A Comprehensive List of Resources for the Contact Center Sourcing Process

by Blue Ocean in Blog, Contact Center Outsourcing, Customer Service Outsourcing

 

Your organization is ready to find a new contact center outsourcer. What’s your next step? We’ve compiled a list of the most helpful outsourcing resources, in order from discovery to launch. We’re here to help! Read on!

 

Is It Time to Outsource? 5 Questions to Ask Yourself

Maybe your organization is so early in the discovery phase that you’re not sure if you’re actually going to outsource at all. You’re looking at potential outsourcers to see if it even makes sense. If that’s the case, here are a few discerning questions to ask:

1. Do you need to add capacity?
2. Do you have to scale for rapid growth or seasonal volume?
3. Can your business benefit from more robust redundancy?
4. Are you well positioned to integrate AI into your customer care?
5. Do you just need to focus on your core offering?

Dig deeper in this article >

5 Insights About Sourcing and Developing Strategic Partnerships

You know that partnering with a contact center outsourcer is more than just signing on another vendor. This means that your role in procurement is infinitely more complex—and yet also more purposeful.

What does it really look like to source a strategic partnership with an outsourced customer care provider? We sat down with Director of Strategic Sourcing and Logistics at St. Michael’s Hospital in Toronto, Ontario, Peter Longo, to talk about, well, his title says it all: strategic sourcing. We chatted about:

1. The role of procurement in an increasingly complex business landscape
2. How to bring the intangibles of “strategic partnership” into objective procurement process
3. How cultural alignment factors into the decision-making process
4. What ROI and best total value mean when the measurement of a partnership is intangible
5. The vision for a successful long-term relationship with a third-party partner

Read the interview here >

 

How to Shortlist Potential Contact Center Partners

When the entire outsourcing process can easily take 12-18 months from discovery to go-live, the nightmare is that the entire process is derailed at the eleventh hour because a bidder couldn’t follow through. To avoid that headache (and massive waste of resources), shortlisting potential partners is critical. More is not necessarily better. Here’s the shortlist of tips:

1. At the risk of sounding like Captain Obvious, start with the basics. What are your must-haves?
2. Run a preliminary RFI with a broad pool of vendors in order to narrow down your RFP list.
3. Schedule some site visits before you go to RFP. Narrow down by intangibles first.
4. RFP!
5. Implement quantitative scoring to shortlist your shortlist. Work backwards if needed.

Get the details in this article here >

 

The Fundamental Guide to the Contact Center RFP

You know procurement inside out. But outsourcing your customer care partner isn’t a common procurement event. That’s why we put together this fundamental guide to the contact center RFP. Here’s the highlights:

1. Identify your key stakeholders
2. Define success before you begin
3. Shortlist your RFP participants
4. Draft your contact center RFP
5. Pay attention to formatting
6. Reverse engineer your timeline
7. Evaluate RFP responses

Read more in this article >

 

On-Site vs Virtual Procurement: The Best Way to Find Your Contact Center Outsourcer

Until recently, we were strong proponents of making on-site visits to your shortlist of vendors before the RFP process even happened. It was a surefire way to confirm the bidders on your list could be successful potential partners.

But then, you know, the pandemic.

More often than not, all meetings, pitching, and negotiating are now done virtually. But that doesn’t mean you should nix on-site visits entirely.

In this article, we look at the pros and cons of virtual versus on-site meetings—as well as the best practices for each stage of the outsourcing process.

You don’t want to skip this one. Read more here >

 

Building the Contact Center SOW: The Framework for Success

When you’ve made the big decision and decided on a contact center partner (congrats!), the next step is to collaborate on a roadmap moving forward. Or, in other words, build a robust Statement of Work (SOW). In this article, we explore exactly what it takes to build an effective SOW.

1. The Basics: Who, what, where, when. All the mundane but necessary details.
2. Defining your most critical success measures and KPIs
3. Establishing strong parameters around forecasting
4. Outlining the reporting and analytics process
5. Building in big picture targets with a Risk & Reward model
6. Keeping it evergreen: adjust and realign

Get the info you need in this article >

 

5 Most Critical Elements of a Successful Contact Center Launch

Contact center implementation is an art and science. Achieving a smooth transition will only happen when every milestone and moving part is defined with clear expectations, detailed plans, and dedicated resources. Here’s what you need to ensure a successful launch:

1. A comprehensive, clearly articulated SLA and SoW
2. A structured launch plan
3. Adherence to communication plans
4. Smart resource allocation
5. The foundation of a strategic partnership

Dig deeper here >

 

Need more than what an article can tell you? Schedule a conversation today to talk through your outsourcing needs.

 

 

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