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Partnering with an offshore call center in the Philippines can be a complicated process for first-time or inexperienced buyers. Fortunately, there is a tried-and-true roadmap that can help make the process smoother. Consider the following your ultimate service buyers' guide that will help you partner with the right provider when considering call center outsourcing to the Philippines. 

Before even contacting a call center in the Philippines, the first step should be to identify your organizational needs and priorities. You should feel confident that outsourcing your contact center processes will maximize value by meeting or exceeding your expectations for quality levels, service levels, cost-efficiency, and customer satisfaction outcomes. Start by evaluating your current contact center operations against key performance metrics and consider how they can be improved. Beyond that, you should take into consideration your company's business goals and the necessary capabilities required to meet those goals, especially as it pertains to call center outsourcing.

Finding the right call center in the Philippines to partner with can make all the difference in your program's success, and this goes back to understanding your own requirements. For example, do you need 10 seats or 100? What type of services will you need, i.e., strictly voice-based or a combination of voice and non-voice-based services? Factors like this matter. You want to be considered a key account with your call center of choice, which means your program should be between 3-10% of the vendor's seat capacity. "Partnering with the right call center in the Philippines also means finding one that can offer you services that are ideally suited to your company's business objectives and priorities. This means ensuring that the vendor can offer domain expertise in your specific program area, which will help ensure optimal levels of service quality and cost-efficiency," says Ralf Ellspermann, CEO of PITON-Global, an award-winning call center outsourcing provider in the Philippines. 

Before looking for a partner, it's important to understand what defines a premium contact center. Not all contact centers are created equal and outsourcing to a low-cost vendor can end up costing more money in the long run. Therefore, it's critical to take into account more factors than just the price of services when looking for an outsourcing provider. "Premium call centers do more than just take calls. They are committed to understanding your company's culture, goals, and processes. They provide deep industry experience and offer a wide range of services, such as analytics, marketing, and eCommerce. They also utilize the latest technologies, and infrastructure capable of scaling services to meet your business goals," says Ellspermann. 

When outsourcing your call center, it's also crucial to consider the quality of the agents employed by the call center. In other words, don't just look for providers that can provide a large number of agents at a dirt-cheap cost. Look instead for those that can provide the ideal number of highly skilled and experienced agents to efficiently handle your specific program requirements - especially if you want to offer premium customer service. Low agent turnover is also a key factor, as a stable workforce will result in a program that delivers consistency and better quality service.

When evaluating your options for outsourcing, it's also important to make sure the call center you partner with offers advanced technologies that can support your company's business goals. Doing so will help maximize the quality of the services delivered to end customers and ensure that you get accurate data to help you make informed decisions on future improvements or changes to support your business objectives. Related to this is the importance of a call center's infrastructure. A good call center outsourcing provider in the Philippines should have infrastructure and facilities that can support your program. This includes the necessary resources to be able to effectively operate such as web hosting, virtual private servers, cloud services, call center equipment like phones and computers, etc. Also, make sure the call center has access to a secure data network. The last thing you want is a lack of capacity or a poor quality experience because the call center's facilities and equipment were outdated.

Scaling a call center program is a natural progression. If you partner with the right vendor and achieve success, you'll want to feel confident that the vendor can meet your future contact center needs. In this sense, it's important to work with a company that has the capability to add agents when you need them and can add new lines or channels as needed to match increases in demand. In addition, try to find a vendor that will be able to provide an upgrade path for you so they can scale and support richer features as your business evolves.

After finding a provider that can meet your needs, one of the next steps you'll need to take is to establish Key Performance Indicators. One of the most important factors in call center outsourcing in the Philippines is the ability to meet or exceed your goals for service levels, cost-efficiency, and customer satisfaction outcomes. Quality control is also essential and includes customer service metrics like call abandonment rate, agent speed to answer, average handle time, etc. These KPIs will provide a means for both parties to know that goals are being met or exceeded, allow you to monitor the quality of services delivered by your call center in real-time, and make informed decisions on how to further improve your program.

"Outsourcing your call center requirements should be viewed as a long-term investment and partnership, so choosing the right partner for this program is key to its success," says Ellspermann.  It's important for you and your provider to work together in a shared decision-making relationship, with open communication at all times. Look for vendors that will be open and transparent with you regarding their strengths, weaknesses, programs, services offered, etc., as well as offering the ability to customize your program to meet specific needs. Call center outsourcing in the Philippines is not just about minimizing costs; it's about maximizing value by ensuring quality levels that meet or exceed the needs of your customers.