Customer service outsourcing benefits at a glance!

The importance of good customer service?

Before listing the customer service outsourcing benefits, it may not be superfluous to reiterate the importance of good customer service. Customer service is an essential part of the customer experience. Whether it's after-sales, presales advice, complaint handling or technical support makes little to no difference in this. Let's be honest, are you a long-time customer with an organisation where customer service is not up to scratch? Where you have to wait a long time for a response? Where you cannot contact them via the channel you want at your convenience? Of course quality, price and convenience play a role. Particularly in "becoming a customer" then. Deciding whether or not to buy. However, if you open any review site and read through it, you will still notice that many positive but even more negative reviews are about service.

Customer service outsourcing benefits 5 advantages at a glance

Outsourcing customer service has advantages in many situations. It increases flexibility and capabilities and reduces costs. Here are the 5 main advantages of outsourcing customer service:

1. Specialisation and focus

A company like us does nothing but handle customer contacts and help organisations optimise customer service. The moment you, as a company, have set up, taken care of and improved customer service for all kinds of different companies, in all kinds of different ways, you get better and better at it. Every customer service is totally different, of course. That also makes it fun. In general, you can say that companies that have been handling customer contacts for all kinds of different clients for a long time should therefore be reasonably good at it. This is different from for a webshop, for example. A webshop is (if all goes well) very good at selling products over the internet. Customer service is not their core business. It is part of it, just like purchasing, online marketing, HR, facility etc. etc., but a web shop is not specialised in it. So outsourcing customer service has the advantage that you hire someone for whom that customer service and the professional handling of customer contacts is indeed the core business. 

2. Economies of scale

Economies of scale are the cost,- and quality advantages realised by operating on a larger scale. In customer service, most of the costs are in personnel and ICT/systems. Especially in start-up and growing organisations, we see that initial investments and running costs of a customer service organisation are fairly out of line with revenues. Using a company that can spread these costs across many other customers ensures that they are much lower. Customer service outsourcing advantages such as economies of scale are then in start-up costs of systems, recruiting staff, absorbing (sick) absence, etc. In addition, a company like ours can often create a blended solution for lower volumes whereby a very good and comprehensive customer service can be provided.

3. Price vs. features vs. quality

This ties in a bit with the economies of scale above. The moment you can concentrate on 1 thing you are good at, it generally goes better, faster and easier than when it is something you do "on top of it". Handling customer contacts effectively, efficiently and professionally is a profession. The rule is: the more you do it, the better you become at it. Providing your own customer service is, of course, great. Nevertheless, our customers see the added value of outsourcing mainly in gaining in-house expertise in the field of customer service support. Apart from getting the basics right (good accessibility at the times and channels the customer wants), working with a professional partner adds a stable basis for growth. If all goes well, an external partner already has most channels up and running and has a basic staff already in place. You get that experience, knowledge and expertise for free, so to speak.

 4. Flexibility

Een goede partner biedt een mate van flexibiliteit die intern vaak lastig te realiseren is. Of het nu gaat om blended of dedicated ondersteuning een goed georganiseerde externe partner (SpangenbergGroep bijvoorbeeld 😊) is vaak erg flexibel als het gaat om openingstijden, kanalen, systemen, bezetting en de inhoud van de werkzaamheden. Deels natuurlijk ook weer schaalvoordelen waarbij er makkelijker met capaciteit tussen projecten kan worden geschoven. Pieken of dalen in het aantal contactmomenten zijn makkelijker op te vangen. Klantenservice uitbesteden voordelen liggen dus ook in het toevoegen van een groetere mate van flexibiliteit.

5. Mopping up.

Veel van onze klanten dweilen met de kraan open. Dat wil zeggen dat ze keihard werken aan het afhandelen van heel veel klantcontacten (dweilen) zonder de oorzaak daarvan aan te pakken (open kraan). Met een basis die op orde is kan een goede externe partner (SpangenbergGroep bijvoorbeeld 😊) je helpen met het dichten van die kraan. Door met een bril van 20 jaar ervaring te kijken naar de inhoud van de klantcontacten, kunnen we helpen met het wegnemen van de oorzaken die vermijdbaar klantcontact opleveren. Vermijdbaar klantcontact is dan dat deel van het klantcontact dat het gevolg is van een bedrijfsproces dat niet is afgestemd op de klantbeleving. Een voorbeeld is een leverancier van ons waar wij geen factuur ontvangen van een bestelling. Deze moeten we dus altijd opvragen. Pas je die processen steeds aan op basis van input vanuit klantcontact specialisten en dan draai je langzaam die kraan dicht. Dan wordt dweilen ineens een stuk makkelijker, efficiënter en leuker. In het genoemde voorbeeld: Stuur gewoon gelijk de factuur mee en zorg dat deze klopt. Heel erg simpel lijkt me maar als je niet actief op zoek gaat naar dat soort simpele verbeteringen dan ga je ze ook niet vinden. 1 van de belangrijkste klantenservice uitbesteden voordelen is dat je dus constant verbeteringen door kunt voeren met externe expertise.

The core customer service outsourcing benefits?

The core benefits are that by hiring someone who is very good at what they do you get more than it costs you. Those revenues and direct but also indirect costs are difficult to quantify. Of course, the benefits also depend a lot on the situation. Hopefully you found our blog on Customer service outsourcing: The benefits interesting!

Outsourcing customer service has had a number of benefits for our clients:

1.  Multilingualism: Client cannot provide appropriate multilingual staffing itself
2. Flexibility: Client does not have the ability to plan flexibly itself and deploy extra capacity around busy times.
3. Expertise: Client does not have the knowledge to set up its own customer service department and run it effectively, efficiently and professionally.
4. Opening hours: Client closes at 17:00 but wants to be available until 21:00 and on weekends.
5. Growth: Client, due to rapid (international) growth, does not have the ability to keep up with that growth in customer contacts and wants to focus on that growth.

As mentioned, each specific situation has its own advantages. We are, of course, happy to take a look to see where in your situation, if any, the advantages would be. Hopefully, our blog on Customer service outsourcing: The benefits? given you an idea of the added value.