You’d be forgiven for thinking that “selling” is the last thing anyone should be doing right now. I mean, we are in the midst of a global pandemic, surely businesses are battening down the hatches and waiting for the storm to pass? Interestingly, no.
The initial focus on contingency planning and disaster recovery that we saw in the first in the first lockdown has subsided. Businesses have transitioned their staff to remote working and they’re into a rhythm. Dare we say it, it’s business as usual (well usual-ish).
So, we took the opportunity to speak to Gungho’s Operations Director, Chloe Bonnett, to take the temperature of her teams work supporting global RegTech & LegalTech vendors during COVID-19.
Are people actually answering the phone right now?
Yes! Working from home still means working. We haven’t seen a huge change in calling patterns and people are responsive to talking about ways they can streamline their compliance processes.
If anything, we’ve noticed that people have more time to talk because they’re not as caught up in meetings. That said, our clients are being sensitive to the impacts of COVID-19 and some have adapted the industries that they want us to target.
How are you getting through to the right people for your RegTech clients, now that most Compliance Prospects are working from home?
We have a huge, ever-evolving data set that we have developed in-house over the last 13 years. Our team of Data Researchers spend their time gathering the contact details we need, to ensure that our Discovery Agents get through to decision-makers.
We have the mobile numbers and direct email addresses for almost 200,000 compliance related Job Titles around the world. Lockdown, or no lockdown – we help our clients get in front of the right people by optimising this data and ensuring our calling & emailing campaigns are highly targeted.
Surely Senior Compliance Professionals don’t want to agree to appointments right now?
What people realise is that the world is still turning, and compliance laws and regulations still exist. Post COVID-19, global regulators will be examining business processes and with the huge increase in online transactions due to Coronavirus, organisations are open to risk.
The RegTech & LegalTech vendors we work with, are focused on all sorts of industries – from financial to retail and everything in between. Generally, what we see, is business around the world is heavily investing in technology right now to support the complexities of running Risk & Compliance programmes.
The ramifications of not investing can often be disastrous, so the appetite for looking at software & services is very much there amongst Compliance Professionals.
How have your teams adapted their working?
We are all set up and working from home. The transition was easy for us because we already worked in a digitally focused way with a central Salesforce.com system. All we need is a secure internet connection and we could work from anywhere.
The biggest difference is that our ACAMS accredited Discovery Agents are using their expertise to set up web meetings (rather than face to face). We’re finding it’s easier to get meeting slots because Compliance Professionals have a bit more availability in their calendars, without the distraction of office chatter or the ties of the daily commute.
What’s the future looking like?
We are hoping that now we are into the 2nd lockdown, we might be over the worst (fingers crossed) and we will see life (slowly) getting back to normal. We know that as an organisation, we can carry on working from home indefinitely so we’re not in a rush to make any changes.
We haven’t reduced our working hours, and everyone is working as they were before. We know what we do is valuable to our clients and we’re one of the best at what we do, so for us, the future is looking as bright as ever.
You heard it here first – appetite for compliance technology doesn’t stop! So, pick up the phone and talk to us about how we can make sure you maximise opportunity during COVID-19 and beyond. Call us on +44 (0) 203 326 8150
