Regardless of what kind of business you are running, having a prompt and efficient customer service department is imperative. There is no better way to foster strong customer relations, boost your retention rates, and increase loyalty to your brand than through solid customer service. However, as your business expands you will likely come across the expected growing pains, such as more questions and feedback from your consumer base. If your customer service department is not fully prepared to deal with these demands, it can seriously damage your company’s image and reputation.
An in-house call center can work in certain situations, but when a business experiences growth, the shortcomings of keeping it in-house quickly become apparent. Before getting to that point, it is a better idea to examine all the potential drawbacks of maintaining a call center in-house.
Time Requirements
Time is a resource that is crucial in all aspects of business, and doubly so when it comes to customer service. Running a call center in-house will require considerable amounts of time from your employees. Every call from a customer must be received, every question answered, and all feedback heard. With an in-house call center, this means that you employees are tied to the phones, which doesn’t leave them with much time to attend to any other important or day-to-day duties that they may have.
A simple solution to this problem is outsourcing the call center duties. Once you do so, your in-house staff can return their attention to the tasks that are vital to keeping your company running in top form. What is more, when you outsource, all your call center duties will be handled by trained professionals whose primary focus is dealing with everything that customer service entails.
Hiring Call Center Exclusive Staff
Some businesses can’t afford to assign their existing employees to call center duties. If that is the case, the next step is to hire and train staff exclusive to the call center. You will also require IT experts and HR agents in order to ensure that everything runs as smoothly as possible. Unfortunately, the choice to hire staff to handle all aspects of the in-house call center is something that comes with a hefty price tag attached, particularly if extensive training is needed.
Rather than going through the entire recruitment, hiring, and training process, outsourcing your call center can actually cost you less in the long run. You will get access to agents that are already trained in customer service and call center technology, saving you the cost of training and IT and HR requirements.
The Cost of Call-Center Infrastructure
Incorporating call center infrastructure into your existing business is going to be a large expense, and not one that should be taken lightly. Consider everything that is required for essential call center operations: adequate office space, agent workstations, and all relevant technology and hardware. These costs can be an incredible drain on your resources and what is more, those costs will likely increase over the years due to upgrade necessity and maintenance requirements.
Outsourcing your call center needs can spare you these costs and in addition, be a far more affordable solution in the years to come. All maintenance and upgrades will be dealt with by the outsourcing company, removing that particular problem from your yearly to-do list.
Outsourcing is the Solution
Dealing with customer service in-house is no small task and will require serious commitment, funding, and time that you, your employees, and your business may not be able to spare. An argument in favor of in-house call centers is the aspect of control, but if you choose to partner with a reliable, trusted outsourcing company, like KPI Connect, that will not be an issue. Instead, the company will work together with you in order to ensure that all call center operations are handled exactly the way you want. Call KPI Connect to find out how we can help you.
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