to make sure that you are who you say you are, why you're making calls, you know, all, all that stuff. And then once we have you verified with the, with the carriers and they know who you are, because we've done that work, we give them your list of phone numbers. All we need. There's no, you know, people always ask me, is there an integration required? Well, there's no integration because all I need is the, the list of phone numbers. And, and, and we tie it to that Legal entity. And you know, from there the carriers will, you know, register the numbers. Now there's, there's no such thing as a 100% way to prevent being labeled as spam. The carriers always withhold the right. But after we get you registered, you cannot be labeled as fraud, which again is the illegal call tag. And it's much worse than spam. The carriers don't even connect your calls, but you cannot be labeled as fraud and you're much less likely to come up as spam. So. But that is the first step, step to getting this problem solved. Does that make sense?

Sure. And it is not in some ways a programming thing to solve. It's a relationship thing that we've solved with the carriers, Correct?

Absolutely. Absolutely. That is the piece that people are missing. And it's unfortunate because it does affect legitimate businesses. Again, we only launched and figured out how to do this dealer identity program because we wanted to solve this for our volley business. And so it was, it was affecting us too. So the carriers don't know who you are. It does come down to the relationships.

And they don't know they're not tracking people with phone numbers normally. So a lot of the solutions out there that are checking numbers and swapping them out, unproductive at best.

It's, it's, it's a bad strategy that even if it works in the short run, it's not going to work long term. Because let's just say that you somehow switch to a number and it's a clean number. Like you said, the carriers don't know who owns each number aside from the entities that, that they have on file through, through a service like this with the carriers.

Correct?

Absolutely. Absolutely. That, that is, that is the piece. The carriers don't know who owns each number. So good chances that you get that, that people are missing. And it's unfortunate because it does affect legitimate businesses. Again, we only launched and figured out how to do this dealer identity program because we wanted a new phone number. You swap it out and that number is going to be spammed, tagged already because the carrier to solve this for our volley business. And so it was, it was affecting us. Don't know who had that before, but let's just say you get a new number. Well, because being labeled as spam is down to consumer complaints and dialing practices. If you swap out your phone number, continue to have the same dialing practices, that new number is going to come up as spam in just a few weeks again. So at worst, it doesn't work at all. And at and creates aggravations for your customers who are constantly seeing new numbers come through. And at best it works for just a short while and then you're right back where you started. And, and worse because you need to constantly be monitoring to make sure that you aren't coming up as spam. And the only way to do that too, so the carriers don't know who you are. It does come down to the relationships that is to be doing test calls every single day from all of your.

Numbers to and, and they don't know they're not tracking people with one of.

The, the phone to a phone with one of the big three carriers on it. And you need to test on all.

Three phone numbers normally. So a lot of the solutions out there that are checking numbers and swapping them out unproductive at best.

It's, it's great because just because Verizon has you labeled doesn't mean that AT and T does and vice versa.

There's a tangible cost and you paid money for a lead and customers aren't going to answer. I certainly never answer potential spam calls. There's also an unquantifiable reputation lead, reputation cost when people think you're doing something wrong even though you're not when you, when you call them and it comes up as potential spam. How do we put dollars on. On those two things?

Well, the unquantifiable as you put it is harder to put dollars on, but in terms of hard cost to your business, we certainly can. Some it's a bad strategy that even if it works in the short run, it's not going to work long term because let's just say that you somehow switch to a number put dollars on this. The average dealer that we speak to is spending about 100 and it's a clean number. Like you said, the carriers don't know who owns each number aside from the entities that, that they have on file through through a service like this. $100 per new callable lead. And if, and if you assume that 10% of those calls are labeled as spam or fraud, then if you make 10 calls, you just wasted $100. Right. And as it multiples from multiplies from there. Now the crazy thing is that it's not 10%. In 2021 in this data was calls from the carriers. 30% of all calls were labeled as spam or fraud. So the actual impact could be a lot higher on 10. The carriers don't know who owns each number. So good chances that you calls to call leads that you paid $100 for, you might have wasted $300. Get a new phone number, you swap it out and that number is going to be be spammed tagged already because the carriers don't know who had that before. But let's just say you get a new number. Well because being labeled as and you know you're wasting money on leads that you never had a chance to reach on top of the fact that you know any one of those could have turned bam is down to consumer complaints and dialing practices if you saw into a sale. And one of the things that some of the the trainers that we speak to in the industry teach is a 15% conversion rate per 100 callable leads. So if you assume that you have a hundred callable leads and you're going to sell 15% of them, well, Scott, isn't it appropriate to say that it's about $2,500 gross for a sale though Maybe that's a little conservative nowadays. But pop out your phone number, continue to have the same dialing practices, that new number is going to come.

Well, I think that's in limbo. Margins were really high. Now as inventory grows they're getting a little lower. But every one of our customers can.

Knows that they're up a spam in just a few weeks again. So at worst it doesn't work at all and creates aggravations for your customers who are constantly seeing new numbers come through. And at best it works for just.

Margins are and can put a dollar figure to it. The other, the other key point though is I heard from a lot of our customers before we put this in place, they were really concerned with their reputation because they thought the customers must have thought they were doing something wrong even though they weren't.

Absolutely. And really we've just been talking about sales up to this point. There's also an impact on your service business because people who you need to get in there for recalls, oil change, you know, all of the reasons you're calling these folks again, 30% of them might not be able to answer. So once you're a while and you're right back where you started and worse because you need to constantly be monitoring to make sure that you aren't coming up as spam. And the only way to do that we have them verified. It is important to note, like I said, there's nothing you could do to 100 is to be doing test calls every single day from all of your numbers to one of the the phone to a phone with one of the big three carriers on it and you need to test on all 300% prevent spam. So we have the, the dashboard then that the carriers give to us. We can monitor every single number that we have registered with them to ensure every single week that it is staying clean. And if something doesn't stay clean for whatever reason, we have the further agreements in place where we can remediate a spam tag that comes up. So this is a fully hands off for you but hands on for us monitoring service to ensure that your calling reputation stays clean. Because just because Verizon has you labeled doesn't mean that AT and T does and vice versa.

There's a tangible cost in clean forever. We have this. You paid money for a lead and customers are going to answer. I certainly never answer potential spam calls. There's also an unquantifiable reputation lead reputation today this top as a topic because it's bundled in with all Volley sales and we get a lot of questions on it. So we wanted to put this on the website just, just to fill in some of the gaps for some of the people who maybe didn't sit in on the, on the phone conversations. But not to turn this into a sales call. But we do sell this separately separate from Volley, correct?

Yeah. You know you can sign up as an independent dealer as we put it. We, we do all of our volley.

Number cost when people think you're doing something wrong even though you're not going.

Forward have dealer identity protection on them. And then those Volley customers can get the rest of their store numbers going if they want to. For, for, for, for a small when.

You, when you call them and it comes up as potential spam. How do we put dollars on, on those two things?

Well, the unquantifiable as you put it is harder to put dollars on but in terms of hard cost to your business we certainly can upcharge. But really it's, it's, it's available. We just need to get them going, get them verified and start monitoring the numbers.

Thanks. You guys can contact us with any other questions. This is something that is going to get much worse. We will have some follow ups on this in future episodes. Please reach out if you guys have questions. Jake, thanks today and hope everyone is having a good week. And and we'll talk to you soon on the next Volley rally. See you later.

And put dollars on this. The average dealer that we speak to is spending about $100 per new callable lead. And if, and if you assume that 10% of those calls are labeled as spam or fraud, then if you make 10 calls, you just wasted $100. Right. And as it multiples from multiplies from there. Now, the crazy thing is that it's not 10%. In 2021 in this data was calls from the carriers. 30% of all calls were labeled as spam or fraud. So the actual impact could be a lot higher on 10 calls to callable leads that you paid $100 for, you might have wasted $300. And you know, you're wasting money on leads that you never had a chance to reach, on top of the fact that, you know, any one of those could have turned into a sale. And one of the things that some of the trade.