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Cheaper, Better Customer Service? Try "Homeshoring"
When DigitalBridge Communications launched its broadband wireless services company in 2005, the company decided to use home-based, outsourced virtual customer service agents instead of a site-specific, company-managed call center. It saved a bundle of money.
“Homeshoring,” as contracting with home-based workers is known, shaved 40 percent off the price of hiring folks to handle customer calls, says Kristen Kizer, director of customer care for the Ashburn, Va.-based startup that provides services to rural and underserved communities.
Contracting with Arise Virtual Solutions Inc., to supply home-based agents was the easiest, and most affordable, way to manage customer service.
Outsourcing saves the overhead costs associated with operating a call center, which is one of the major advantages of homeshoring, says Stephen Loynd, a telecommunications analyst for IDC, of Framingham, Mass.
The other advantage of homeshoring is the kind of people it attracts.
Agents buy their own equipment and pay for monthly Internet service. And for the most part, the home-based agents set their own schedules, which attracts more qualified agents, such as stay-at-home moms, idle retirees and college students, Kizer says.
Homeshoring Takes Off
JetBlue Airways was one of the first companies to use homeshoring. In 2000, the budget airline’s own agents began taking calls from home; it now has 900 home-based reservation agents in metro Salt Lake City.
Author: Lynne Meredith Schreiber
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