The global market for Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) will reach over $262 Billion in the next 5 years, so it’s important to recognize what’s propelling this industry forward. Outsourcing has always been touted as a cost-effective alternative for call centers, but advances in automation, big data, and cloud services, has made it even more appealing. Unless a call center can afford to acquire all of these resources, or create them in-house, BPOs offer a tremendous opportunity to harness their benefits without wasting precious time and money. However, as the industry adjusts to these technologies, the opportunity for error grows as well.
Whether you’re a BPO or a business looking to outsource, keep these 4 mistakes in mind when setting goals and expectations: Continue reading
How long is too long? Standards like 80/20 for the call center industry help to guide average speed of answer but the truth is, acceptable hold-time varies from industry to industry and from customer to customer. Even a second or two can jeopardize the entire experience in your customer’s eyes, and risk the possibility of an abandoned call. Whether your hold times are longer than the prescribed average or you’re hitting the 80/20 mark, it’s important to provide callers with an accurate expectation of wait time and respectful alternatives to waiting on hold such as a call-back. 
How do you view the role of the call center? Most executives see it as an outright cost. Accordingly, for many support teams, the goal is to reduce expenditures, rather than focusing on the customer. For them, it’s more important to minimize call time, even if it means providing mediocre service. Many contact centers will invest heavily in saving just a few seconds per call (a few seconds!) at the expense of the customer. They monitor analytics like a hawk just to make sure their agents perform accordingly.
Sounds good, doesn’t it– a single, focused strategy that produces a dramatic increase in customer experience for your brand? If only it was that easy.
I’ve written about the benefits of 
Maybe you run an answering service, a small customer support function, or a 2,000 seat call center. Whichever it is, I’m sure the questions running through your mind are:
