Good customer service makes good business. There’s no denying that. How you choose to go about providing it makes all the difference. A skilled and competent customer service team can give wings to your company’s progress, by boosting customer satisfaction, increasing customer retention, and creating long-term customer loyalty.  But should you provide customer service in-house, or let an expert do the job for you?

The costs of establishing and maintain a customer service team is prohibitively expensive. It involves high operational and administrative costs. Whereas, customer service BPO (Business Processing Outsourcing) providers are experts that specialize in handling customer queries, complaints and requests. A good customer service BPO will be experienced in building customer relationships with tried and tested strategies.

BPO services provide benefits that go well beyond lowering costs. The objective of BPO services is to streamline efficiency, reduce costs and strengthen business output. It helps companies become more accurate, efficient and agile. This is why it makes sense to outsource to inbound call centre services or call centre services — it delivers assured benefits. Today, BPO services or contact centre services also include automation and other cutting edge technology to amplify the benefits.

BPOs (Business Process Outsourcers) add value to the business by helping to control costs, reduce risk and increase transparency.

Why is customer service important?

It has often been mentioned how good customer service improves the business bottom-line. Customers choose brands based on the quality of customer service. They are willing to pay more for excellent customer service. It creates happy and loyal customers. Loyal customers stay with the brand bringing repeat business.

They also spread positive brand reviews and advocate for the brand, attracting potential customers. This way, customer service improves the business bottom-line.

How BPOs help your business increase efficiency

1. By allowing you to focus on your core functions: BPO services imply third-party service providers managing business processes for an organization with the aim of improving with cost efficiency, performance or both. You can turn your attention to other aspects of business in the certain knowledge that BPOs will get work done the way you want it. They maintain zero backlogs and report to you. This relieves you of the responsibilities of those processes that the call centre outsourcing services provider has taken up, increasing your productivity and sharpening your focus on other critical areas of business.
2. By improving customer relationships: You get to extend better customer service and build healthy customer relationships when using SPO services. You get access to ample resources, the right equipment and technology to deliver excellent customer service. Customer service agents utilized by BPOs are trained and retrained to handle various kinds of interactions. Cutting edge technology enables the customer service team to extend swift, accurate and consistent assistance, 24/7. Earn brownie points for quick resolution of critical queries through your BPO provider.
3. By giving you a competitive edge: Gain a competitive edge over other players in the field by arming yourself with efficient support. When you get better at your core functions, what you are really good at, you are building a formidable barrier between your brand and that of competitors. Further, an efficiently run business with loyal customers who swear by its excellent customer service, is hard to beat. When an experienced BPO has your back, you can create strategies that will outsmart your competitors.
4. By saving on resources: There is a clear cost advantage when you utilize BPO services. Customer service BPOs like outsourced inbound call centre services save you the hassle of setting up an entire customer service department. You do not have to invest in office spaces, utilities, equipment, technology, hiring, training or other related operational and administrative requirements, not to mention maintenance, licenses, statutory compliance, etc. Outsourcing to a call centre services provider saves your time and resources, while ensuring that processes are being carried out to your specifications. BPOs take the risk and hassle away from you, while saving you money.
5. By providing access to the best skills: Outsourcers have access to the best skills and talent in the industry. They make it their business to employ only the best, because it is their reputation on the line. BPOs hire qualified, university-educated, skilled customer care agents who are trained to solve customer issues and deal with different kinds of people. They can scale the size of the team up or down depending on business requirements, without affecting the quality of the team. Peak times require more hands. Off-peak times require fewer people on board. It would not be easy to keep hiring and laying-off employees if you were to handle this in-house. Besides, you would be compromising on the quality of talent when you hire temporary help on your own.
6. By allowing access to the latest technology: Technology is crucial to reinvent and streamline your processes. More often than not latest technology comes with a heavy price tag. Through BPO services you get to eliminate the costly burden of maintaining up-to-date technology. You can also utilize the expertise of IT professionals, IT resources and world-class technology

It is important to enhance digital customer experience too

Today’s busy consumers are short on time and patience. They have more channels to connect with brands, than before — other than phone support, we now have email, messaging services, live chat, online platforms and social media. And they expect prompt responses, and on the channels that is most convenient for them.

Phone support continues to be the most favoured channel that allows callers to explain complex issues directly to a live agent. This is why companies that deal with high call volumes choose professional call centre outsourcing services providers or inbound call centre services providers. Several inbound call centres are contact centre services with multichannel capabilities.

No matter the channel, customers contact you to find solutions and expect a good customer experience. And they want to walk away feeling that you have understood them and that their issue is resolved. And this is important for the brand too. Customer reviews can make or break a brand. A negative experience can cause businesses to lose potential customers. This is why it is crucial to ensure that the digital customer experience is not lacking in any way.

Putting it all together, leveraging the right talent, resources and technology through outsourcing partners can bring about unprecedented growth within your company. BPOs have been around for decades and have revolutionized the way people do business. They have rebooted business models to drive progress and streamline the depth of business. Organizations are able to actually focus on delivering value to their customers through outsourcing services. BPOs will continue to assist organizations drive progress and realize favorable outcomes.