Long Term Ties Work Well in BPO

Long term tie-ups with BPO outfits work well for business firms. There are a flood of reasons why. For starters, the call center firm that you work with for long will know your way of doing things. There will be very little to explain. With each project, the coordination will get better. Employees of both organizations will understand the strengths and weakness of each other. That will enable the answering service agents support your business and vice versa in a more organized way. Then, you wouldn’t have to be worried about your brand image because the call center services will perfectly understand the value of your brand. They will not do something that is not within the purview of your business ethics.

Coming to more professional matters, long term business ties means the BPO firm would take extra care of your work. No call center would like to lose out on assured clients. If they see a sizeable volume of answering service projects coming from your end, they will not hesitate to go all out for your projects. You can negotiate better about deadlines and price tags. Working with long-distance business partners would also mean an atmosphere where you can make suggestions without being pulled up for it. The mode is more relaxed, though not complacent. At the end of the day, the call center firms do realize that this is a fiercely competitive world!

New Career Paths for BPO Employees

The job market in the developing countries like India was different before the coming of BPO. Most employees were content in the job that they were doing. There was hardly any talk of changing jobs for most middle-class employees. That has undergone a sea-change with call center units.

Suddenly this was an industry where there was always some more to be covered and some more glory to be achieved. The hierarchy in business process outsourcing is anything but flat. There is a lot of opportunity for the career-oriented to go ahead and do something spectacular for themselves and their career.

Thanks to the improvements that they can see in the BPO sector, the young guns are stepping up as well. They see not just a career in the call center company that they are joining up with. They also see that the call center services training that they get here will hold them in good stead when the move to other business outsourcing units in the future.

Nothing that you pick up in the answering service industry goes to vain. Your knowledge will be tapped at some point, in the company you are working at present or in a future one. So if you are a new entrant to this world, pull up your socks and learn!

Police Looking at BPO for Support!

The police department of San Carlos is looking at the BPO industry for support! No, don’t jump to erroneous conclusions; they are not really looking for help with their investigations! The answering service of the police department is failing to deal with the call volume. The inbound call center agents are needed to bring their skill, expertise and equipment to the table. Because of the deluge of calls that the police departments receive from distressed citizens, several police units are hunting for call center units to take those calls and get them processed promptly.

Untrained answering service agents have led to serious disasters in the recent past. Several deaths happened because the 911 call center couldn’t respond in time. The loss of lives is a bad price to pay for the absence of a proper inbound call center team. No wonder San Carlos is ready to outsource its phone lines to a business process outsourcing firm. The costs cuts are another advantage. Outsourcing the phone lines to call center services will save them $2m a year! That was what they were paying extra to have in-house staff take calls and mess them up at the same time! Surely this deal is what they needed to strike way back!

BP Needs Call Center Monitoring

Did you read out post on how a call center agent alleged foul play against BP? The agent, identifying herself as Janice, said that the answering service system at BP was a “diversion”. In the light of that statement, industry experts are trying to figure out how a top-brass firm like BP did not have a call monitoring system in place. That is probably the basic quality check that you can have in any call center services outfit. The interaction of the customers and the agents has to be monitored not just for security reasons, but also to measure the performance of the agent. These voice clips can also be used for training purposes.

With BP faltering to keep expectations at more serious levels, the call center flaw is probably being looked at more gravely on a ripple effect. You can say that suddenly people are on an overdrive to find fault with everything to do with BP! But the truth is that the answering service agent’s allegations are something of importance. She also alleged that inbound call center agents keyed in “blah blah blah” when they should type in customer information. BP has commented that they could find only one such entry when the caller had been an incomprehensible drunkard!

Web Marketing Services from BPO

To tweak an ancient proverb, spare the website, spoil the business! Small business firms that want to keep their head above water have their work cut out. Their only hope of survival in a ruthlessly competitive world dominated by large corporate houses is to hire a call center for web marketing service. Search engines don’t rank companies according to their net worth. They rank according to their online presence. Here you are at par with a multimillion company if you have the right SEO team backing you. BPO firms provide web marketing services that may include creating and designing a website. Your website is your online shop cum information center. The help desk services team handles the web marketing work.

Web marketing is new to the call center world. But they have made quick strides. Now you have BPO agents marketing and promoting websites on search engines without breaking a sweat. They are more aware of the online tools available that can fine-tune their marketing methods. Working smart is the online mantra. With the right technique, the help desk services team can optimize their efforts for greater results. The client company needs to be branded online so that existing and potential customers can reach over to connect base at any time. Accessibility helps, especially when your competitors are breathing down your neck to step in and replace you any second.

Most Encouraging BPO Trend: Diversification

The most encouraging trend to have emerged from the BPO sector is that of diversification. Traditionally we would associate call center units with just voice calls and telemarketing. With time, business process outsourcing units are now moving towards other related services which are basically non-voice. The in-demand services in this slot would be the back-office functions. Several of the outsourcing destinations like India and the Philippines can safely be called the “back-offices to the world”! Non-core business work, like website optimization, is handled by trained professionals. They help the unit’s claim to be a multi-functional center.

Diversification in BPO is also seen in the nature of job generation. The call center units do not provide jobs to agents and employees working directly under the company only. There are many fringe employees who are not under the direct payroll of the company but are employed by the business outsourcing firm. For example, there are many who handle the food and transport facilities for the bona fide employees. These people can also be considered to be employed under the business outsourcing sector. The work done in the non-voice section is also at par with the best in the world. It’s no wonder that companies in countries like USA and UK are still looking at these centers with more than just a passing interest.

For Better Lead Generation Tools, Go Online!

It’s official now! Business trends are moving away from offline modes to online ones. We know that lead generation was heavily dependent on the outbound call center team. That is changing. Now market studies and surveys are showing that emails and websites are becoming more efficient in providing qualified leads. Web leads are the order of the day because people like to look for information online. They impart a lot of credibility to companies which have a sparkling website rather to those which have telemarketing people calling them up. The need of the hour is pull marketing instead of push. What with call center services including website creation and designing and marketing, the race to go online has just begun.

The results of the lead generation survey should serve as an example to many of the business firms who are still working without a website. It’s high time to get a corporate website at least. Call center agents would like to use your website as a landing page for their leads as well. Moreover, the inbound call center team would appreciate queries through emails and website comments because sometimes the call volume goes beyond control, especially when the business firm plugs in phone numbers in DRTV ads. Responding to emails also give them the chance to pitch sales more elaborately and professionally.

Call Center for Employment

Tshwane is a place that many of you might not have heard. As a matter of fact, it happens to be the home to 7 of 8 national science councils and claims to be the most educated place in South Africa. The government of this place of an odd 2 million people is looking at the call center industry to generate jobs for the people. BPO is known to be the main provider of employment in many areas. This would be no different. But for the answering service industry to work great guns, there has to be more than just a passing interest. The powers-that-be in these parts have to extend a helping hand to business outsourcing investors so that they find investment in this area economically viable.

The economics of BPO firms are pretty easy. The employers just want the infrastructure in place. Then they need a team of dedicated and skilled call center employees. If Tshwane considers itself to have a very high number of educated people, it will definitely act in the favor of the city. Jobs in sectors like retail and insurance, that are traditionally known to generate jobs, have fallen short of expectations because the per capita income of the population has gone down. So they have very little savings, let alone investments. This has shifted the onus of employment firmly on the shoulders of the business outsourcing industry. It remains to be seen if Tshwane becomes another Metro Manila.