As we know that customer is the king. Customer satisfaction is of utmost importance for most businesses. This is the reason companies are coming out with a dedicated customer service wing. There is a separate department to handle relations with customers.
We are living in the 21st century. The needs and expectations of the customers have changed dramatically. Moreover, the needs and expectations vary as per demographics. This is the reason customer service has become a niche area that requires specialized skills.
Businesses have started outsourcing customer service to save their time as well as man-force. Moreover, these customer service providers are experts in their field, so they will be able to deal with customers in a better manner.
However, many businesses are still skeptical about outsourcing their customer service. They believe that lack of management control can hamper decision-making. In this article, we will look into all the benefits of outsourcing customer service.
1. Reduces Cost
Cost-cutting is an important aspect of businesses. Every dollar saved is a dollar earned. Reducing cost is one of the main motives behind customer service outsourcing. However, that is not the sole motive. You should not compromise with service quality to reduce costs. If your customers are not happy with your service, they can abandon you and move to your competitors. So, while selecting an outsourcing firm, you should try to know about its quality of services, clientele, as well as its track record.
2. Dealing with a spike in volume
Some businesses, like tour companies and hospitality, experience a seasonal spike in volume. They will have to deal with more customers during the holiday season. Companies like telecom and others experience a spike in volume during nighttime. So to deal with these spikes in volume, companies can outsource their customer service.
Even if you have a dedicated customer support team they might not be able to handle all customers simultaneously. This might result in higher wait times for customers. And you know it very well that customers hate waiting. BPO service providers have the expertise as well as manpower to deal with these problems. They will be able to handle every customer without much waiting time. Moreover, every customer is important; you cannot afford to miss even a small portion of the pie.
3. Multi-channel support
Multi-channel support means employing different forms of communication like emails, calls, chat, social media, etc. This is a very effective way to handle a large number of customers. However, this is very difficult to be implemented by a business. Outsourcing companies provide this feature. Using multi-channel they will be able to deal with a large base of customers simultaneously. Some customers may be introverted and shy away from calling, for them we have chats and SMS. Some customers are quite active in social media; their queries can be resolved on the same platform. This way you will always have some channel open for customer support.
4. 24 x 7 support
We live in the digitalized world. It is very much possible that you will have customers from around the globe. This makes 24 x 7 support very important. Many customers may want to communicate with you after regular business hours, so round-the-clock customer support becomes imperative. For example, if you have an e-commerce company that caters to the needs of global customers, you must have 24 x 7 customer support. Establishing round-the-clock customer support can be difficult for businesses so it is best to outsource your customer service.
5. Complexity
If you are into a complex technical business, it is better to have your dedicated customer support team. This is because a third party might not be able to understand what you provide and how you work. This confusion can create a division between what you provide and what your customers are told. Moreover, technical things might not be handled properly by a third party. However, things like lead generation and appointment setting can be outsourced. This combination of insourcing and outsourcing can prove to be a blessing for your business.
6. Size of organization
Outsourcing is for businesses of every size. However, if your organization is a small one, or it has a small customer base, it is better to have in-house customer support. That would be more economical. However, large businesses with a large customer base should definitely outsource their customer support. They will be benefited from the expertise of these outsourcing companies. However, if you are a growing startup, whose customer base is increasing exponentially, you should opt for outsourced customer service small business. This way you would be able to keep in touch with your ever-increasing customers.
7. Organization culture
Broadly there are four types of organizational culture: competence, control, cultivation, and collaboration. Outsourcing customer service would suit you or not depends on what type of organization you are in.
If your company follows a control culture where there is a definite hierarchy and well-defined structure of power, you may not be able to outsource customer service, because it requires you to be collaborative with the third party. However, if we are accommodative enough and understand the ins and outs of the business then we can outsource customer service in any type of organization; all it needs is a little creativity from our side.
To sum up
So we find that there are many benefits of outsourcing customer service. It can improve customer satisfaction, address a large base of the customer, experts are dealing with your precious customers and a lot more. The benefits are many.
However, no one should just jump into outsourcing their customer service. You should consider factors like business volume, training, maintenance, employee compensation, and equipment costs. You should do a risk-benefit analysis of having in-house customer support and outsourcing it. Every business is unique in its way and finds out what suits its organization. This way you will be able to make an informed decision.
