Conduct client or market surveys to obtain information about potential customers.

“Conduct client or market surveys to obtain information about potential customers.” is a supplemental task performed by Telemarketers. Among the occupation's 12 rated tasks, workers place it 1st by importance (#12 most important). About 36% 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.

• Monitor external affairs, trends, or events. in Monitoring Processes, Materials, or Surroundings

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: T3.

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
• Obtain names and telephone numbers of potential customers from sources such as telephone directories, magazine reply cards, and lists purchased from other organizations. · importance 4.1
• Schedule appointments for sales representatives to meet with prospective customers or for customers to attend sales presentations. · importance 3.7

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-4629,
  title  = {Conduct client or market surveys to obtain information about potential customers.},
  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-4629}
}