Any small business should strive to create a positive customer experience, and today, outsourcing the customer service function is easier than ever. However, outsourcing is not always a good experience. As a small business leader, you probably experienced these 4 common pitfalls when you first outsourced.
Pitfall #1: Poor Involvement
When you outsource, make sure you have a Team Manager involved and make available for your pool of outsourced agents to turn to when they have questions.
He or she must manage the knowledge-based and FAQ. Ensure outsourced agents use the proper canned responses and assist customers the way you expect. Team Manager will be responsible for informing the agents about product updates and training. Define the daily duties, escalation procedure, productivity metrics, and feedback system you want the outsourced agent to perform.
Pitfall #2: Weak Onboarding
Outsourced agents must be properly onboard in the beginning since the first agent is the foundation of the team as it grows. Early team members can often train new agents and guide them through complex tasks. You may experience frustration for weeks or months into the relationship if you don't correctly train those early hires.
Make sure that you spend a few days determining workflows, gathering the most popular Q&As, and figuring out how you will share this information with them. Consider asking your outsourcing company if they have specialists who can help you build these documents, but keep in mind that this could incur an additional cost.
Pitfall #3: Poor Planning
Outsourcing companies offer the advantages of flexible scalability, allowing you to vary the level of support based on changing volumes. Having an idea of your average handle time and how many tickets come in per day and year will help you build the right team.
Analyse support trends from the last six to a year of your helpdesk. Plan how the outsourced company can support the sales and marketing departments' growth and activities forecast for the next six months. Without evaluating these two factors, you will either be overstaffed, resulting in high costs, or understaffed, resulting in backlog and quality issues.
Pitfall #4: Performance Metric
Monitoring the quality of work done by the outsourced agents is essential. Even the best of agents will inevitably make mistakes. You can identify training gaps and correct them as soon as possible using performance metrics.
Apart from identifying the best agents, you can also show appreciation to those performing well and reward them. Decide which metric will be most beneficial to you and discuss the best way forward with your outsourced company.
Final thoughts
Your outsourcing company should be your partner.
Your customer service can be scaled up by outsourcing. Select outsourcing companies who have experience supporting your field because these companies will know how to manage processes, design teams, as well as train them.
Put time into crafting out how you want to set up your outsourcing workflows, and you'll be on your way to success. The process becomes much easier once it's established as compared to hiring in-house. You no longer have to worry about hiring and retaining your helpdesk agents; instead, you can concentrate on nurturing your most valuable customers.
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