Types of Call Centres for Business
Understanding the purpose of your call centre is crucial in determining its operations, measuring performance, and generating income. Outbound or inbound services are mainly handled by call centres.
Inbound Call Centre:
An inbound call centre mainly addresses customer-initiated queries. This call centre type works well for those who focus on helping people and are less concerned with the performance-to-income ratio. As a customer service provider, an inbound call centre handles technical support, process, and dispatch orders.
Outbound Call Centre:
In an outbound call centre, a call centre agent makes calls to a customer for telemarketing, sales, surveys, or fundraising purposes. The calls could either be cold or warm. This call centre type is ideal for those who have previous sales experience and highly motivated by reaching commercial targets.
Examples of Outbound Call Centre Services:
– Pay per lead telemarketing: A call centre places calls to potential customers to generate leads that have shown interest in your service.
– Telemarketing appointment setting: This process involves arranging for the team selling the product or service to meet with the client intending to buy that service.
Combining Inbound and Outbound Calls:
It’s possible to handle both inbound and outbound calls if you have the relevant capacity and staffing. Offering a combination of inbound and outbound services caters to all stages of a customer’s journey and work with a wider range of clients.
In-person or Virtual Call Centres:
Apart from location, the most significant difference between in-person and virtual call centres is the type of phone system used.
In-person Call Centres:
This call centre type is not reliant on the internet to make or answer calls, and training with all staff in the same location is often quicker. It could, however, be expensive, have limited talent pools for hiring, and operations are restricted to just one timezone.
Virtual Call Centres:
This call centre type is cheaper to operate, requires only minimal technology, allows for the possibility of hiring staff around the world, and provides the ability to work in multiple languages and timezones. Delays in internal communications are, however, likely to occur, and hiring internationally could be more complicated.
Using Both In-Person and Virtual Operations:
It’s possible to manage a call centre with both in-person and virtual operations, with some staff located on site and others working remotely.
How Call Centres Generate Income:
Different call centre types generate revenue in various ways. A call centre contracted to generate sales will make money off commission from successful sales. Alternatively, if your call centre handles the customer service side of an organisation, your business, and employees may be paid per minute, hour, or call when fielding any inbound calls. As an outsourced call centre, you will usually agree on a custom solution for services before providing services for a client.
In summary, understanding different call centre types is essential for businesses looking to maximize their customer service and generate income. Knowing the best call centre type for your business between inbound or outbound, in-person or virtual, or a combination of both is the key to achieving your business objectives.
