SO, what is it like to be a telemarketer?

“Rude responses and even abusive words, recalled Naresh Kalimuthu, who worked as a telemarketer seven years ago.

He was offered the job while waiting for his SPM results because he was fluent in many languages.

Naresh’s job was to promote a gold card, affiliated to a well-known hotel. It offered many hotel-stays and F&B benefits.

“The worst was one guy who just shouted profanities when I politely introduced the card. He slammed down the phone. I was at a loss for words,” said Naresh.
They were trained for two days on how to promote the card. But Naresh realised that the power to persuade and convince people rested entirely on the telemarketer’s capability.

“Although there was no quota on how many sales we had to make per day, we were nevertheless required to make 50 calls per day,” he said.

As for where the database of phone numbers could have come from, Naresh said that was one “curiosity” that was left unanswered.

“Every morning, we’d get our list of phone numbers and we started making those calls,” he said.

Although he had no regrets working in the field as he considered it “a good learning experience”, the annoying factor was being on the phone throughout the eight hours of work.

Today, many years after graduating from university, Naresh is a process manager in an IT company where he manages the service desk of a call centre.