ConnectAndSell Reviews

Pros

For most part calling a large number of contacts takes very little effort with this. It's especially useful for follow ups and reminders, where the speed really helps keep outreach moving.

Cons

There are times when it feels a bit slow and the handoff from the autodialer to the sales rep can sometimes be confusing.

Pros

It does let my team get through a high volume of calls in a short amount of time.

Cons

After doing a thorough ROI review on my team's performance, the actual results were very limited. Whenever I asked for recommendations or best practices, the response was usually to blame us for not getting better outcomes. This platform might fit a smile and dial setup but it's not effective if you want reps to have thoughtful, meaningful conversations with prospects. In the end, it really wasn't worth what we paid.

Pros

Uploading a contact list is easy and their team handles dialing every number on your behalf. Once they reach the right person, they patch you directly into the call which makes outbound calling much more efficient.

Cons

Sometimes the platform can be a bit slow and every now and then I get connected to the wrong person by mistake.

Pros

Scaling outbound has become much more manageable with this. Before, increasing prospecting meant bringing on more people but now we can rely on the team behind this product instead. Our five person SDR team is seeing about a 10x jump in volume while spending far more time actually speaking with interested, qualified prospects.

Cons

It does require a major investment so if your process isn't fully organized, it's pretty easy to be inefficient and feel like money is being wasted.

Pros

There honestly isn't a lot to praise here. If I really stretch, I can say the software is mostly free of bugs, probably because it has very few features and a very minimal design. One thing it does handle well is integrating with Salesforce and that part is fairly simple.

Cons

Even making a basic call feels unnecessarily complicated. You have to dial a ConnectAndSell number first, then enter an agent code followed by a hashtag, then a passcode with another hashtag and only after that do you get connected to your prospect. Once the conversation ends if you hang up from your phone, you have to go through that entire frustrating process all over again. On top of that the call me button was removed for some reason which only makes things more frustrating. The interface is also very unattractive and comes across as poorly designed.

Pros

Used the right way, this software can be a huge boost. It lets you reach a very large number of prospects quickly which can lead to more sales or at least better quality conversations. It can make 500+ dials per hour and setting 10 or more demos in an hour is absolutely possible.

Cons

The catch is that you really need a large amount of solid, clean data. Without that, it's easy to waste the whole day going in circles and speaking with unqualified leads that are unlikely to turn into anything.

Pros

Honestly, the standout part for me has been my CSM. She's been incredibly helpful in showing us best practices and guiding us on where and how to engage clients through the platform. The built in reporting is also very solid so it's simple to keep tabs on your process or see where there isn't one. As an SDR, being able to work through a massive list in just a few hours helps me take better care of customers while staying on top of my pipeline and campaigns.

Cons

One thing that makes me uneasy is not really knowing who their agents are or how they're speaking to our clients. There have been a few occasions where we added our own cell numbers to a list and sat together taking incoming calls from C&S agents. The way those calls were handled was inconsistent. Some agents actually talked with us and asked a couple of questions, while others did what they were supposed to do, heard the right name when we answered as the target and then transferred the call. That inconsistency has definitely made us cautious even though the platform itself is powerful enough that we still want to use it.

Pros

When you've got a big list and fairly accurate phone numbers, including corporate lines, this is exactly the kind of tool that delivers. This combines real people with a smart coordination system to work through IVRs and gatekeepers, then connects you directly with live prospects who are ready to talk. You're basically sitting in one huge conference call setup and when you hear the ping, that's your cue to jump in immediately. If you handle it properly and it was something I got comfortable with pretty quickly, there's no noticeable lag or awkward delay. The biggest benefit is that an enormous number of calls get placed and your time goes into actual conversations with real people instead of getting stuck in phone menus or leaving voicemail after voicemail.

Cons

Because so much of the process happens out of sight, it's tough to really judge how well the callers are doing at getting past gatekeepers and reaching the right contacts. Since they're paid per call, the skeptical side of me wonders whether a hang up feels less like a missed opportunity to them than it does to me. It also doesn't offer any multi channel email sequencing. You either get a conversation or you don't and that's the whole model. There's no option to choose from different voicemail approaches or trigger follow up emails based on someone's title or other details. The platform is built entirely around speed.

Pros

ConnectAndSell is an extremely user friendly service. The goal was for all of our sales reps, including me, to upload our call lists and let the platform keep dialing those numbers until it reached the decision maker. Once someone picked up, you'd hear a beep and could immediately start your pitch. It turned a slow calling process into something much faster.

Cons

We bought this service not just to raise the number of calls each person could make in an hour but also to get past front desk gatekeeping and reach decision makers directly. In our situation though, the dropped call rate was much higher than when we handled calls manually and that ended up costing us a lot of opportunities compared with the slower, more traditional approach.

Pros

It's been a fantastic way to broaden our outreach beyond what we could manage on our own. It does an excellent job of improving the rate of reaching the right contacts.

Cons

The downside is that, depending on how reporting is set up, it can bring in contacts you don't actually want to speak with. Building strong reports around the people you do want to reach is the biggest factor in being successful with this tool, aside from having solid contact data.

Pros

One of the best parts of CAS is being able to stay on the platform and handle other work while it dials contacts for me. That setup helps me talk to more people in less time and ultimately get better results.

Cons

At times, I'm not completely sure how they're getting prospects on the phone and occasionally people are upset about the way the call reached them.