“Outsourcing” used to be a four-letter word. For some, it still is. Once you’ve been doing something long enough, letting go of certain parts of your small business can feel like letting a small piece of yourself go.
Customer communication can be one of the toughest to hand off. After all, it’s a big part of what makes your business, well, your business.
But keeping up with your customers also gets tougher the bigger your business gets. And trying to take it all on yourself just isn’t feasible if long-term growth is your goal.
Here’s why:
1. You’re probably not an expert in customer communication.
You’re an expert in whatever it is that you do. Whether you build homes, fix broken bones, or argue case law before a judge, you do what you do because you’re great at it, the best even.
Customer service is its own specialty. That means that, while you may enjoy chatting with the people you serve (and hopefully the feeling is mutual), that doesn’t make you an expert.
You can’t hire, train, or develop that kind of expertise yourself when you’re busy saving lives, writing closing statements, and running your business day-to-day.
2. Managing and training a team isn’t always efficient —especially if you have to do it over and over again.
Business growth means more clients and customers. It also means hiring more team members to answer questions and quell concerns.
The cost of hiring one in-house receptionist to handle customer calls is more than just their salary, which starts at around $34,000 per year. You also have to consider the cost of their benefits and training—not to mention your time and money spent looking for the right person in the first place.
As your business grows, you’ll need to repeat this process over and over to build a solid communications team. Then you need to hire someone to manage that team, keep that team happy, and ensure they stay so you don’t have to start over again.
3. The size of your team may never match customer demand.
If the last few years have shown us anything, it’s to expect that just about anything can happen to us, our communities, and our businesses, at any time. One month you can be flooded with customer inquiries that require a new round of hires to manage, and the following month everything comes back down again—leaving you with more team members than you can afford.
Business fluctuates month to month. Sometimes your team will be inundated with calls, and perhaps a few fall through the cracks, while other months, your in-house answering team won’t know what to do with themselves because far fewer people are calling. That’s the reality of owning a business in today’s economy.
Outsourcing makes small business growth possible.
Your business needs to be flexible enough to respond to shifting customer demand and agile enough to outlast your competition when things run dry for reasons outside your control.
Outsourcing customer communication helps you do both.
Today’s customer care professionals have specialized experience that comes with handling hundreds of calls per day. They’re available to provide support at a moment’s notice with no training or onboarding required. And they can provide as much or as little help as your business needs to meet demand during your busy season and beyond.
The bottom line: outsourcing your customer communication to virtual receptionists can help your business grow by providing exceptional service in a smart, affordable, and scalable way that works for any business in any environment.
Interested in learning more about virtual receptionists? Check out our full guide!
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More than technology, marketing, or even a great product or service, the experiences people have with a business are what matter. In fact, the majority of consumers consider customer service a deciding factor in making purchases.
That means if you’re not providing the right experiences, you’re missing out on serious opportunities. Find out what kind of customer service your business provides—along with tips to get on the right track or go even further.
