Selecting the right outsource call center is one of the most important decisions you can make for your business. Your call center is an extension of your brand, so it is critically important that your vendor understands your company and provides the level of service your customers have come to expect.
In such a complex and rapidly-changing marketplace, it’s almost impossible for a company to stay current on the latest trends and provider performance. The only way to ensure you are fully evaluating the market before you select a call center partner is to enlist a partner that has their finger on the pulse of the BPO industry.
Here are the steps in the call center selection process:
- Evaluation of Needs
- Identification of Key Requirements
- Extensive Call Center Vendor Search
- Develop a List of Finalists
- Evaluation of Needs Call Center Site Visits and Due Diligence
- Call Center Site Visits and Due Diligence
- Final Selection
Finding the right outsource
call center partner is no easy task.
You’re probably facing several challenges, such as:
● Incomplete BPO Vendor List
Relying on search engines, colleague suggestions, and cold calls from BPO salesmen to populate your shortlist means you are restricting yourself to just a fraction of available BPO providers.
● Limited Time & Resources
You have limited time and resources, so you can’t possibly perform a deep analysis on more than a handful of providers, increasing the likelihood of missing out on a great potential partner.
● Slanted Information
You are largely relying on information provided by the call center sales representatives, so you often don’t know what to expect in terms of everyday performance for your campaigns.
That’s where we come in. Outsource Consultants simplifies your call center search and takes the guesswork out of the BPO selection process. We’ll do the heavy lifting, so all you need to do is select a partner from a heavily vetted list of top-performing vendors. And we do it at NO COST to you!
Here’s how it works:
1) Evaluation of Needs
Knowing exactly what you need is the key to finding the right outsource call center partner. Our meticulous approach to your needs evaluation allows us to consistently match companies with the perfect BPO provider.
Our decades of call center industry experience have helped us create a rigorous requirements gathering process. We’ll cover everything you’ve already considered – and often bring up additional needs you haven’t.
We start the process with in-depth discussions to gain a complete understanding of your business, your culture, and what you need in an outsource call center.
We’ll evaluate pain points in your existing outsourcing strategy, review the pros and cons of global outsourcing locations, and examine both geo- and vendor-redundancy strategies. We also review your compliance and call center technology needs.
To maximize your budget, we’ll discuss budgetary requirements, call center pricing methodologies and cost reduction strategies.
2) Identification of Key Requirements
We work with you to identify your key outsourcing requirements, including:
- Budget
- Number of agents
- Flexibility and ability to scale
- Service type performance
- Channel performance
- Languages
- Relevant industry experience
- Geographic location
- Certifications
- Security requirements
- And more!
3) Extensive Call Center Vendor Search
We have spent years researching and screening outsource call centers to develop a database of over 1000 US-based, nearshore, offshore, and at-home BPO locations – including hundreds that wouldn’t have otherwise been on your radar. These outsource call centers go through a rigorous vetting process, and our analysts are continually receiving reporting data from them to update our database with current pricing, experience, and KPI performance.
Using our proprietary matching algorithm, we use over 50 data points to develop a shortlist of BPOs that meet your exact requirements.
4) In-Depth Comparison of Vendor Finalists
Once we’ve narrowed down your BPO options we provide proposals from the vendors and present your key requirements and pricing to you in a side-by-side comparative matrix so you can easily evaluate all your vendor options in a clear, concise fashion.
Our side-by-side comparative analysis allows you to review these finalists at a glance. All of the call centers included in this list will match your key requirements, so you can easily focus on the “extras” or unique offerings provided by the vendors.
5) Call Center Site Visits and Due Diligence
We understand how time-consuming this phase of the process can be, so we take the burden off of you by:
- Coordinating initial conference calls with vendors to discuss cultural alignment
- Arranging site visits with key stakeholders
- Offering advice on performing thorough reference checks
- Equipping our clients with negotiation tactics and providing guidance on key agreement points
6) Final Selection
Our mission is to arm you with all the information you need to make the right decision. While we are certainly here to answer any questions you may have regarding the final selection, we intentionally take a step back during this phase.
We are confident that the options we have provided will suit your needs, and do not want you to feel that we are influencing your decision.
7) Ongoing Monitoring
Once you select an Outsource Consultants partner, our work is just beginning to drive performance. Once a month the BPO and Client Success team meets with the vendor to review KPI metrics, discuss wins, identify opportunities, and advocate for improvements when needed.
Our relationships with our clients are long-term and ongoing, so we maintain a position as your advocate for the length of your partnership with your call center. We will continue to monitor your call center’s performance to ensure they keep meeting and exceeding your expectations.
- Monitoring program performance monthly to include Key Performance Indicators (KPI), Customer Satisfaction (CSAT), and other measurements as deemed necessary.
- Provide feedback and guidance to the BPO provider as needed to assure the program quality and performance meets the expected standards.
- Source additional BPO Providers as requested or needed.
- Maintain communication with the BPO Partner.
- Facilitate monthly KPI review to determine BPO partner CSAT.
- Keep you up to date on call center industry best practices.
Remember, our services come at NO COST to you. There’s no obligation to
select one of our recommended partners, so there’s absolutely no risk to you.
Working with Outsource Consultants vs. Searching on Your Own
Utilizes an extensive database that compares services, industry experience, cost and more to find call centers that match key requirements.
Your search is limited to vendors you have found and researched on your own or recommended by colleagues, that may not fit all of your requirements.
We provide cost proposals and an objective, side by side comparison of heavily vetted call center partners.
Call center sales representatives will typically only present positive information while glossing over data that may make them seem less desirable.
Call centers of all sizes are evaluated to see if they will fit your needs. Our expertise with middle-market providers means finding true strategic partners at a lower cost than major BPOs.
Self-guided searches are often limited to only major BPO providers due to their considerably higher advertising budget and inherent name recognition.
With over 25 years of call center industry experience, we have an acute understanding of quality and trends within each country. We are often able to recommend additional locations that may better suit your needs.
You may be missing out on high-quality call centers that wouldn’t have otherwise been on your radar.
With Outsource Consultants, the goal is to find you the call center that perfectly matches your needs at a competitive price – we are vendor agnostic.
The vendor sales representative will understandably focus only on convincing you to choose their call center.
We handle the research and vetting process, allowing you to skip to the shortlist and make a decision from a list of call centers that are pre-qualified to meet your requirements.
You will spend considerable time and energy on an expensive RFP process that may not even produce quality candidates.
Unlock Your Success: How CX Leaders Win with Outsource Consultants
Many CX strategies fail because they treat contact center labor and technology as isolated elements, missing the chance to leverage the full potential of CX. We help you unlock a clear advantage by combining strategic CX labor outsourcing with top-performing global BPO providers coupled with the perfect-fit technology to achieve your tailored CX Dream Path™.
