Girish Batra built NetAmbit into a highly successful insurance selling firm on the back of a no-frills telesales team. He’s now looking to expand his model
It’s 9.30 am on a Monday morning and the phones start ringing. “Good morning uncle! May I have a minute of your time?” says an overenthusiastic voice in Hindi to someone in Jhansi, Uttar Pradesh.
Seconds later, an elderly lady answers her phone in Jalandhar, Punjab, and is greeted in Punjabi, “Good morning, grandma! I’m calling from Bharti Axa. Does your son have insurance?”
And in Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh, an SUV-driving farmer gets a call in Telugu, “Good morning sir! I’m calling from ICICI Prudential, and you are one of 50 people short listed across India by us for a special offer.”
In town after town, the calls keep coming. By the time the month is up, 7-8 million Indians will have received such calls. Each of these calls can be traced back to one of 2,600 youngsters equipped with nothing more than a stack of printouts and a telephone. They work for NetAmbit.
The Kings of Non-Affinity
With over 4,000 employees, NetAmbit bills itself as the largest “non-affinity based direct sales model” for distributing financial products in India. “Affinity marketing” means marketing products to new consumers on the basis of their past buying patterns or interests — for instance offering international roaming plans to members of airline frequent flyer programmes.
In NetAmbit’s case the opposite, “non-affinity”, simply means selling to people whose needs and preferences you have no idea of. Meaning, NetAmbit is the undisputed leader in India at cold-calling anyone and selling them financial products. It is 5-6 times bigger than its nearest competitor in the space, says Tarun Chugh, executive vice-president and head of sales and distribution for ICICI Prudential Life, India’s largest private insurer.
“They can sell anyone, anything. If I could give them my leads they could do a better job than me!” says Yashish Dahiya, founder and CEO of India’s largest Internet-based insurance aggregator, Policybazaar.com.