Avoiding Spam Likely: Best Practices for Calls That Convert

Introduction

If you’re running outbound B2B sales right now, your biggest competitor often isn’t another vendor. It’s the two words showing up on your prospect’s phone: spam likely.

Carriers are under siege from robocalls and scams. In 2024 alone, U.S. consumers were hit with about 52.8 billion robocalls, according to YouMail’s Robocall Index, and 2025 is already trending higher. YouMail. To protect subscribers, carriers and analytics apps are aggressively labeling and blocking anything that might be unwanted.

That’s great for consumers. It’s brutal for your SDR team.

Hiya’s 2024 State of the Call report found that 46% of unidentified calls go unanswered, and 77% of consumers say they’re more likely to answer if they know who is calling. Hiya, 2024 State of the Call. Quality Voice & Data’s research suggests that over 95% of calls labeled ‘spam likely’ never get answered. Quality Voice & Data.

So if your numbers are getting tagged, your SDRs can grind all day, your dashboards can show 200 dials per rep, and your pipeline will still quietly fall apart.

In this guide, we’ll break down:

• Why spam labeling is a pipeline problem, not just an IT nuisance
• How caller ID analytics actually work behind the scenes
• The dialing behaviors that get B2B teams flagged
• Concrete best practices to avoid 'spam likely' and lift connect rates
• How to monitor and remediate number reputation
• What all of this means for how you structure and run your sales development team

If you care about meetings set and pipeline created, call reputation needs to sit right next to open rates, reply rates, and demo-show rates on your scorecard.

1. Why 'Spam Likely' Is a Sales Problem, Not Just IT’s Headache

The macro environment: carriers are drowning in spam

Carriers aren’t out to get sales reps-they’re trying to survive an arms race.

• YouMail reports U.S. consumers received roughly 52.8 billion robocalls in 2024, with monthly volumes regularly north of 4 billion. YouMail.
• Hiya’s H1 2024 Global Call Threat Report shows that nearly a third of all unknown calls across 40+ countries were flagged as spam or fraud, and spam flag rates were above 20% of unknown calls in most markets. Hiya Global Call Threat Report.

To handle that, carriers partner with analytics engines (Hiya, First Orion, TNS, etc.) and give them pretty free rein to over-filter. If there’s any doubt, the call gets tagged, throttled, or quietly blocked.

Buyer behavior: prospects don’t answer strangers

Even if your call does make it through, you’re battling human behavior.

• Pew Research found that 8 in 10 Americans generally don’t answer calls from unknown numbers. Pew Research Center.
• Hiya reports that 46% of unidentified calls go unanswered, and 92% of consumers believe unidentified calls are fraudulent. Hiya, 2024 State of the Call.
• When calls are actually labeled 'spam likely', Quality Voice & Data’s study shows over 95% never get picked up. Quality Voice & Data.

Put those together and the math is ugly. If one of your main outbound numbers gets flagged and you keep hammering it, your effective addressable market by phone can drop to near-zero-without a single rep realizing it’s a technical issue, not 'bad leads'.

The direct revenue impact

This isn’t abstract. It shows up in cash.

Kixie cites an industry report where 81% of businesses said they’d lost revenue due to calls incorrectly flagged as spam, and 15% reported lost revenue over $100,000. Kixie.

Strategy New Media’s analysis found that across industries contact rates have dropped by about 40% due to spam labeling and blocking. Strategy New Media. If you’re buying high-quality B2B data and running a solid sales team, that’s money straight into the shredder.

For an outbound B2B org, that adds up fast:

• Lower connect rates → fewer first meetings
• Fewer first meetings → thinner pipeline
• Thinner pipeline → stressed AEs and missed quarters
• Meanwhile, CAC goes up because you’re buying more data and spending more SDR time to hit the same meeting goals

If you only remember one thing from this article, let it be this: phone reputation is now a core sales metric. Treat it like you treat domain reputation in email.

2. How Caller ID Spam Labeling Actually Works

To fix a problem, you need at least a working mental model of the system.

When your SDR dials a prospect, two main layers decide what shows on that screen and whether the phone rings at all:

1. Carriers, AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, etc.
2. Analytics providers, Hiya (AT&T), First Orion (T-Mobile), TNS/others (Verizon and others)

These analytics engines run massive data sets on calling behavior and user feedback. They don’t care if you’re a SaaS unicorn or a basement scammer-they care if your behavior looks risky.

What they look at

While nobody publishes the exact formulas, providers and spam-remediation vendors consistently mention the same factors:

• Call volume per number, Too many calls per day or per minute from a single caller ID
• Frequency to the same recipient, Multiple attempts in a tight window to the same number
• Answer vs. ignore/decline rates, Lots of declined or unanswered calls suggest people don’t want your calls
• Call duration, Tons of sub-10-second calls look like robocalls, bad data, or reps hanging up instantly
• Historical reputation, What that number did before you owned it (you might inherit a burned number)
• User feedback, Block/report-spam events, FTC complaints, and app-level reports

Cross a certain risk threshold and your calls start showing as 'spam likely', 'scam risk', 'telemarketer', or never ring at all.

STIR/SHAKEN and attestation levels

To fight caller ID spoofing, the FCC pushed the STIR/SHAKEN framework, which lets carriers verify the number you’re presenting:

• A-level attestation, Carrier is confident you own and are authorized to use the number.
• B/C-level or no attestation, Looks more suspicious; more likely to be filtered or labeled.

Vendors like Quality Voice & Data have shown that upgrading to A-level attestation can boost answer rates several-fold, because your calls stop looking like spoofed spam. Quality Voice & Data. If your provider can’t give you A-level attestation on core outbound numbers, that’s a serious red flag for any scaled B2B calling motion.

Identity vs. anonymity

Hiya’s 2024 State of the Call makes it painfully clear: identity is everything.

• 46% of unidentified calls go unanswered.
• 77% of consumers are more likely to answer when they know who’s calling.
• 92% believe unidentified calls are fraudulent. Hiya.

So even if you’re not labeled spam, simply showing up as a random 10-digit number is killing almost half your opportunity before reps even say hello.

3. The Behaviors That Get B2B Teams Flagged

Most teams don’t get in trouble because they’re evil. They get in trouble because they look like robocallers at scale.

Let’s walk through the main landmines.

3.1 One or two numbers for everything

A classic move: the company has a 'main sales line' and maybe one backup. SDRs, AEs, CSMs, and even billing all call out from the same few numbers.

From an analytics engine’s point of view, that’s chaos:

• High overall volume from a small set of caller IDs
• Mixed sentiment-some people love the support calls, others block the relentless cold calls
• Inconsistent call patterns across time zones and segments

Once that main number gets flagged, every function taking outbound calls from it pays the price.

Better approach:

• Create dedicated number pools for SDR/BDR, AEs, customer success, and finance/collections.
• Don’t use the same number for cold outbound and for support callbacks.
• Size the pool so each SDR has access to multiple IDs, but don’t go crazy with dozens of numbers per rep-you still want control.

3.2 High call volume per number

Cold calls are a volume game, but there’s a line between 'active sales team' and 'robocall vibe'.

CloudTalk notes that in 2023 more than 28% of unknown calls were flagged as spam or fraud, and some outbound teams saw connect rates drop to as low as 5% as carriers clamped down. CloudTalk. High-volume traffic from a small set of caller IDs is exactly what filters are built to detect.

As a rough rule of thumb for cold outbound:

• Keep daily dials per number in the 30-50 range, depending on your connect rate and vertical.
• Spread volume across your number pool with auto-rotation.
• Watch for spikes-like an SDR suddenly doubling their dials from the same ID.

3.3 Over-dialing individual prospects

Even if your per-number volume is fine, hammering the same human is another big red flag.

Multiple calls per day for several days in a row looks like harassment, not professional persistence. It also generates block and 'report spam' events, which feed your negative score in real time.

For cold leads, a reasonable ceiling is:

• Max 2 calls/day
• 6-8 total call attempts over 2-3 weeks, blended with email/LinkedIn

If someone picks up and explicitly says 'not interested', take the win and DNC them. You’ll save your reps’ time and your reputation.

3.4 Tons of ultra-short calls

Carriers use call duration as a quality signal. If your logs are full of calls under 10 seconds, algo-brain assumes one of three things:

• Robocalls hanging up on machines
• Terrible data (wrong/out-of-service numbers)
• Reps bailing as soon as they hit voicemail

None of those are good.

Coaching your reps to stay on the line when someone answers, use strong openers, and leave quick, relevant voicemails not only helps convert, it tells analytics systems, 'this is a real conversation, not a spray-and-pray robocall.'

3.5 Calling outside reasonable hours or ignoring compliance

The FTC’s Telemarketing Sales Rule (TSR) and related FCC rules set clear expectations on calling hours, DNC handling, and abusive practices. Most pure B2B sales calls are exempt from the National Do Not Call Registry, but not from rules around deceptive or harassing behavior. FTC TSR Guidance.

Some states also extend protections to business numbers. DNC.com FAQ. Complaints trigger investigations, and investigations often push carriers to be even stricter with traffic from the offending numbers.

Bottom line: if you treat compliance as 'legal’s problem', you’re missing the point. It’s a sales risk because it feeds into your spam score.

4. Best Practices to Avoid 'Spam Likely' and Get Calls Answered

Here’s the playbook I’d hand to any VP of Sales or RevOps owner.

4.1 Fix your number hygiene and dialing strategy

a) Right-size your number pool

For a small team (3-5 SDRs):

• 1-2 dedicated outbound numbers per rep is usually plenty.
• Keep a few 'bench' numbers warmed in case you need to rotate.

For larger teams (10+ SDRs):

• Build a central pool for SDR outbound and auto-rotate across it.
• Ensure that no single number is carrying a disproportionate share of the volume.

b) Set hard limits in the dialer

Bake reputation protection into your tooling:

• Daily dials per number (e.g., max 40-50 cold calls/day per ID)
• Calls per prospect per day (max 2)
• Total calls per cadence (6-8 over 2-3 weeks)
• Time-of-day windows by prospect time zone (e.g., 9 a.m.–6 p.m. local)

Don’t rely on 'tribal knowledge'. Reps will always push the line under pressure.

c) Warm up new numbers

Treat new caller IDs like new email domains. Start with lower volume and ramp gradually while monitoring answer rates and call duration. If a fresh number suddenly underperforms, investigate before you scale it.

4.2 Register your business and numbers

If carriers don’t know who you are, your calls start life under suspicion.

Make it a project to:

1. Inventory every outbound number used by sales, marketing, CS, and finance.
2. Register your organization and numbers through:
• Free Caller Registry (feeds AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, etc.)
• Hiya’s Business Portal
• First Orion and TNS portals where relevant
3. Keep this up to date as you add or retire numbers.

This helps analytics engines associate your calls with a legitimate, consistent brand instead of random digits.

4.3 Tighten STIR/SHAKEN attestation

Sit down with your telephony provider and get crystal clear on:

• Which calls are getting A-level attestation
• Where attestation might be dropping (e.g., complicated call routing, third-party dialers)
• Whether they offer any visibility or reporting on attestation status

If they can’t explain it or can’t get you A-level on core outbound, strongly consider switching providers. In a world where Hiya is flagging tens of billions of spam calls a year, being unverified is a handicap you don’t need. Hiya Global Reports.

4.4 Clean up CNAM and directory listings

Your caller ID name (CNAM) needs to match what shows up in public directories:

• Website
• Google Business Profile
• LinkedIn
• Yelp, industry directories, BBB, etc.

If you’re 'Acme Cloud Inc.' in one place, 'AcmeCloud' in another, and 'ACME' on caller ID, you’re not exactly screaming 'trustworthy.'

Standardize a canonical business name and propagate it everywhere. Then:

• Work with your carrier to update CNAM for your key numbers.
• Call test devices on each major network (AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile) once a month and screenshot what shows up.

4.5 Use branded caller ID where it makes sense

Branded caller ID is the phone equivalent of a verified email sender-your company name and sometimes logo and call reason show up** on the recipient’s screen.

Hiya’s data shows that:

• 46% of unidentified calls go unanswered
• 77% of consumers are more likely to answer when they know who’s calling
• 92% believe unidentified calls are fraudulent Hiya, 2024 State of the Call.

For B2B teams calling senior leaders on their personal phones, branded caller ID can be the difference between 'ignore' and 'fine, I’ll at least hear them out.'

You don’t need it on every number, but rolling it out on your highest-volume or highest-value lines is often worth the investment.

4.6 Stop calling like a robocaller; call like a consultant

Carriers see behavior, not intent. You can’t fix that part. But you can fix behavior.

Some best practices:

• Sequence design: Blend calls with well-timed, relevant emails and LinkedIn touches. B2B cold-calling stats consistently show that buyers respond better to multi-channel, value-led outreach than to pure call blitzes. ZipDo / WifiTalents.
• First 10 seconds: Equip SDRs with openers that quickly confirm relevance (role, problem, or trigger event) so more calls turn into real conversations, not instant hang-ups.
• Voicemail discipline: Leave short, personalized voicemails that reference a specific problem, not generic 'I’d love to connect' fluff. This keeps durations up and gives prospects a reason to return the call.

Remember: quality behavior protects reputation. If your calls routinely last several minutes and lead to real conversations, carriers read that as 'legit business,' not spam.

5. Monitoring & Remediation: When You’re Already Labeled

Let’s say the damage is done. One of your main numbers is showing up as 'spam likely'. Now what?

5.1 Confirm the problem

Don’t rely on one anecdote from a rep’s cousin. Verify.

• Ask several customers/prospects on different carriers what they see.
• Check numbers in public databases and apps (Hiya, Truecaller, Nomorobo).
• Look for sharp drops in connect rates or unusual patterns by carrier in your dialer/CRM reports.

CloudTalk recommends using a mix of carrier databases, CRM logs, and customer feedback to triangulate whether you’ve hit a spam trap. CloudTalk.

5.2 Rotate, rest, or retire numbers

If a number is clearly burned:

• Stop using it for high-volume outbound immediately.
• Move that traffic to a clean, properly registered pool.
• Either rest the number (no outbound for a period) or retire it completely.

Keeping a bad number live is like continuing to send cold campaigns from a domain that’s on a major email blacklist. It only drags everything down.

5.3 Open remediation tickets

Work with:

• Your carrier/VoIP provider
• Analytics providers where you’re registered (Hiya, First Orion, TNS)

Provide:

• Evidence of your business identity
• High-level description of your calling use case
• Confirmation that you comply with DNC/TSR rules
• Any internal changes you’ve made (reduced volume, improved list quality, etc.)

Some remediation partners and call-reputation services offer ongoing monitoring plus dispute handling-a good option if you don’t want RevOps living in spam-portal dashboards all week.

5.4 Learn from those who fixed it

Real-world example: an installation company in Chicago found that many of their outbound calls were showing as 'unknown' or 'spam likely'. When they switched off aggressive auto-dialing, adopted dynamic local presence with legitimate local numbers, registered their caller IDs, and improved call timing and voicemails, calls labeled 'spam likely' dropped by about 60% in two months and callback rates nearly tripled (from 10% to ~30%). LL Media.

The lesson for B2B: small, boring changes-healthier pacing, better identity, slightly more thoughtful voicemails-compound into a big lift in connect rates over a quarter or two.

6. Compliance, Trust, and Why 'Don’t Be Sketchy' Still Matters

This isn’t the sexy part, but it’s non-negotiable.

6.1 Understand the B2B carve-outs (and limits)

The FTC’s Telemarketing Sales Rule:

• Generally exempts business-to-business solicitation calls from National DNC provisions (with some exceptions like nondurable office or cleaning supplies). FTC TSR Guidance.
• Still prohibits deceptive, abusive, or harassing practices.

DNC.com notes that most B2B marketing calls are exempt from federal DNC rules, but some states regulate B2B calling more strictly, and federal rules like the TCPA still apply in many scenarios. DNC.com FAQ.

So yes, B2B is treated differently from B2C-but not so differently that you can spam people without consequences. Complaints still create risk, and risk still feeds into spam scores.

6.2 Build simple guardrails into your process

At minimum, your outbound program should have:

• Time-of-day rules, No calls outside standard business hours in the prospect’s local time.
• Internal DNC list, If someone asks not to be called, mark it in CRM and sync it into your dialer; honor it forever.
• Clear disclosures, Reps should identify themselves and the company quickly; don’t play mystery-caller games.
• No spoofing, Don’t fake caller IDs, and be careful with hyper-aggressive local presence.

These aren’t just legal checkboxes-they’re reputation signals. If people feel misled, you’ll earn more blocks and spam reports.

How This Applies to Your Sales Team

Let’s bring this down from theory to Tuesday-afternoon reality.

For RevOps / Sales Leadership

1. Make phone reputation an explicit KPI.
• Track connect rate by number and carrier.
• Monitor average call duration, block rates (where visible), and spam labels via reputation tools.

1. Assign an owner.
• Designate someone in RevOps or SalesOps as the call reputation owner.
• Give them access to carrier/analytics portals and dialer admin rights.

1. Audit your stack.
• Map your entire calling path: dialer → carrier → analytics → device.
• Confirm STIR/SHAKEN attestation levels and registration status.

1. Optimize sequences for both conversion and reputation.
• Redesign cadences so no one channel is overused.
• Emphasize relevance and value early in scripts so more calls turn into real conversations.

For SDR / BDR Managers

1. Coach behavior, not just scripts.
• Track and coach toward healthy call durations.
• Flag reps who redial the same contacts too aggressively.

1. Give reps visibility into reputation.
• Let them know when numbers are temporarily benched or retired.
• Teach them how 'spam likely' happens so they understand why guardrails exist.

1. Tie metrics to reality.
• Don’t celebrate '200 dials' if connects are tanking. Celebrate conversations.
• Shift some emphasis from pure activity count to conversation rate and meeting quality.

For Marketing & Sales Development jointly

1. Own list quality together.
• Agree on ICP and persona criteria.
• Enrich and verify phone numbers (direct dials vs. switchboards vs. personal mobiles).

1. Coordinate multi-channel storylines.
• Use email and content to pre-warm accounts so cold calls feel less cold.
• Reference emails or content in calls ('hey, I sent over that case study yesterday…').

1. **Measure channel mix at the sequence level.
• Look at how combinations of email + phone + LinkedIn drive meetings, not just each channel in a vacuum.

When you line up identity, dialing behavior, and messaging, you don’t just avoid 'spam likely' labels-you make every call more worth answering.

Where SalesHive Fits In (If You’d Rather Not Build All This Yourself)

All of this is doable in-house. It’s just a lot.

You need someone managing number pools and registrations, someone else watching TSR/TCPA changes, someone instrumenting dashboards, and managers coaching reps not to behave like a robocall center under quota pressure.

That’s exactly the gap SalesHive fills.

SalesHive is a B2B lead generation agency founded in 2016 that’s booked 100,000+ meetings for 1,500+ clients across SaaS, manufacturing, fintech, and more. They run full-service outbound-cold calling, email outreach, list building, and SDR outsourcing-with both US-based and Philippines-based teams, plus proprietary AI tools like eMod for hyper-personalized email..

On the calling side, that means:

• Thoughtful number strategy (pools, rotation, warm-up)
• Proper STIR/SHAKEN implementation
• Ongoing reputation monitoring and remediation
• Compliance-aware cadences and scripts
• SDRs who are trained to open strong, keep calls conversational, and avoid the behaviors that trip spam filters

On the email side, eMod’s AI personalization supports calls with relevant, context-rich outreach that warms prospects up before the phone rings. That multi-channel approach reduces the temptation to over-dial and keeps your overall outreach looking-and feeling-like real human engagement, not noise.

Because SalesHive works on month-to-month terms with risk-free onboarding, you can spin up or reboot your outbound motion without committing to a long, expensive internal build just to figure out whether your phone program works.

Conclusion + Next Steps

'Just make more calls' used to be decent sales advice. In 2025, if you ignore spam labeling, it’s a surefire way to burn your numbers, demoralize your team, and quietly suffocate your pipeline.

The game has changed:

• Carriers are blocking and labeling at massive scale.
• Buyers are defaulting to 'ignore' for unknown numbers.
• A single bad caller ID reputation can wipe out months of hard work on messaging, lists, and hiring.

The good news: the fix is mostly operational discipline, not magic.

1. Audit your numbers and current reputation.
2. Register your business and tighten up STIR/SHAKEN and CNAM.
3. Redesign your cadences and dialing limits to look like a real business, not a robocall farm.
4. Monitor and remediate continuously.
5. If you don’t have the cycles to own all that, bring in a partner** like SalesHive that lives and dies by call deliverability and meeting volume.

You don’t have to accept 'spam likely' as the cost of doing business. With a bit of upfront work and ongoing attention, you can keep your calls landing, your SDRs talking to real prospects, and your pipeline growing the way it should.