As a business, you want to reach out to your customers and get (high) returns on investment. When you offer better customer service, you get happier customers and, thus, you get more returns.

To send the right feelers to your existing and potential customers, you need the right medium. And what better choice than outsourced call centres or contact centres? Inbound call centre services in Australia providers allow you to deliver excellent customer service swiftly, effectively and effortlessly, while improving the business bottomline. Call centre outsourcing services providers give businesses the flexibility and boost they require to grow. You can focus on your core business competencies while these specialized service providers extend professional customer support.

These technology-enabled call centre services save businesses a huge chunk of money. They manage, monitor and track communications from customers. These metrics are then analysed and used to better their experience with the brand.

What is the alternative?

To understand that, let us first have a look at what call centres really are.

Call centre services, or contact centres, offer inbound and outbound services. Inbound call centre services in Australia includes assisting existing customers with request, complaints or queries. That is, customers call in for help, and experienced service agents ensure that they are attended to. Outbound call centre services teams call existing or potential customers to update existing data, for sales, proactive customer support, surveys or verification services.

Customer support can be provided in-house. But that would mean handling every related requirement on your own. You will need the manpower, facilities, technology and equipment to handle multiple channels — phone, fax, email, SMS, live chat, social media, online forums — in-house, 24/7. The maintenance, ongoing management, training, retraining and other processes will add to the cost.

Read on to know how outsourced call centre services are a more sensible, highly beneficial and customer-centric solution.

Cost-effective support

Staffing and managing a call centre in-house is an expensive proposition. It can be challenging, and even, taxing to manage it efficiently, requiring a great deal of involvement. Setting up an in-house call centre needs a sizeable investment in infrastructure facilities, equipment, technology, IT, licenses, etc. Not to mention the hiring, training, retraining, management and other administrative and operational expenses. By using outsourced call centre services, businesses stand to save a significant amount in administrative and operational costs, and can further plug in any revenue leakage.

Find out how much it would cost you to run an in-house customer service department and do an apples-to-apples comparison with an outsourced service provider’s quote for the same. Consider costs related to payrolls and benefits for the customer service agents and supervisors, telecom and Internet connectivity, IT systems and software, other technology, dedicated call centre equipment, space and utilities, hiring, training and retraining — these are just a few of the aspects involved. You will see that getting outsourced customer support makes perfect sense. This is true especially for small to medium companies.

Increased efficiency

Outsourced contact centre services utilize latest technology to provide the best customer experience. Interactive Voice Response (IVR) systems reroute customer calls to the appropriate agents. Robotic Process Automation (RPA) implemented at the outsourced contact centre allows shorter response times, faster turnaround times, improved accuracy and consistency in processes. This way, businesses can meet customer expectations better. Or even exceed them.

Automation reduces errors and the time taken to get repetitive work done, saving businesses a lot of time and money. Your employees do not have to do boring, mundane work. Instead you can channel their talent and skills towards value-added work that require their decision making skills. This increases employee engagement and raises productivity.

You can focus on core functions such as product research and development, marketing campaigns and growth strategies, while professional call centre companies take care of customer support.

Outsourcing gives you access to dedicated call centre services teams that have qualified, skilled and trained agents who know what it takes to provide good customer service. They represent your brand. They are specialists who know how to deal with every kind of caller. These agents are trained rigorously, sticking to quality standards, in order to make effective connections with your customers. This contributes to healthy customer relationships.

Callers might abandon calls if they do not get immediate assistance. You do not want to lose your customers to your competitor. Outsourced call centre services are managed and closely monitored to ensure that they achieve reduced call wait times, faster resolution of issues, lowered call volume and reduced errors.

Uninterrupted Support

Customers demand assistance on a round-the-clock basis. This is especially true now when businesses reach out to customers across the globe. Time zone differences mean that you can expect queries and complaints to pour in all day. However, it may not possible to hire agents to run the customer service team 24 hours a day. Round-the-clock availability may not a realistic option for in-house customer support operations. Whereas, call centre outsourcing services companies provide 24/7 support that costs less. Even when your business is closed, your customer support is taken care of. Complaints and requests do not pile up; and your responsiveness increases.

Amplify customer experience

Legacy call centre services run on old systems that are cumbersome and inefficient. You need to keep adapting with the times. Staying current will help you provide good customer service that costs less. Updating technology and systems used to provide customer service can turn out to be costly. This may not be practical when you have internally managed customer service operations. Specialised service providers stay updated on a constant basis. You benefit from their technology edge without the risk or expense.

Inbound call centre services are meant to provide swift and accurate resolutions to customer’s requests, queries and complaints. Performance assessments and improvement plans form part of the service level agreements. Outsourcers make call centre quality a high priority. This way you get the best quality-monitored service.

Outsourced inbound call centres ensure that your customers are assisted swiftly and efficiently with a view to create a positive customer experience. To create happy customers. Happy customers are loyal to the brand. This is how your business can increase customer retention and create repeat business. Happy customers are brand ambassadors too, recommending your brand to their friends and family — potential new customers. This way you can increase your revenue.

Scalability

Call centres allow a great deal of scalability. Increased call volumes, adding new products to your line or moving into a new market or location, can increase the need for customer support. When you outsource, you get the scalability advantage. Team size can be expanded to handle peak time during holidays or when call volume is likely to increase, and scale back down when call volume is low. And so, through outsourcing, businesses don’t have to make any additional investments in hiring, training, infrastructure or management just to handle peak times. That is, they can achieve seasonal scalability without any financial impact.

Multichannel support

Today, it is not wise to ignore the digital media, as customers take to online channels to communicate and look for information. Unhappy customers can become vocal online quickly. And happy customers can spread the word just as quickly.

To be visible and accessible, businesses need to be where their customers are. While phone support continues to enjoy its popularity, customers also take to the social media to ask questions or place complaints.

Multichannel support is known to increase customer satisfaction and customer retention levels. But to ensure this, you need dedicated service agents who screen online channels to provide prompt responses. Outsourcers provide cost-effective online support. Customer service agents man multiple online channels, allowing them to multitask. Online support through multiple channels is known to reduce interactions costs and increase service efficiency. Businesses garner substantial savings by leveraging the power of online customer support. You can also build trust and brand loyalty by utilizing the personalized approach a multichannel contact centre.

In-house call centres can be limited in various ways, making them rigid and costly. It is not easy for internally managed customer support operations to keep up with the latest technology and training systems or a continual supply of skilled manpower or maintain the right call centre metrics to meet business goals.

On the other hand, customer support can be outsourced to experienced professionals who provide excellent customer service in a cost-effective manner. Outsourcers take the risk and hassle out of your hands, while you focus on core business functions.

In short, with outsourced call centre services, it costs less to get more work done, and to get better work done. Call centre services are catalysts in improving the profitability of businesses. Hand over your customer service function to an experienced call centre outsourcing services provider and reap assured benefits.