Obtain names and telephone numbers of potential customers from sources such as telephone directories, magazine reply cards, and lists purchased from other organizations.

“Obtain names and telephone numbers of potential customers from sources such as telephone directories, magazine reply cards, and lists purchased from other organizations.” is a supplemental task performed by Telemarketers. Among the occupation's 12 rated tasks, workers place it 3rd by importance (#10 most important). About 63% of workers say it is relevant to their job.

This is a single occupation-specific task statement from O*NET. The figures below describe how central the task is to the job and what independent studies measure about AI and this kind of work — not a prediction that the task will be automated.

Work activities this task rolls up to

O*NET groups concrete tasks into broader work activities shared across many occupations.

• Identify business or organizational opportunities. in Identifying Objects, Actions, and Events

AI exposure

The OpenAI / Eloundou “GPTs are GPTs” study rates this task E2. Exposure with tools — software built on top of a language model (not the model alone) could cut the time by at least half.

Exposure measures whether a model could meaningfully speed the task up — it is an estimate of overlap with model capabilities, not a measure of whether the work will be done by software. The study's intermediate score (β) for this task is 0.50. Automation potential label: T4.

Other tasks in this occupation

• Contact businesses or private individuals by telephone to solicit sales for goods or services, or to request donations for charitable causes. · importance 4.8
• Explain products or services and prices, and answer questions from customers. · importance 4.7
• Obtain customer information such as name, address, and payment method, and enter orders into computers. · importance 4.7
• Record names, addresses, purchases, and reactions of prospects contacted. · importance 4.6
• Maintain records of contacts, accounts, and orders. · importance 4.6
• Adjust sales scripts to better target the needs and interests of specific individuals. · importance 4.5
• Answer telephone calls from potential customers who have been solicited through advertisements. · importance 4.4
• Deliver prepared sales talks, reading from scripts that describe products or services, to persuade potential customers to purchase a product or service or to make a donation. · importance 4.4
• Telephone or write letters to respond to correspondence from customers or to follow up initial sales contacts. · importance 4.3
• Schedule appointments for sales representatives to meet with prospective customers or for customers to attend sales presentations. · importance 3.7
• Conduct client or market surveys to obtain information about potential customers. · importance 3.3

See all tasks on the Telemarketers page.

Sources for this page

Every figure above traces to a named public dataset and the exact release below — not hand-written opinion. See the full methodology for what each measure does and does not mean.

• O*NET 30.3 U.S. Department of Labor / National Center for O*NET Development
• “GPTs are GPTs” (Eloundou et al.) arXiv 2303.10130 OpenAI / academic

Data compiled June 2, 2026. Figures are estimates, not advice.

@misc{singulariki-task-4624,
  title  = {Obtain names and telephone numbers of potential customers from sources such as telephone directories, magazine reply cards, and lists purchased from other organizations.},
  author = {{Singulariki}},
  year   = {2026},
  note   = {O*NET 30.3; “GPTs are GPTs” (Eloundou et al.) arXiv 2303.10130. Accessed June 7, 2026},
  url    = {https://singulariki.com/tasks/task-4624}
}