Why Start-ups Must Outsource their CX Initiatives

Posted On: September 21, 2018

As LinkedIn named India’s 25 most attractive start-ups in 2018, I was excited to see which of them have made it to the list. As I went through it, I found many popular brands on the list having distinctive elements that led them to success. The highlights among them were strong business models, seamless customer experience & digital initiatives coupled with advanced tech stacks.

In the e-commerce space, a smart blend of technology and customer engagement leads the way to success. Look at Flipkart, which by delivering exceptional customer experience established an ever-growing pool of customers. There is a lot to learn from this Indian start-up that stood up tall amid stiff competition from the US giant Amazon and its Indian counterpart Snapdeal. Who knew that a Bangalore-based company originated in 2007 will be sold for billions, accounting for the world’s biggest e-commerce purchase in 2018.

I believe, there is a common string that binds successful start-ups. Precisely, a big thriving idea and their readiness to embrace outside help. It reminds me of Slack, which is amongst those start-ups that utilized outsourcing prudently. By outsourcing  their interface design and logo creation to MetaLab, a reputed Canada-based agency; Slack established itself as a distinctive messaging software that feels & looks different. Today, it is one of the most widely used set of workplace communication services globally.

Slack’s story speaks volumes about how outsourcing can come out as a crucial strategy to refine a product’s essential components. And rightly so, as after the revamp, Slack raised a $250 million round of investment in 2017 with a total valuation of $5 billion then. Today, it has jumped to a valuation of more than $7.1 billion.

So, here is a list of common challenges that e-commerce start-ups must let outsourcing experts handle:

Omni-channel Support

Customers demand no less than instant, accurate, and consistent support across channels like call, email, chat, and social media. And it takes the best of technology, employee expertise, and infrastructure to facilitate a seamless omni-channel experience, which comes at a high in-house cost. In an e-commerce setup, it is natural to receive tons of support tickets. Customers can come up with queries anywhere from order to delivery. Managing it in-house with no experience can be tricky. So, it would always be better to let an industry specialist take care of it.

Back-end Support

Brands in expansion stage go through the hassle of increased need for back-end support. As a brand shifts its gears, it also requires an increased employee strength in response. Accommodating a massive number of employees to work in-house will not only demand extra working space but also call for additional tech, infra, and training resources. Thus, it is better to let experts manage back-end support than messing it up in-house.

Regional Support

To gain traction in tier 2 & 3 cities and new regions, one of the primary requirements of an e-commerce company is to support folks in their regional language. No language barriers facilitate smooth company-customer interactions and therefore make customers feel more engaged with the brand. Interactions with support execs who understand customers’ native language takes customer experience to a new level. Regional support becomes easy when you get it done through an outsourcing partner that offers multilingual support.

Order Fulfillment

Untimely order delivery has become one of the biggest pet peeves for e-commerce customers. In contrast, timely product delivery becomes a key driver for customer satisfaction. As the order volume increases, things start becoming difficult for in-house vendor coordinators. However, having it outsourced to a dedicated team ensures orders are rolled out smoothly and in time.

An efficient BPO partner does not only solve basic support functions but also provides modern tech tools to enable smooth digital transformation. Using an efficient knowledge management platform with built-in engagement components, it helps you build excellent conversational interfaces and enhance customer experience.

Take a look at some prominent knowledge management components that raise the bar for customer engagement:

Content Management

Efficient content management rests at the core of every website or application’s smooth functioning. Little elements like quick & relevant product findability, predictive search based on customers’ preference & order history go a long way to keep them engaged. An AI-backed content management system also helps pushing custom notifications to customers based on their search interests.

Decision Trees 

It becomes easier to understand information when it is presented in the form of smaller pieces. Decision trees reduce complex interactions to a few clicks. They combine a set of logical statements that represent a step by step way of finding answers for a given query. Decision trees especially help with resolving shipping-related queries, where with a few simple steps, customers can confirm their order status.

Picture Guides

Like it is said, “A picture is worth a thousand words”, picture guides bring in high level of customer engagement & satisfaction. Having them handy, execs find it easy to help customers navigate through solutions. A picture guides tool integrates over a website and app to act as a strong self-help platform for customers. Offering 360° view of mobile handsets & electronic appliances, it enjoys specific significance to close such orders. Likewise, its integration with back-end tools & existing CRM enables agents with efficient troubleshooting and save NFF (no fault found) returns.

Conclusion

In order to fulfill rising expectations of modern-day customers, you need to put as much focus on customer experience as you put into other functions. But, the question here is – do you carry that expertise, experience, and resource base? Call centers are a boon for every emerging business. Specialists do it better than you can do, scale up & down when its needed, and stay abreast the latest trends.

With decade’s worth of industry experience and having attained a credible name in BPO & technology domain; KocharTech works as a strategic business partner for businesses across industries. Some of the top brands operating in the E-commerce, BFSI, Travel and Telecom industry rely on us to look after their CX initiatives. Get in touch with us to know more.