Are your customers getting the quality help and at the time the help is needed? Are your in-house employees juggling between attending to customers and handling their primary duties, resulting in extended waiting time when customers call in? Remember, your customers are the reason why your business is still in existence. Therefore, giving them less attention than they deserve can turn them over to your competitors, causing your business to dwindle. Outsource help desk to help you pay maximum and quality attention to your customers.
So, Is Outsourcing Help Desk the Right Thing to Do?
The situation described above is typical of many businesses and companies. There’s hardly special and quality time dedication to customers. The same employees in charge of payroll or other functions are the same persons charged with the responsibility of answering customers’ phone calls and attending to their needs. How are they going to deliver quality customer care and help in such situation?
Obviously, the most sensible solution is to outsource help desk for the following reasons;
1: Undivided Attention
Outsourced help desk service providers have no other duty but to answer customers’ phone calls and resolve their complaints. They are not charged with any other responsibility like the employees in a typical business or company setting. Therefore, they focus all their energy, attention and skill to resolving customer’s complaints and technical issues, leading to increased customer satisfaction. This would in turn result in a ripple effect in form of increased business patronage, customer loyalty and more referrals.
2: Round-the-Clock Help Desk Service
Most businesses and companies run the typical 8am-4pm working duration. As a result, customers may not get help to resolve technical and other issues afterwards. On the other hand, outsourced help desk providers work round-the-clock since they adopt the shift-duty modality, making it possible for customers to call in at any time, even at very odd hours to get the help they need.
So, if you are wondering why consumers tend to gravitate more to your competitor, it is because your competitor is leveraging helpdesk outsourcing solution to offer consumers the help they need for their technical issues, even during off-business hours. Customers are confident that someone would pick up their call at the other end even at 12 midnight and beyond.
3: Time-Zone Barrier is Eliminated
Also, since outsource help desk providers run shift or rotational duty, time-zone barrier for businesses that also serve international customers is eliminated. This is because there’s always someone at the other end stand-by and ready to attend to the customers’ technical needs regardless of what time of the day it is.
4: Less Waiting Time
I hate it when I get those annoying messages at the other end — “you have five customers ahead of you…you have to wait for 3 minutes…” Almost every customer hates to hear that as well. I can easily tell that companies that give customers such off-putting responses are not yet leveraging help desk outsourcing to reduce call waiting time and enhance customer satisfaction.
Here’s the bottom line, choosing to outsource help desk is the right decision for any company or business.
Daven Michaels is a New York Times Best Selling Author and CEO of premiere global outsourcing company, 123Employee. The company employs hundreds of young bright individuals on three continents. His International event, Beyond Marketing Live! inspires entrepreneurs build & grow their business with revolutionary new theories and systems allowing them to design the business and personal lifestyle of their dreams.
The choice of a new call center outsourcing service provider is akin to the dilemma we face when confronted with tens and hundreds of choices of different varieties of the same product at the store, without any way to taste them. The interview is a very important component of the process of selecting a choice of a company to provide your business with call center outsourcing service. This enables you to closely relate with the people who will be handling your business and keeping in touch with your customers and potential customers, thereby playing a major role in determining your company’s reputation and sales.
While interviewing companies, a lot of factors will determine your final choice.
Some of them are positive, and some are negative, but at least one major one is negative, but disguised as positive. It is the “yes” company, and you should be very wary of committing your business into the hands of such people. This type of company is the type that always has a positive and affirmative response to all of your inquiries. It is either these companies are amazing and extremely good in every aspect, or they are merely blowing smoke. The saying “if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is” is often the case.
The most important question is whether or not that company can properly handle the particular business process that you are considering them for.
If you consistently get an unreserved “yes” to all your inquiries, you should remember that while it may be true that they can handle all the processes they say they can, call center outsourcing service providers are usually better in some aspects than others. Some are better in voice, while others excel in non-voice. Some are excellent in customer service support where voice quality is pivotal.
In searching for a BPO to outsource to, you must ensure that you find the one that is willing to come clean to you about its limitations.
A truly good call center outsourcing service provider will only take on those projects and campaigns that they are sure they will excel in because of the awareness that a single failure could tarnish their image beyond repair. In order to ascertain this, you should be adamant on being provided with references, and investigate the reputation of the firm thoroughly.
If, after considering all the factors involved, you have made the decision to move certain parts of your business abroad, you should be aware that you can find excellent service in all the subsets of call center outsourcing service. However, you must ensure that you do not contract with a company that, after leaving an interview with them, you feel like you have just listened to a sales pitch with a lot of sound, but no substance!
Daven Michaels is a New York Times Best Selling Author and CEO of premiere global outsourcing company, 123Employee. The company employs hundreds of young bright individuals on three continents. His International event, Beyond Marketing Live! inspires entrepreneurs build & grow their business with revolutionary new theories and systems allowing them to design the business and personal lifestyle of their dreams.
The outsourcing of business processes has long been considered a very advantageous process for companies to maximize their profits by seriously decreasing the cost of providing a variety of services. Despite the decrease in cost, this method still ensures that the quality of service and productivity of such processes like telemarketing, IT staff and customer manpower are enhanced.
In short, outsourcing enables a company to effectively streamline its operations while it focuses on developing its core businesses.
Of recent, there has been a significant increase in the practice of outsourcing labour to countries like the Philippines due to the much lower costs of labour there. But apart from the lower costs of providing these services from abroad, there are actually quality-of-service gains to be made from employing offshore companies. In the Philippines, there is a rich and diverse pool of highly qualified manpower who have special raining and vast experience in service-oriented jobs. The Philippines is currently regarded as the best place to get outsourcing staff for several business processes.
This is due to a number of unique advantages:
English language proficiency – The Philippines comes in as number 3 of the largest English speaking countries in the world, and due to this, the offshore staff in the Philippines are able to communicate in the English language with the utmost effectiveness. At all levels of education in the country, students receive intensive instruction in the use of the language. In fact, the language dominates the instructional process, resulting generally in a wide vocabulary, splendid grammar and diction, as well as a very high level of comprehension in most employees. Due to the fact that Filipinos have been greatly influenced by American culture, most of them find it easy to adopt an American accent, which makes them easier to talk to.
Former U.S colony – The fact that the Philippines was once a colony of the United States of America means that the country has a close affiliation with other countries with English as their first language. This is part of why the Philippines has grown to be the number 1 offshore outsourcing destination.
Time zone differences – The difference in time zones is one of the major benefits of outsourcing your services to the Philippines. The time zone difference between Australia and Philippines is only two hours, and this ensures that the employees in Philippines will be working within your company’s normal business hours.
High level of education – Most of the Philippines outsourcing staff are college degree-holders and computer savvy. The Filipino culture emphasizes the importance of education, especially in information technology, in recent times. The skill levels of the staff are at world-class levels, and definitely impact the businesses that employ them positively.
The prestige factor – In the Philippines, call center and BPO jobs are held in much higher regard than in more developed countries. Because of this, Philippines outsourcing staff generally perform their jobs with great commitment.
Daven Michaels is a New York Times Best Selling Author and CEO of premiere global outsourcing company, 123Employee. The company employs hundreds of young bright individuals on three continents. His International event, Beyond Marketing Live! inspires entrepreneurs build & grow their business with revolutionary new theories and systems allowing them to design the business and personal lifestyle of their dreams.
Are you looking for a way to cut costs in your small business and at the same time, increase or maintain a high level of customer service?You probably would have read about outsourced receptionist services. You may want to give this service a try.
Due to fairly recent technological advancements, it is now possible to hire a virtual receptionist. With this service, all calls to your business can be sent through a professional outsourced receptionist service. This could be done through a “hosted” telephone number or by the use of call forwarding. This should save you the cost of hiring an in-house administrative assistant for the job, which would definitely cost more.
With this kind of service, small businesses can make it possible for their customers/clients to have better personal touch than they would if they used call center services or answering services with limited ability.
This can however be feasible when you choose the right receptionist services. A simple way of achieving this is by looking for a firm that offers better services at averagely better rates. A remote outsourced receptionist is going to be the first live representative that customers encounter. You need a receptionist that would make a great first impression.
You do not want a faceless receptionist. You sure did not sign up for a robot either. An ideal virtual receptionist should be warm and friendly. He/she should have some charisma and make a customer want to do business with you. It should feel like he is standing right in your front desk, talking to the most amiable person he’s ever met.
A great virtual receptionist service would do whatever it takes and would employ several methods to please the companies they represent and their customers.
If you want your outsourced receptionists to perform better, work with them. They need to stay informed and updated about your products and services. You should provide scripts for them, or go through their scripts to ensure they are in line with your company goals and would help callers in the fastest and most efficient ways possible. Do not just stop at that find out how your virtual receptionist service hires their employees. Find out if they feature friendly people that converse freely with customers. You need to know if they are well trained and if they are updated with the latest trends in the industry.
What service options/packages do they offer? Do they do background checks on their receptionists? Do they place emphasis on customer service? These are things to find out.
It takes more than a friendly voice to direct callers to the right person in the office. Your outsourced receptionist should be able to transfer calls to the right extension. A good service should also be able to take messages, if you should be away from your desk. The ability to take simple orders and even schedule appointments is a plus.
Affordability is a factor in choosing an outsourced receptionist, but be sure to do your homework, so you do not get roped into contracts with services that wouldn’t help your business.
Daven Michaels is a New York Times Best Selling Author and CEO of premiere global outsourcing company, 123Employee. The company employs hundreds of young bright individuals on three continents. His International event, Beyond Marketing Live! inspires entrepreneurs build & grow their business with revolutionary new theories and systems allowing them to design the business and personal lifestyle of their dreams.
A help desk provides support services for clients and employees. Help desks takes emails and inbound phone calls, addresses the concerns of contacts and tries to solve their problems. For example, if the employee’s computer is faulty or if the ordering system has issues, it is the job of the help desk to help the caller solve the problem. The primary focus of Help desks is on technical issues.
Several companies these days have chosen to rather outsource their help desk services. Outsourcing help desk has several advantages, some of which are:
Flexibility – You can now have 24-hour support!
Assuming your business runs on the traditional 9-to-5 time schedule, you will most likely not have employees that wouldwork in the help desk department during nonpeak hours. If your clients or other employees happen to call in for assistance after the peak hours, the calls will go to a voice mail, which can be frustrating for time-sensitive issues. This could make you lose some business!But if you hire help-desk workers who work from different time zones, you can be sure to provide 24-hour support from live representatives.
Cost Reduction – Pay Less
There are lots of companies that provide excellent outsourcing servicesat incredibly reduced rates. It would surprise you to know that what it could cost you to outsource your help-desk services to a team from one of these outsourcing companies in a year may be less than what it would cost you in a year, if you hired one in-house staff to do the same job. Outsourcing your help desk on contract basis saves you money on the employment benefits and other packages an in-house staff attracts. The office space, the telephony system and other equipment needed to provide a good help-desk service is another cost you would avoid if you outsourced your help-desk services.
Outsourcing makes Management Easier
Beside the stress it would save you interviewing and training your customer service representatives, a standard outsourcing company with good HR skills can ease management for you by both handling your Help Desk services and a great deal of your human resources. Help desk outsourcing companies have highly trained staff that is experienced in all aspects of help-desk management and customer relations. The third-party company can both recruit and hire employees, making the job easier for your human resources department. The company will also find a replacement, in case an employee leaves, saving you more in recruiting costs. The company also manages employees and effectively tracks the time worked, record missed days and addresses performance issues.
Increase your Profits
A company with an inadequate help desk creates customer dissatisfaction. Customers could call in at any time, and when they do, they want to speak to someone directly and immediately, and have their problems resolved as soon as possible. A well trained help desk that works 24 hourshelps you meet the client’s needs. Make your clients happy and they will stay with your company much longer and refer their friends and family to do more business with you, thereby increasing profits.
Daven Michaels is a New York Times Best Selling Author and CEO of premiere global outsourcing company, 123Employee. The company employs hundreds of young bright individuals on three continents. His International event, Beyond Marketing Live! inspires entrepreneurs build & grow their business with revolutionary new theories and systems allowing them to design the business and personal lifestyle of their dreams.
It is now much easier for businesses with limited budget to improve their business operations. All they need do is to outsource their non-core work requirements. Today we have lots of outsourcing websites that offer variety of services that can enhance the business processes of your company.
Some of the services offered by outsourcing companies include web design, application development, e-commerce development, helpdesk, SEO and database design among others.
Application development is constantly advancing. Outsourcing websites have state of the art platform options that could provide sophisticated solutions and entirely new approach in the design of applications. There is also a consistent improvement in the security features to fight the growing security threats many businesses face online. Outsourcing websites have development teams with the innovative skills required to collaborate, integrate and tackle compliance issues in order to meet the needs of their customers. Application development can be outsourced by companies to outsourcing websites and they can comfortably handle all the tasks, from the application design to development and testing, application integration, development, testing, maintenance and support.
In case you want to design a website or an e-commerce portal, outsourcing websites can be of service to you.
They have teams the required skills and technical knowledge and experience to provide businesses with professional web designs and e-commerce solutions. Web design can be approached from a different innovative perspective and outsourcing websites have been known to design websites that have better ease in navigation and are more functional and beautiful. E-commerce and online shopping today has become a trending phenomenon because of the expertise of outsourcing companies in the field. They have proven to be both efficient and effective in providing services that meet various business needs.
Outsourcing companies have enough experience in several technological solutions to offer excellent services on the e-commerce application niche.
There are outsourcing service providers with a track record of being reliable enough to provide efficient e-commerce application that is suitable for their kind of businesses and guarantees functionality. You can count on them for a customized solution.There are several other services offered by outsourcing websites, one of which are helpdesk outsourcing. It is always amazing to know that a small business can have a very efficient customer service department without having to hire a number of staff or set up an office space.
Outsourcing service companies already have highly trained staff who would handle this for their clients.
If you have a team of website and database developers, you know that they need continuous proper training to update themselves in order to provide you better services. These training take time and cost money. To save time and resources, companies have found it wiser to outsource some of these services to companies who have made it their business to constantly improve themselves for the sole aim of serving people who need their services.
Daven Michaels is a New York Times Best Selling Author and CEO of premiere global outsourcing company, 123Employee. The company employs hundreds of young bright individuals on three continents. His International event, Beyond Marketing Live! inspires entrepreneurs build & grow their business with revolutionary new theories and systems allowing them to design the business and personal lifestyle of their dreams.
A business that would stay healthy and grow bigger everyday must have marketing as one of the most crucial aspect of its growth and survival strategies. Every potential customer has to know the services that you are rendering and why you are the best person to fill their needs. This is the only reason why many big business have an entire division dedicated to marketing alone. Don’t get it twisted, good marketing does not come cheap, and it has to be done, no matter the cost.
As a business owner, it is your duty to find a way to have quality marketing, and save as much as possible doing so.
You could always handle your own marketing if you choose, but this might become something that could take a whole lot of your time and resources that should have been allocated to other crucial aspects of your business, even if you’re extraordinarily talented at it (a lot of people aren’t). It’s also important that you remember, that while you’re busy doing being the “jack-of-all-trade”, marketer in your business, your competition is probably launching a more well creative, developed and strategic marketing campaigns that could take you out of the market.You don’t want to sit around and let that happen. Do you?
Now here’s something new that you (and many business owners like you) may not have realized yet.
You can lunch a very appealing and strategic marketing campaign at a much lower rate than you know. How can you do this? Simple: By deciding right now to outsource your marketing campaign. Outsourcing is one of the great ways of receiving high quality products for just a fraction of the usual cost. With outsourced marketing, you now have the opportunity of hiring highly qualified and highly experienced marketing professionals who would work with the sole aim of helping you realize the vision of your company.
With outsourced marketing, you can focus your time and talents to more sensitive aspects of your business, knowing that a result-oriented marketing campaign is running.
Marketing is so important aspect of your business and a lot depends on it. Marketing goes a long way to give your business and products the required publicity, reputation and perception. Marketing is one of the ways in which businesses compete. You have got to market better than your competitors. You need an outsourced marketing service to help you achieve this.
Daven Michaels is a New York Times Best Selling Author and CEO of premiere global outsourcing company, 123Employee. The company employs hundreds of young bright individuals on three continents. His International event, Beyond Marketing Live! inspires entrepreneurs build & grow their business with revolutionary new theories and systems allowing them to design the business and personal lifestyle of their dreams.
One of the most outsourced services in the present time is customer service. You may not know, but most of the company representatives you speak with to resolve issues with a product you purchased or a service you leveraged do not usually attend to you from the company where the product or service originated. And, to be fair enough, you can attest to the fact that they often do the job perfectly that you will never know they are independent service outsourcing providers.
There are a couple of reasons why companies are increasingly leveraging outsourcing to resolve their customers’ technical and other issues. Topmost in the list of these reasons include the following;
Higher Concentration
Service outsourcing providers do not have any other task to attend to outside of a specified outsource service. As a result, there’s increased attention and focus in ensuring that the customer is well attended to, and that their complaint is satisfactorily resolved.
On the contrary, the regular employees are charged with other responsibilities that divide their attention and ultimately affect the quality of care given to customers. So, by relieving the in-house employees the task of attending to customers, they are able to focus on their core duties, leaving the experts (customer service outsourcing vendors) to take better care of the company’s customers.
Better Outcome
Increased concentration and specialization will ultimately lead to improved performance and outcome. This is exactly what happens when companies outsource their customer service to a third party that specializes on attending to customers and resolving their technical and general problems.
Increased Opportunity to Attract and Retain Customers
When existing customers are satisfied with the way a company handles their complaints, they would want to remain loyal patrons. In addition, they will talk to their friends, relatives and just anyone that comes their way about the company and its unparallel customer care. So, by hiring the experts to handle a company’s customers, the ultimate outcome will be increased customer loyalty and increased customer base as more customers join in.
Lower Operational Cost
This is perhaps the number one reason for service outsourcing, and just any other type of outsourcing. When you allow external providers to handle your customer care outside of your business environment, the outsourcing provider shoulders any operational and other costs that come with the contract. This helps you to cut back on operational and overhead costs, thereby increasing your profits and savings. In fact, there’s huge savings benefit from outsourcing as a whole.
However, in order to enjoy these benefits that come with service outsourcing, you must ensure that the outsourcing provider you are interviewing is the right person for the job. Endeavor to interview as many as possible and narrow down your choice to the best in terms of quality, track record, expertise and cost-savings.
Daven Michaels is a New York Times Best Selling Author and CEO of premiere global outsourcing company, 123Employee. The company employs hundreds of young bright individuals on three continents. His International event, Beyond Marketing Live! inspires entrepreneurs build & grow their business with revolutionary new theories and systems allowing them to design the business and personal lifestyle of their dreams.
Office or company administration is simply the operation of the day-to-day activities of an organization. Often, business owners, managers and employees tend to pay too much attention to administrative tasks that they end up neglecting the core aspects that are associated with the real existence of the company. This is why more companies are consistently leveraging outsourced administrative services, so that they can devote quality time to what matters most to the organization.
If you are wondering which administrative task you should outsource, here are the top 10 most outsourced administrative tasks;
1: Human Resource
The rigorous procedures that come with hiring and employee training are some of the activities that take the attention of business owners away from the core aspects of the business.
This is why human resource outsourcing has become a trendy move among companies of various types and sizes. Most companies are increasingly using human resource outsourced services to find and hire the most qualified persons for different tasks and positions within an organization. However, a company should ensure that it hires an outsourcing provider who is specialized in human resources. This way, only the best result can be guaranteed.
2: Email Handling
Communication is one of the most important procedures in any organization. And, with the advent of the internet and the speedy nature of communicating via this means, email has become perhaps the most used means of communication in companies and even among individuals. And, due to huge emails that a company sends and receives, it is not unlikely for those concerned to devote less attention to the core aspects of a business while handling emails. This is why email handling is one of the administrative tasks that organizations are increasingly handing over to outsourced administrative services.
3: Filing System Management and Maintenance
These days, companies maintain large databases for different purposes. Gratefully, the task can be handled by a virtual file system manager who would execute the tasks as though he or she is present in the office. Ensure that you hire the right outsourcing provider for the task. The person must be skillful in handling this task and should have current software programs for the task.
4: Customer Support
Arguably, customer support or call-center is the most outsourced tasks handled by outsourced administrative services. With the growing concerns, complaints and needs of customers, it is wise to adopt a procedure that would focus undivided attention on the organization’s most valued asset – the customers. This is why customer support outsourcing has become a consistent act among organizations.
5: Payroll
Payroll and other finance-related tasks are also being outsourced increasingly. This way, the company and those that work for it can devote quality time to the core aspects of the company’s existence.
There are more administrative tasks that you can leverage outsourced administrative services to execute. You can start with these top 5.
Daven Michaels is a New York Times Best Selling Author and CEO of premiere global outsourcing company, 123Employee. The company employs hundreds of young bright individuals on three continents. His International event, Beyond Marketing Live! inspires entrepreneurs build & grow their business with revolutionary new theories and systems allowing them to design the business and personal lifestyle of their dreams.
Outsourcing administrative services is one of the great ways to free up quality time for what matters most to a business or organization. And, back office administration is one of the office tasks that take the attention of management from the true essence of a business’ existence.
What is Back Office Administration?
It is simply the management of the business processes or departments that are not directly linked to the public. Typical examples of such processes include clerical services, data management, and technological support.
Companies usually incur huge expenses in managing administrative operations, and especially overhead costs. However, smart businesses are rather leveraging outsourcing administrative services increasingly to achieve huge cost savings in this aspect as well as other aspects of a business management.
Back Office Administration Outsourcing – How It Works
As mentioned earlier, back office admin outsourcing has gradually become a common practice in today’s business environment. Companies, both large and small are now using this business solution to handle virtually all back office responsibilities such as creating bill, managing payroll, handling human resources, and executing data entry tasks.
The various benefits that this process brings to a company or business include cost savings from paying far less to the outsourcing contractor compared to hiring employees full-time. The cost savings do not come just from the higher cost of hiring full-time employees, but mostly from the additional compulsory employee benefits such as health insurance, leave allowances, and other bonus payments. Offshore outsourcing will promote even higher cost saving when it comes to leveraging outsourcing administrative services.
However, in order to avoid concerns such as the level of quality outcome of back office outsourcing services in its entirety, a company or business should employ the following steps in hiring an outsourcing service provider;
Target an outsourcing provider that specializes in offering back office services. Such provider will do a better job than a general contractor. However, general contractors may have experts that are qualified to handle different aspects of outsourcing operations.
Draw up a proper contract. This is very important if you are concerned about the final outcome in terms of quality. When an outsourcing provider knows he or she is legally liable if anything goes wrong with the task, the person would employ the best possible expertise and technique in carrying out an assigned project.
Use the same standard of hiring procedures for full-time employees. Just as you would employ strict and professional procedure to hire an in-house employee, do the same with outsourcing administrative services. This will ensure you end up with the right provider for the task.
Finally, you may also seek quality referral as one of the best methods for hiring the best outsourcing administrative services. Find out who the outsourcing providers of the top companies in your industry are.
Daven Michaels is a New York Times Best Selling Author and CEO of premiere global outsourcing company, 123Employee. The company employs hundreds of young bright individuals on three continents. His International event, Beyond Marketing Live! inspires entrepreneurs build & grow their business with revolutionary new theories and systems allowing them to design the business and personal lifestyle of their dreams.
