Category Archives: Call Center

Outsourcing Contracts: What do you need to consider when creating one.

May 18, 2016 by 123outsource
Categories: Call Center | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

There are thousands of companies all around the world doing outsourcing. In India, they are a little more nitpicky about defining exact requirements to the point that you can’t have a conversation with them about anything without them asking, “So, what are the requirements?” I like to chat and feel people out before I talk about exact requirements. But, if you are in the business of drafting contracts, you need to have a very point by point system of identifying requirements.

If you are outsourcing call center services or software, it might be difficult to define quality in contractual terms. Contracts typically act on the behalf of the call centers providing the service. As a buyer, you need to have a contract that protects you too. Here are some contractual issues that I will elaborate upon below.

COMPENSATION

Payment for outsourcing services involving call centers is normally on an hourly rate with a fixed number hours per month or a fixed rate for a project. Contracts typically specify when payment is to be made and with some basic terms. However, there are some issues with these basic contracts.

Hourly Wages — Contracts with hourly wages ensure that the company will get paid. However, the buyer has no way to know if the number of hours the company claimed to have done really got done. Additionally, there is no way to know which worker completed the hours, or if the work completed was efficient or quality work. With software work, the code might be sloppy or have bugs which is another huge issue. If the buyer doesn’t make sure the contract specifies quality control in some way, shape or form, the seller is solely getting the benefit of the contract.

Fixed Rates — Fixed rate contracts are risky for both parties. If you are an outsourcing company and bug fixing is part of the contract, five months after you finish, you might still be getting requests to fix bugs. Additionally, what if your client wants add-ons to the programming. If you are the buyer, fixed rate compensation protects you from people who pad hours. However, you still do not know if a quality job will be done. As a buyer of programming services, if the programmer doesn’t deliver functional, clean code on time, you are in big trouble. Unfortunately most firms do not do good work, nor is their work on time, nor do they care even slightly. Knowing what you are paying doesn’t guarantee the work will be done on time or protect you from “spaghetti code” which is messy code.

Specifying Workers — it might be difficult to get an outsourcing house to do this, but specifying which worker will complete the job or the parts of the job at least guarantees that someone you like or know will be doing the work regardless of quality or efficiency of work.

Deadlines — If you have a clause in your contract that specifies deadlines for when parts of the project get done, you as a buyer are safer. However, if you are paying a deposit, you could still lose your deposit. I have never seen a programming company deliver on time, so your deposit money is generally money down the drain which will put you in the economic position of a hostage. Think very carefully before giving a deposit to a stranger unless they have very good reviews from reputable sources. If you divide your project into bite sized parts and pay upon completion, you will find out very quickly if the company you hired misses the first deadline — and it will be their problem.

Specifying Particular Workers — A contract could specify which employee is going to do the job. If you like Ramesh and feel he does good work, you could specify that Ramesh will complete the project singlehandedly. Ramesh would have to have an investment in the contract because in India people quit their jobs every four months on schedule usually for frivolous reasons. The boss of the outsourcing company will not be comfortable with this because he knows his turnover is unpredictable, plus other clients might need Ramesh since Ramesh is a star employee. You might have to pay extra, but it might be worth the protection. Playing musical chairs with employees is something Indians are used to, but is suicide in American business. You need someone good who won’t quit, so if you can negotiate that into the contract, you will be a lot better off as a buyer.

Emergencies — Some companies have clauses in their contracts about what happens if there is a natural disaster, war or other uncontrollable circumstance. Holding yourself not liable in such a situation is reasonable.

Penalty Contracts — If you can get the outsourcing company to agree to pay a penalty for finishing late, you have more leverage to get them to finish your project on time which in outsourcing is almost unheard of at least for the smaller players. No outsourcing company will agree to such a term without being paid a lot more. But, it might be worth it to you otherwise you will get hung up to dry for sure.

Quality of Code Contracts — If you are the buyer of programming services, you need to be very sensitive to the quality of code, especially if you are dealing with Indian companies. You need to first of all have an expert who you can hire in America to assess the cleanliness of the code. Ask your expert how you can write specifications in the contract that will protect you from the infamous spaghetti code which is a nightmare that will haunt you as long as you own the code which could be as long as a decade. If you put restrictions on the quantity of lines of code used, that might be a primitive way to safeguard yourself. Additionally, if you give a test project to see how efficiently they write code, that will give you an indication how good the individual is who did the test project who might not be the same guy who does the real project. Tricky— hmmm.

Another way to ensure concise code is to stipulate that if your expert can write any part of the code in 25% or less lines and make it work correctly, that the vendor is penalized. This is easy to enforce if you can get your expert off his rear end to actually do the work at $150 per hour instead of the $18 per hour you’re paying for an average guy in India.

CALL CENTER CONTRACTS

Call Center Result Oriented Contracts — Most call centers do not want results based contracts otherwise their income very unreliable. It makes more sense to pay a base rate and then extra if sales quotas are met. It also makes sense to quickly fire a company who doesn’t get you enough sales. I recommend comparing about twenty companies and see which one gets you more sales in the long run. Keep in mind that if Company #1 has Filipe you might get good results until Filipe quits and Scott takes over. So, make sure each company puts at least three employees on your job so you can get a sense of the average output that the company gives rather than how things are when you get their star employee.

Call Center Monthly Contracts — It is risky for a new client to just trust your company with a one year contract, especially if they have never visited your office. If the client is in Manchester, NH and you are in Manila, Philippines, it might be hard for them to come and visit although I recommend that they do. Many call centers try to get people to invest in long contracts when they are just starting out. It makes sense to give new clients the right to have smaller contracts with easy terms and not too many minimums so you can at least get them on board. Once they like your service, then you can be a little more demanding. Additionally, explain your countries employment laws, minimum wages, minimum hours per week or month so that your American client doesn’t act surprised when he/she finds out at the last minute.

IF YOU ARE THE VENDOR

If you are an outsourcing company, it makes sense to have contracts that get you paid by the hour. That way you are not reliable for quality, timeliness or anything else. You might get fired, but you will still get paid if the quality of your work is horrible. Make sure you get paid a lot more if the client has unique specifications. However, I would not necessarily say no to unusual requests. The reason is that other companies will say no, so this is an easy way to get a client who will be loyal to you assuming you don’t screw up too badly. In general, to attract new clients, I would be flexible in your contracts so you can attract a higher percentage of your leads to try you out.

IF YOU ARE THE BUYER

As a buyer, you need a contract that protects you from:

(a) Poor Workmanship (sloppy coding, bugs, or general bad service)
(b) Goal Achievement — in the call center work this means retaining clients & making sales.
(c) Missed Deadlines
(d) Disappearing Staff Members
(e) Inefficient Hourly Based Work (or hour padding which amounts ot the same problem)

A contract that doesn’t incorporate quality standards is a contract that makes sure you pay without guaranteeing value. If you can get to know the company and work with them for a few months before signing a bigger contract, that would make your situation somewhat safer. No contract will protect you 100% and few vendors will sign a contract that protects anyone except themselves. So, at least try to have contractual control over being able to choose your workforce, have control over deadlines, have an incentive plan which motivates the vendor, and have some stipulations for quality. If you are signing a big contract, you should consult an Attorney and really think deeply about what the issues are. If you are not experienced, you will overlook some very serious issues — so be careful.

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How to start a Call Center or BPO Company – advice analyzed

May 16, 2016 by 123outsource
Categories: BPO, Call Center | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

Real world commentary on starting a call center BPO business plan

How to blogs are easy to write, and popular too. But, how practical is the generic advice really? Does general advice cover “what if” scenarios? In real life, does business ever go as planned? Does your text book always, sometimes or never cover what to do in situations that really do happen? The answer is that generic advice will only give you a general framework of ideas of what to do to start out in a BPO business. The rest should ideally be covered in detailed tutorials, but rarely is. Part of the problem is that there is no market for nitpicky business advice — few want to read it unless it is juicy and drama-packed. So, here is my commentary about generic how to start a business advice.

Create a business plan
It is a well known fact that individuals who succeed are much more likely to have written plans than those who do not succeed. The fact that you wrote your plan down indicates that your though is more decisive, and also better thought out. A BPO business without a business plan is like a road trip without a map or idea of where you want to go. You need some type of plan, and the best plan incorporates all of the variations of what you might do. In real life, you have no idea of what direction your business will go if you are successful at all.

Real World Advice
The most important real world advice I can give you is to be receptive to what people want from you, and don’t be fixed on what you think you want to do. If you want to do customer support in call centers, but your clients want you to do Android technical support for 70% of their accounts, it’s time to learn Android. If you only have one request for Android, then it might not be worth pursuing. Basically, you have to be ready, willing, and responsive to shift directions when you feel it makes sense to do so. Being too rigid can kill a small call center startup.

Investors
If you wish to attract investors to your BPO startup, a professional and formal business plan will be necessary. You should have it done in conjunction with a professional who specializes in formal business plans who can guide you through the process. Those who fail to plan, plan to fail, so don’t skimp on planning. Without the head of the company having a solid background in BPO work and management, investors will not give you the time of day — nor should they. A company without a foundation will likely not get off the ground. But, there are plenty of opportunities to pay your dues at call centers in the Philippines and India and get experience.

Executive Summary
Specify how your company fills a need in the market place and why you feel you will be successful. If you have already been successful in the market previously, that is a type of indication that you will do well again.

Company Description
Write a quick description as to what your services will include. The critical aspect here is to specify what your company will do better in terms of hiring, training, hours of operation, and specialized, customized or tailored services. Companies that do well tend to focus on particular tasks and be experts at what they focus on in addition to having a few supplementary and related tasks they do as well.

Market Analysis
You need to document and research how large your market is, how large the market is projected to grow, how big your niche market is, etc. You need to include market pricing, government regulations, operating costs, and more.

Real World Advice
Market analysis is all find and dandy. But, what is more important is knowing how you can penetrate the market yourself, and what people will pay you. They might pay you a lot less than others are charging until you build a reputation and steady clientele. It is hard to pay employees, pay rent, and make a profit when you are being paid 20% less for the same work the other guys get full price for. Temporary as that situation is, take it into consideration.

Services
In addition to specifying the wide variety of services you wish to offer, you need to specify this clearly on your website. Many websites go on and on about high and lofty company missions without ever mentioning what the company actually does! Fluff vs. facts. If you offer too many services which you know nothing about, you might look good on paper until someone actually uses you. If you focus on doing particular services well, and don’t do what you can’t do well, your reputation will precede you.

Marketing & Sales
You need to know how you plan on selling services. How many salespeople will you have? Will you have a website or online advertising (recommended.) Who are you going to contact for jobs? You should make a very long list. You need to know the analytics and metrics of service sales as well such as how many calls you’ll have to make to get a single contract. In a small startup you will be the sales, management, training, marketing, and finance department. If you don’t know how to do all of these things you’ll have to rely on a partner who might easily betray you, quit, or slack off leaving you high and dry.

Funding Needs
If you are just starting out, it is hard to know how much money you’ll need. You need staff, an office, phone lines, computers, utilities, consultants, and more. It is better to overestimate how much you’ll need as running out of money will shut you down permanently.

Financial Projections
The advice I read online is that you should have a projection of financial data for the first five years. In real life, you have no idea of what will be going on in five years, even if you are very established. Markets change fast, you will change, and you probably won’t even be in business in five years (a cheerful thought.) Whatever your financial projections may be are just guesses. I tend to suspect that those who do financial projections for Coca-Cola Corporation are the best in the business and yield a lot of accuracy for their statements. You unfortunately do not have Coca-Cola’s highly paid experts. So, just do your best and don’t invest any faith in your numbers as they are no more permanent than clouds in the sky.

Appendix
Include any supporting documents, important information, credit history, reference letters, licenses, permits, contracts, etc.

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Filipino Call Centers

May 1, 2016 by 123outsource
Categories: Call Center, Keyword | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Find Filipino Call Centers on 123outsource.net. We keep our search results filtered regularly to list only the best of Call Centers at the top of our list. We also have many call center specialties such as Appointment Setting, Chat Support, Email Support, Technical Support, Lead Generation, and more.

Most of the call centers listed with us are in Manila, Makati City, Cebu, or in various parts of India. So, if you are looking for a Manila Call Center, Makati City Call Center, Cebu Call Center or India Call Center, you have come to a place with a lot of hiqh quality and up to date selection.

Call center contracts can really vary from company to company. Some will allow you a one or two month contract while others demand a year. There are a few that will allow you to book services one day at a time as well if you prepay them. We recommend interviewing the actual call center agent before hiring any of the call centers you might find. If possible, try them out on a small call center project before committing to a long term call center contract.

Skills you need to have to open a Call Center

April 16, 2016 by admin
Categories: Call Center | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

Please also see:
How to get more clients for your call center (compilation)
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2015/08/20/how-to-get-more-clients-for-your-bpo-or-call-center-compilation/

Everyone in India these days dreams of opening call centers. Yet, the call center industry has almost completely left India except for technical support, aggressive marketing and a few smaller companies that don’t amount to much. Companies have gone to the Philippines where people there are more gentle, understanding, caring, sympathetic — which are traits that people in America want from a call center that less than 1% of Indians have! On the other hand, Filipinos lack aggression and are not as strong on technical skills which is where India has a huge edge (a sharp edge by the way.) So, India can still compete, at least in some ways. But, the Indians who want to open call centers don’t understand the skill sets involved, and they can only succeed if they have these skills.

(1.) Be the Best Agent Yourself
If you were never a call center agent, or weren’t very good, you won’t understand what is involved in being a great call center agent. If you run a new call center, that means you’ll have to hire people by the dozen to help you out. If you are the best call center agent yourself, you’ll know what to look for in applicants, and you’ll know how to pick the best ones and train them the best way possible so they can become just like you! Even if you didn’t have the softer qualities that the girls have, if you were good by guy standards, you might be able to hire and train others.

(2.) Spot Talent
If you hire call center agents, you will notice that most of the people applying for outsourcing jobs talk to quietly, too loudly, are too aggressive, too passive, too dumb, too unhelpful, or to folksy which means they’ll talk all day to the clients and not get work done. You need to know right away who the best people to hire are. Sometimes that is hard because in your stack of applicants there are no best people. So, you need to have a way to rank your applicants so you can hire the best dozen if you need to hire a dozen. And if people are not perfect, you need to be able to spot the ones you can train to be perfect which leads me to my next point.

(3.) Train Talent
After you have figured out who to hire, and have a long list of backups (because people quit and get fired on a whim in this business,) you need to train people. Training, monitoring, and evaluation never ends in a good call center. But, the newer hires will need more of your attention. You need to make sure you have time in your schedule to do all the hiring, firing, training, and monitoring.

(4.) Hire Monitors
You can’t do everything yourself, so you need top notch people with a lot of experience in the industry who can monitor, train and to management tasks for you. If you find someone who is second rate, your call center won’t do well. If you find someone great who quits, that is also not good. You might consider having a profit sharing program so this person is more of a partner than a wage earner — that way they will invest more in their work.

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You might also like:
Marketing your BPO outsourcing firm from A to Z
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2016/05/22/marketing-your-bpo-outsourcing-firm-from-a-to-z/

BPO projects, how to get them and what they entail
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2011/10/20/bpo-projects-how-to-get-them-and-what-they-entail/

How to start an outsourcing company
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2015/12/29/how-to-start-an-outsourcing-company-2016/

Should you work for a startup to learn how they operate?
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2015/09/05/should-you-work-for-a-startup-to-learn-how-they-operate/

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(5.) Be Ready
Most Indians jump to step five before they have even been a rep or manager themselves. You need at least five years experience as a rep before becoming a manager, and you need five years experience as a manager before you should consider starting your own gig. Otherwise, you will for sure go out of business! I you don’t have the patience to be in this industry for ten combined years, then you do not have the patience to run your own call center which I assure you is a lot more involving than working at one. Most workers burn out after a few months, quit jobs, go to another call center or call centers, repeat the process for about two years and then leave the call center BPO industry. The fact that you endured ten years puts you in a very special category.

(6.) Find Clients
As a call center CEO, you need to be a master of the art of finding clients. If you did it for another outfit for years before starting your own, that is a good background. A call center cannot survive without clients. On the other hand, your clients won’t stay for long if you have lousy callers or managers. You should be an expert at all of the marketing channels associated with accumulating clients from email, cold calling, networking, websites, and even freelancing. If you start your business marketing yourself as a freelancer, you can accumulate your clients one by one which is a lot easier than trying to fill twenty seats, and then getting fired after two months which is more like a roller coaster than a BPO.

(7.) Manage Growth
Many of the most famous call centers have had huge problems managing growth. Because in real life, your call center demand may go from 100 seats down to 30 seats and then up to 200 seats. Call center business is a roller coaster, and you have to be a master of adapting to fluctuations in demand. My suggestion is to try to develop a clientele of very steady clients over time. If you have empty seats, charge a low fee for a three month contract for a new client. If you temporarily do not have enough free seats charge more for new clients. If you are consistently booked, it is time for a satellite office, or to move to a bigger office. Most call centers do not gracefully handle fluctuations in the market and get blown around in the wind of unsteady clients. They try to compensate by having one year contracts with complete strangers who have no reason to trust them. The result is lost prospects. There are other ways to balance growth where you do not alienate the client.

(8.) Save Money
If your business is doing well, you should save your money so you can invest in buying an office. Many in the call center business do a lot of drinking or partying. The stress of call center work makes people want to drink. You need to have a healthy liver and clear head to survive in this business. Also, if you party your profits away, you can’t grow. Buying your own office is a great investment and here’s why. Most people buy real estate and rent to irresponsible people who don’t pay rent on time or destroy the place. The investment is filled with risks. If you are the occupant of your investment, you’ve eliminated 75% of the risk right there. Even if you go out of business, you can still rent the building out to others and have passive income. So, buying an office is the best investment you could make — and it’s a sign of stability, prosperity, and respectability!

(9.) Do Good Deeds
If you are in the call center business, after you die you will go to a special heaven designed especially for you. It is referred to as call center heaven. But, you can only gain admittance if you do good deeds. So, be a good person and don’t do anything you shouldn’t!

(10.) There is no ten
Shouldn’t this entry have an even number of points? No! There is no ten. Why not, ten is a good round number? There just isn’t. You have learned enough now. So, go out into the real world and make your mark, grasshopper!

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A Filipino Call Center gets a 250 seater job from 123outsource.net!

November 5, 2015 by 123outsource
Categories: Call Center, Philippines | Tagged , | Leave a comment

A company just called me from the Philiipines about their call center. They said they had a listing on 123outsource.net and just was offered a huge job. The job was from a huge company who is going to test them out with a sixty day job for ten seats. If all goes well, then they will be needing 250 call center representatives from this company to help them out. The call center in Manila who got this job is going to be purchasing multiple listings from us now that they know our directory attracts serious business. This particular assignment is a multi-million dollar contract and I am proud to say it derived from the hard work I put into my online directory over the past several years! Many call centers advertise with us, but this is the best story so far.

If you want to get more business to your call center or call centers, contact us at info@123notary.com and we can discuss your options. “Regular” positions are US$200 per year and show up above the free listings on our site. If you are serious about any type of outsourcing profession and want to advertise, we would love to hear from you!

Using Linked In to network for your BPO or Call Center

September 29, 2015 by 123outsource
Categories: Call Center, Marketing | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

It is not easy to promote your call center and gain clients. You can cold call companies, promote a web site or use social media. There are so many social media sites out there it is hard to know which one is the right one. For business, LinkedIn has some definitive advantages.

The average LinkedIn member has an average yearly household income of $109,000
50% of LinkedIn members have decision-making authority for their companies.

But, how do you use LinkedIn for your call centers?

Create a profile
You need to create a LinkedIn company page. Make sure you fill the page in very completely with all of your background professional information and every pertinent fact about your company.

Post regular updates
You can post regular updates on your profile about what you are working on at the moment.

Connect by Networking
One way to gain new contacts on LinkedIn is to contact relevant people who follow your contacts. It’s easier to make a new contact if you have some common ground.

Participate in Groups
You can join up to fifty LinkedIn groups and participate in call center discussions. You can also provide good answers to other people’s questions. Being regularly seen helps, but being seen as a reliable source of intelligent commentary and knowledge helps even more.

LinkedIn Advertising
We tried LinkedIn Advertising for my discussion group. We did get new followers, but the cost was not cheap. It was $2 per click and we got a new follower for every $12-14 we spent which was not terrible, but not really cost effective.

Paid Memberships
LinkedIn limits the quantity of professionals that you can contact in a month. So, unless you have twenty profiles you use together, you can’t contact that many people. Paid memberships let you contact more people to network with.

Start a Group
In outsourcing, most of the groups have job postings. Our LinkedIn group has a lot of interesting outsourcing and business discussions.

What is a follower on LinkedIn worth comparatively?
I run 17 social media campaigns and I am constantly trying to figure out what a follower is worth. I can measure click patterns and see how many of them like particular blog articles. However, the actual human beings doing the clicks from LinkedIn are much more influential and hence could be considered to be of a higher value than perhaps a Twitter click to my site. How much more valuable is a LinkedIn click than a Twitter or Facebook click? I would tend to say more, but how much more is hard to say. If you compare various social networks, compare the costs of developing a group that will give you 1000 clicks a month to your blog or site. It might take a much higher quantity of followers to get the same result on Twitter, but might be easier to attain those followers. The math is complicated. But, if you want to get ahead in networking, you need to be able to identify the most time effective methods and avenues of promoting your call centers!

LinkedIn is not big on outsourcing
Keep in mind that there are not many outsourcers using LinkedIn and they are not at all interactive. To market your call center or BPO you need to find regular business owners who could be in any field that might need your services. Get to know them and see if they have an interest in trying you out.

How to get more clients for your BPO or Call Center (Compilation)

August 20, 2015 by 123outsource
Categories: Call Center, Compilations, Popular on Twitter, Semi-Popular | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

We wrote many blog articles about outsource marketing that were so popular, we were not able to top them. However, many of these articles are from long time back and they never resurface to the top of the feed of our blog. So, we are going to bring them back in the form of a compilation to give you a choice of many articles!

How to attract more clients to your call center part 1
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2011/05/05/getting-more-clients-for-your-call-center/
Relationships are the key to success. How well do you get to know people and nurture the relationship? It might all start with a cold call, so get your fingers ready to dial.

How to attract more clients to your call center part 2
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2011/05/19/how-to-attract-more-clients-to-your-call-center-part-2/
Hiring the right staff and training them meticulously is part of the secret. You need to mentor them, coach them, and keep metrics on them. Experienced workers will keep your clients happy, so don’t deliver any novices or you’ll all be sorry.

How to find clients for call centers — good salespeople
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2013/04/08/how-to-find-clients-for-call-centers-good-salespeople/
You could have the best call center in the world, but without the right salespeople, getting new clients might not be so easy. Having well trained salespeople is key, and having a few extras around might not be such a bad idea either.

How to get clients for call centers — contracts!
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2013/04/05/how-to-get-clients-for-call-centers-contracts/
Getting clients is just half the battle. Once they agree to do business with you, what type of contract should you use? Should it be rigid and long term, or a more relaxed month to month contract that is more “friendly?”

How to acquire clients for call centers — presentation!
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2013/03/29/how-to-acquire-clients-for-call-centers-presentation/
If you provide a good service, that is half the battle. But, how you present yourself online and over the phone can mean the difference between gaining that new clients and losing them.

How to gain clients for your call center: Pay-Per-Click!
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2013/08/01/how-to-gain-clients-for-your-call-center-pay-per-click/
There are many ways to get clients for your call center, but attracting people using PPC can be one of the fastest. You’ll need to know all of your keyword variations inside out and how the Google Adwords and other systems work. After that it is all systems go!

How to acquire call center clients — looking like a big company
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2013/06/20/how-to-acquire-call-center-clients-looking-like-a-big-company/
Some people are comfortable hiring a small company. But, larger clients prefer to play ball with larger companies. So, how to you appear to be large when you are not?

Is an English accent important? Just do your job!
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2014/03/01/call-centers-in-india-is-an-english-accent-important-just-do-your-job/
Some call centers in India like to have agents with seemingly perfect English accents. But, the key to getting ahead lies more in quality work than in flashy accents.

Gaining new clients and nurturing them correctly
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2015/04/17/gaining-new-clients-and-nurturing-them-correctly/
We all have our hands out for new clients. However, how often are we there to solve their problems or just ask them how things are going? Do we woo them the right way? And how is our credibility?

OTHER INTERSTING ARTICLES

Half a million Filipino call center workers are on American time
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2014/03/29/half-a-million-filipino-call-center-workers-are-on-american-time/
It is hard to think of people staying up all night just to please us in America, but in the Philippines, this is a reality!

Why Indian Call Centers Fail
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2014/03/16/why-indian-call-centers-fail/
Many call centers are new startups that lack the skills or discipline to keep their work up to high standards. They also hire staff who often lack experience or training. The results are catastrophic!

Handling Stress in a Call Center Office
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2012/05/22/handling-stress-in-a-call-center-office/
People who work at call center offices burn out fast. The problem is that they do too many hours of calling each day and have no mechanism of de-stressing. We propose a long list of proven techniques to eliminate your stress today!

Attracting clientele via 123outsource.net — the 1st step
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2013/01/26/attracting-clientele-via-123outsource-net-the-1st-step/
123outsource.net is a powerful directory for attracting outsourcing business. Learn how to use our tool the right way!

Are you tired of outsourcing to India?
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2013/03/05/are-you-tired-of-outsourcing-to-india/
The cultural behaviors in India are not usually to our liking in the US unless you get lucky and find someone really considerate. See how cultural differences ruin outsourcing relationships.

Is it better to have a woman do your phone calls?
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2014/01/04/is-it-better-to-have-a-woman-do-your-phone-calls/
Men are better at being authoritative, but women are less threatening. Who should you hire for your next process?

Are your callers annoying?
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2012/05/14/are-your-callers-annoying/
Finding call center reps with pleasing voices and personalities should be your main priority. Learn the art of interaction in this quick article!

How to start an outsourcing company
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2011/04/24/how-to-start-an-outsourcing-company/
Be an expert in your field and have a decisive offering. But, what about free trials? Am I crazy? Learn step by step what you need to do and get prepared!

How to write a resume for an outsourcing job!
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2011/03/09/how-to-write-a-resume-for-an-outsourcing-job/
How do you document your education, professional membership and job objectives? Should you use chronological order or inverse? What else should you put on the resume?

Create stories in your blog about the experience of your clients
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2014/07/18/create-stories-in-your-blog-about-the-experience-of-your-clients/
Do you want to be good at marketing in 2015? Marketing is all about storytelling these days, so learn the art. If you are good at blogging too, so much the better!

From 100 Indian call centers down to 1
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2014/01/21/from-100-indian-call-centers-down-to-1/
When we weeded out the unprofessional call centers on our directory, we got rid of almost all of the Indian call centers. They didn’t answer their phone professionally and didn’t behave as if they were “real” businesses either.

Cottage industries in India ruin India’s outsourcing reputation
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2013/09/29/cottage-industries-in-india-ruin-indias-outsourcing-reputation/
Many outsourcing companies in India are not real companies. When you call them and ask their company name, they often have multiple names and multiple ventures all run out of someone’s bedroom that are often not real businesses at all.

Solutions to India’s transportation problem
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2011/04/10/solutions-to-indias-transportation-problem/
India is a country filled with traffic jams and new overpasses being built daily. But, what if they used more innovative solutions like moving walkways and standing only buses? Hmm…

5 important things call center agents must do

July 19, 2015 by 123outsource
Categories: Call Center | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Five Important Tips the Call Centre Agents Need To Use To Improve Their Customer Services
Your customer service call centre is generally considered to be the heart of your business and has a direct effect on your customer’s interaction. When they experience long times or ineffective agents customers would then be unhappy with your organization and would begin to look for some other solutions. In a recent study conducted by customer service manager reports 91.5 percent of your customers are unlikely to recommend your company once they have had a bad customer experience. This is why it is important that you improve your call centre operations. Given below are 10 important tips on how you could improve your customer services in the organization.

Clarifying the complaints of your clients and customers:
Sometimes customers are never clear when they are reporting their problems. They would never be sure of their problems and would be frustrated about making a call affecting their communication. And in order to resolve the issues quickly and easily our own communication has to be very efficient. Open ended questions like who, what, where, when and how would always give you the right information while closed questions would deliver confirmation. So try and use closed questions that would help you control the conversation allowing you to proceed towards the right resolution.

Whatever you tell yourself its true:
I once heard someone that the more she told herself how lucky she was the luckier she turns out to be. This simple act of telling yourself something and believing it delivers the right result. And once we believe something it would manifest itself in the body language, the facial expression and voice. This would also mean that when you believe that your next call would result in disappointment then your body language and emotion would also express disappointment. Who would want to listen to someone who always sounds to be disappointed on the phone? No one so your customers here would refuse to listen to you and as a result would refuse your invitation to buy the products and services from you.

Smashing your negative beliefs:
Its quiet amazing of how someone could be positive about making an outbound sales call and as just we are about to dial there is a little voice which sits on our shoulder and says waste your time and they won’t be interested in buying anything from you. Within seconds our motivation tends to disappear and our brains go into overdrive to deliver reasons of not making the call. So rather than focusing on the negative beliefs train yourself and say that this could be the best deal of the day.

Being fast and consistent enough:
Consistency is the key when it comes to the call centre as no one would want to be consistently slow and bad. And not having simple, fast accurate and updated information is often the downfall of the agents especially when it comes to the two customer service blips. It generally stands for a reason that the call centre agents would require one common knowledge base that would work successfully across all the communication channels starting from phones, emails and social media.

Making sure that self-service does not turn out to be a poor service: Always every customer centric environment would have one self-centric form. Operations need to be very aware of the fact that how user friendly it is and how user friendly could it sound. Very basic but something that is vital to the customer satisfaction level.

So what do you think are the best ways of improving your customer service? Do leave your comments below.

Author Bio:
Abhishek Jain has over 10 years of experience within the BPO Industry and Finance and Accounting outsourcing services. Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) Services India delivers and manages various offshore/onsite projects in various technologies and domains

Attracting clients to your call center — testimonials

July 18, 2015 by 123outsource
Categories: Call Center | Leave a comment

We all want to attract more clients to our business. But how? There are so many avenues to attract clients. Some are expensive, and some are cumbersome. We have written many articles on the topic that you can read about if you click on the right on our call center category and scroll.

Missing the Obvious
Many call centers lose clients when they answer the phone. It is common for overseas call centers to have unclear phone lines and people who don’t speak clearly. My take is that you can’t possibly be a decent call center if there are any serious issues with your communication. Others have a dysfunctional web site with links that don’t work. If you can’t function, how can you possibly help others to function?

Getting Testimonials is Easy
Getting testimonials is a great marketing technique. It costs nothing to get testimonials — all you have to do is ask. You can use people as references as well. The question of where to post your testimonials is an even more interesting one. You can have a web page or several web pages devoted to testimonials. It is a common best practice to show the beginnings of a few of your best testimonials on your home page, and then have a “more…” link below that for those who want to read all of your client testimonials. You can also put more testimonials on your services page. A smart business person will put testimonials all over the place.

Review Sites are Powerful
Sites like Yelp, Angie’s list, and many directories have reviews these days. There are new sites sprouting up every day as well. Although these sites are “external,” having reviews on them can be powerful as you can link to those sites. Additionally, you can refer people to sites with reviews about you by using Twitter and Facebook as well as posting links in your blog.

Do You Blog?
Most people in outsourcing do not blog. There are only a handful of companies that do, and their blogs are often quite boring with ultra-short and/or self-promoting content. Others just post about outsourcing deals in the news which nobody wants to read about. People who are interested in outsourcing do NOT want to read about who Wipro and Accenture are buying out, etc. They want to read marketing articles and interesting points of views about the industry. However, you can also post reviews in your blog. If you have a popular blog (which takes a lot of building up to attain) you can post very potent marketing materials on your blog. Don’t try to sell on a blog as a general rule. However, you can publish content about your company, referrals, testimonials, interesting things that happen in your office, etc. The point of the blog is so that people get to know you and respect you as a source of quality knowledge — not to sell. If they grow to like you, they will buy on their own. We get dozens of new clients every month who claim they became clients because they liked our Facebook and blogging which incidentally work as a pair. The Facebook promotes blog posts, and the blog wouldn’t get half as much traffic without the Facebook.

Start Today!
So, go and get some testimonials and post them all over the place where prospective clients will be seeing them. You will get more business and people will feel better about you. You will feel better about yourself as well.

Six Problems That Only Individuals Working In A BPO Industry Would Understand

June 15, 2015 by 123outsource
Categories: BPO, Call Center, India, Popular Posts | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Six Problems That Only Individuals Working In A BPO Industry Would Understand
Anyone who has been working in a call centre, or has already worked there knows that there is no other psychological trauma quite like it, say for example hooked up on a phone call that would never end for the majority of your life, and is been subjected to the worst kinds of humanity.

Time is everything in a BPO Industry. We come across situations where you would have military walking in, your breaks being monitored, strict call length control, monitoring toilet breaks, etc. with each and everything being controlled and monitored. Welcome to the world of robots. Given below are some of the trials and tribulations one would have been experiencing in a call centre and lucky are the ones who escaped from it.

Being shouted at the entire day: You know what could make your clients angry for the things you are about to say. And things like it would take two weeks, or you do not have an account with us, or I would have to transfer your call, or my boiler has not been working and it’s definitely your fault. These are things that would sound like a red rag to a bull. So if you are lucky enough you would be getting a response like this I know it’s not your fault but before things go worse….and is something that’s unlikely to happen.

Being asked to work overtime: Each and every one of us have been doing this. We would have to work overtime in order to pull the given targets. We cannot let our customers down and would require someone who could answer their calls.

Taking up calls that you cannot deal with:These kind of things continue to happen a lot in the BPO Industry and is something that is never funny. Weeping people come forward and tell you their story whereas screaming customers would claim that they are going to come commit suicide with sexually inappropriate comments. And when such things happen you would here need to remember that you would have to wrap up the calls in 2 minutes or else would be fired.

Having to come up at 8.30 and starting your computer: You have been told that you need to be at your desk by sharp 8:30 am and it’s already 9.30. And it’s obvious that certain programme that you would need at your job would take half an hour of time to load. And off course you would not be paid for your extra half an hour then why would you choose to work for an extra hour.

Not wanting to be a part of clients call during day off: Do not try of contacting your customer success team during weekends, it would never ever happen. So try and use whats up, gmail, Viber, and Facebook instead.

Getting Back Home and Noticing That Your Friends Have Been On Facebook The Entire Day: Most of the times we come across situations where we did not have much work to do. And you could just read articles online with a limited access to internet like the fact of the day been written by your manager and your weekly column where your CEO would be describing the holiday he would be going on.
Author Bio:

Abhishek Jain has over 10 years of experience within the BPO Industry and Finance and Accounting outsourcing services. Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) Services India delivers and manages various offshore/onsite projects in various technologies and domains

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You might also like:

Marketing your BPO outsourcing firm from A to Z
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2016/05/22/marketing-your-bpo-outsourcing-firm-from-a-to-z/

Is it time to Uber-size your outsourcing business?
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2016/05/10/is-it-time-to-uber-size-your-outsourcing-business/

How to start an outsourcing company
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2015/12/29/how-to-start-an-outsourcing-company-2016/

If you invested in training your BPO employees, what skills would you teach them?
http://bpo.123outsource.net/2015/03/28/if-you-invested-in-training-your-bpo-employees-what-types-of-skills-would-you-teach-them/

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The correct process to hiring a call center

January 26, 2015 by 123outsource
Categories: Call Center | Leave a comment

Have you ever tried dealing with call centers? Most of them are not so easy. Many don’t answer their phones. Others answer the phone unprofessionally saying, “Hullo?” with a bad phone line. Are you hiring professionals here or what? I found a nice group of managers from a particular call center in the Philippines. They wanted to hook me onto a contract. Everything I asked for by email, they let me know the price of, but never told me the actual process of attaining what I was looking for.

I wanted a call center agent who could do sales, and also do Twitter. I learned that it would cost $250 to put in an ad to find someone who could do Twitter. But, the person would be unknown to the company and unknown to me, and probably not even any good at Twitter. I was asked to sign a year long contract when I hadn’t even interviewed the workers. I am not comfortable signing any type of contract until I’m sure about who I am working with.

Interview multiple agents
Don’t just sign a contract. Before you even give a test job, you need to talk to several call center reps. You need to see if they are up to your standards. Have them go over some scripts with you over the phone to see if they are any good. You might give them some training before going a step further. If you are pressured into signing a contract before training, explain that you are investing your time which is worth $100 per hour in their worker. So, if they think you are just spinning their wheels, you are losing a lot more than they are losing each minute that is spent.

Start with a single easy task
My idea is to have a call center work on a particular task. I might give them a simple but repetitive task to see if they get anything done. I want to interview a few agents first, pick one who I feel comfortable with and see what type of a ride I get. Did the call center solve problems the minute they came up, or did they just take my money? Did I get a nice rep, or someone I was not happy with?

Be careful of contracts
Contracts guarantee that I will pay a certain amount each month. However, contracts don’t guarantee the quality of the person I get or the quality of their work. I would prefer a contract that guarantees a particular standard of work, and if the standard isn’t made, then I’ll give a lower quality $1000 per month which might equal $500.

Multiple tasks are hard
My work consists of multiple tasks. One rep cannot learn to do all of these tasks unless his manager is involved in training everyone. If the manager doesn’t get back to you when he is supposed to then the deal is over.

Try them out in a limited way
Many call centers will allow you to purchase (8) hours of service. That is a great way to try a rep out. If you like him/her, you could hire them full time. If your tasks is harder, or if you need the rep to have a better learning curve, going to a place that specializes in executive assistants might be a better bet. Regular call center agents are not loyal to their work, they quit after 90 days on average (rough estimate) and generally need to be employed at least a particular number of hours per month according to Filipino labor laws. The rules are complicated, but is the quality of service worth the headache?

Try a second task
Rather than going from a single task to ten tasks overnight, see how someone does on two tasks after they have done one. Remember, that outsourcing companies are trying to impress you the first two months. See how they function on the fourth month after they are just being themselves and no longer trying to impress. The wooing process should be slow if you want to get someone good. If you are too fast to dive into a relationship prematurely, you fall into a contract that is in the interests of the call center and does nothing for you other than locking you into place!

Hiring for social media?
Most companies that do social media are not that great. See what they did for other clients. See how well they can communicate social media marketing strategies. Talk to the workers directly and see how competent they are.

Handling complaints in a call center

January 25, 2015 by 123outsource
Categories: Call Center | Leave a comment

Don’t make your attitude about handling complaints lead them to launch into more complaints down the line.

The art of acknowledging a customer’s complaint is is half the battle. The art of doing something without painting yourselves at totally at fault.

I don’t even deserve to live…
So shoot me.

CLIENT: I can’t believe my bill had a $20 extra charge for cat sitting and the mouse channel? And I don’t even own a cat. I don’t even own a self-cleaning oven. Although, if I did have a cat who wanted a self-cleaning oven, the oven would probably lick itself clean.

SUJATA: Oh, I’m so so so sorry! How could we begin to even dream that you would even have a cat? We should be sentenced to sit in our own litterbox forall of eternity — the bad kind, without the chlorophyll!

CLIENT: Well, hold on there. I mean, it’s not like I hate cats, and it’s not like you made a life altering error, except for the cat’s life which never existed to begin with.

SUJATA: Now I am guilty of killing off your imaginary cat. The imagination is the most wonderful thing in the universe. I will personally take 100% of the blame for this grievous error on your bill… and also my boss, and my co-worker Rahul, oh, and also the Samosa guy. You see, your bill was created on the 11th, and that was the day that Sanjit the samosa guy was two hours late. After all, we can’t think clearly on an empty stomach, so he should share the blame.

CLIENT: I can’t believe you are blaming 25% of your errors on the samosa guy, that is so catty of you! I’m reporting you to your boss!

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Curb your attitude!
========================

SANGEETA: Hello this is Sangeeta.

CLIENT: Hi, my name is Carol, and I can’t believe that I was billed an additional $20 for cat sitting and the mouse channel when I have never owned a cat and never signed up for that service. How can your company do that to me? And also, I’ve been a loyal customer of this company for eight years and have never had anything like this happen before. Can you imagine how I feel.

SANGEETA: Actually maam, I am the wrong person to talk to as I am not in complaints, I am in billing.

CLIENT: But, this IS a billing compl…

(on hold music for three minutes…. announcer’s voice: Now you can get the mouse channel for a free trial with NO obligation for two months. Just talk to the next representative who you speak to and get $5 off your next bill just for mentioning it. Also, you’ll just love our new cat sitting service. Your cat deserves…)

RAHUL: Hello, this is Rajul, may I help you?

CLIENT: Oh my God, I just explained my entire situation to the last girl who answered the phone in billing. She didn’t want to talk to me because my issue is a complaint, but it is also a billing compalint.

RAHUL: Oh, you’re right let me transfer you.

CLIENT: Hold on….

(on hold music for another three minutes… announcer’s voice. Your cat deserves the finest in cat sitting services. Our skilled caretakers will give your little furry friend nine life-time memberships in our program. Try our new chicken kabobs — tastes like mouse! And your cat will just love our….

SANGEETA: Hello, this is Sangeeta.

CLIENT: Hi Sangeeta, I have a billing issue to talk about. Please note, that it is NOT a billing complaint, but a billing issue.

SANGEETA: Oh sorry, I don’t deal with billing issues, I only deal with billing, please hold.

CLIENT: DON’T PUT ME ON HOLD, or I’ll come to India and break your neck. I’ll find out where you live, and the address of your office. And then I’ll give you the address of where you’re going to die.

SANGEETA: So, what do you want?

CLIENT: I was billed $20 for cat sitting when I don’t have a cat.

SANGEETA: Oh, I can fix that. Carol Smith? Of 29 Partridge Lane in Boise, Idaho?

CLIENT: That’s where I am, assuming you don’t put me on hold again in which case I’ll have a Mumbai address on MG Road.

SANGEETA: Okay, no need to get upset ma’am. I have removed the charge. The refund will reflect in your next statement. Is there anything else you can help me with?

CLIENT: Yes, there is one more thing. There is one important thing I need to tell you that will turn your career around, and give you a chance to immigrate to America and work at a call center here that pays twenty times the salary that your current job pays.

SANGEETA: Oh really, and what’s that?

CLIENT: Okay, but please hold…

(Announcer says, “Now, you can enjoy the best in call center agent relaxation products. Enjoy the sound of seagulls and oceanwaves in the privacy of your own home in Mumbai, assuming your electricity doesn’t get cut every two hours like the rest of India. Or, use a battery operated tape recorder. Or, enjoy the relaxing sound of Himalayan singing bowls to get into a spiritual frame of mind. Yes, these products can all be yours for a mere….

CLIENT: Sorry, I just wanted to put you on hold to see how you liked it.