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Delhi
Calling…Technology Management
by Jit Agarwal & Edited by Patrick Murphy
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Customer support
and contact can be one of the most expensive aspects of a product's ongoing
costs. This can be especially true for the software and technology sectors
where revenues are often an upfront payment, but product support and customer
contact costs can be a perpetual burden. NetMinds has worked with a number of
clients to help reduce the costs and organizational impacts of supporting and
contacting customers over extended time periods. Contacting and supporting
customers as they learn and adopt your software package, can be a delicate
balancing act, between providing enough support to get the job done and keeping
costs to a level that is reasonable. This article will explore three aspects to
consider when utilizing outsourced call centers to help lower your operating
costs and reduce organizational burden.
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Finding the Right Number |
The first thing
to think about when considering outsourcing call center services is your
internal need for these services. If the core organizational need can be
identified then the implementation is more likely to be successful. The best
way to examine this need is to consider your organization's product line and
how many products result in customer traffic, either in-bound or out-bound. If
there is a substantial amount of call traffic in either direction, then it may
behoove your organization to consider outsourcing this service. Product
support, technical support and customer service can be an attractive set of
services to outsource. Another area to examine is out-bound telesales or
telemarketing. Many organizations forget that the same economies of scale that
can provide for a successful product support function can also provide the same
benefits for out-bound telesales calls. If your organization is making a large
number of prospecting or sales calls then perhaps this is your core need for a
call center service. Additionally, high-touch in-bound calls like billing
inquiries and sales fulfillment can also be managed effectively with an outside
vendor. It is the case that these two might require some additional setup and
systems integration work. However, this need can be typically addressed by
extending the corporate IT infrastructure, such that the vendor's employees,
appear as all other employees on the corporate WAN. Finally, when looking for
the core need, don't forget to consider accounts receivable and collections.
These types of needs can be just the low hanging fruit that makes sense to
outsource for an organization that doesn't view these operations as a core
competency (and sometimes even if it does).
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Picking Up the Phone
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The next step to
a successful call centerimplementation is to examine the success metrics that
will be used to evaluate the ROI on these services. If the services the
outsourced call center is going to be providing are performed internally then
aggregating costs for that department and understanding their budget impact
should be an accounting exercise. If these services are already outsourced then
this task becomes even easier. It may be the case that the organization is not
currently engaged in utilizing the types of services proposed for the call
center. In this case estimating costs and understanding the value of engaging
an outsourced call center requires insight from experts, either internal or
external, as your situation and solution may be different from any other. In
any event understanding the costs allows you to evaluate the metrics for
success for any outsourced call center functionality. Generally speaking these
success metrics should seek to cover the main factors relevant to your
organization. Typically for a call center these are costs, quality of service,
capacity, and transitions. There are other more basic issues like
infrastructure, network, reliability, training, etc. that are relevant and
important. But, all of the players of a reasonable caliber will have all of
this basic blocking and tackling taken care of, and the larger issues mentioned
above is what will separate the wheat from the chafe. Quality of service and
transitions (escalations, hand-offs, project management, etc.) should be chief
among your concerns. With cost and capacity (if volume is a critical issue)
being second tier, but important concerns. If you clearly articulate a set of
goals for each of these four factors then you will be prepared to judge the
value and benefits of utsourcing your call center needs.
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Making The Call |
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The final area
to consider when outsourcing call center services is the pilot. As with any
endeavor, before you jump in with both feet, you should test the waters. This
applies to replacing existing services, or bringing on board a whole new set of
services. A pilot is a good way to test the waters. Any organization looking to
work with you should view the pilot as both a logical preliminary step as well
as a welcome opportunity to deliver a win-win solution. You should be leery of
anyone looking to setup a large contract or commitment without this level of
trial and testing, unless you have a substantial pre-existing relationship with
the organization. Even if that is the case, a pilot can often help flesh out
your needs exactly and the service providers ability to deliver. A typical
pilot should take into account 2-5% of the volume of business anticipated,
assuming reasonable business volumes, to ensure that it adequately reflects the
needs required and the ability to perform. If the volume is substantially
large, then a relevant representative sample should be used instead. Finally, a
pilot is a good place to refine and clarify the success metrics for the effort
on an ongoing basis. It may not be clear, until after the pilot, that a success
metric of measuring post-call customer feedback is important. Statistics and
other reporting variables may also be difficult to identify and quantify until
a data set is in hand, which is what the pilot will provide. Once you've
conducted a successful pilot then you're ready to embark on a full blown
roll-out of call center services.
Net net, a
successfully implemented call center service will lower your ongoing costs,
reduce operational complexity, and can help make your product or service a
success.
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