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After India, the next best destination for business process outsourcing is no doubt the Philippines. All over the country, there are now several call centers and other business process outsourcing ventures that are operating. A quick scan of Philippine newspaper will reveal that more than half of the available jobs are business process outsourcing jobs. Our export sector has exhibited growth due to business brought about by business process outsourcing despite the dwindling dollar. With all these facts in mind, it would seem that putting up a call center seems very lucrative.

We thought of putting up a call center because of these developments. However as we closely studied the call center business, there were several things that we learned that helped dispel our misconceptions about call centers. They are as follows:

1.) Operating a Call Center still follows the traditional business processes - Contrary to what most people believe, Operating a call center does not spell instant big bucks in a short period of time. Just because the demand in the market is so big and because you are earning dollars does not necessarily follow instant profits.

According to the study presented to us, it is only in the second year that the call center starts to profit. In the first year, losses or a break even has to be incurred first. This is similar to any kind of business. You can’t expect to profit immediately. There is a window of time where sacrifices have to be made. Just like any traditional business you have to have a good management team. A lot of small time call center operations have been shutdown due to bad management. Most importantly your Human resource has to be very good as this is one of the most important departments of the call center operations.

2.) Operating a Call center requires intensive Capitalization - Most people believe that putting up a call center requires very much little capitalization. After all you just rent a small space, put up a bunch of computers hook it up to internet connection and viola !!! You can now begin operating right ? Wrong !!! Operating a call center requires intensive capitalization. The dialing software alone cost more than a million pesos. Add to that the computers, plus you have to get licensed copies of Windows XP. You have to set up a server, a good stable and fast internet connection, hook up the wires, buy i.p telephones that call center agents will use.

3.) Starting a call center requires you to intensively market it - There are those who think that since there is so much demand for call centers if they build it, clients will come. This kind of mentality is what causes other small call center operators to close down. The demand is not just for any “call centers” per se, the big demand is for reputable call centers. This means that you have to project yourself as somebody who can deliver services that their clients wants them to deliver. Since you are new in the call center industry, you will have to work hard to establish yourself as “reputable.”

Big names in the industry have no problem establishing themselves as reputable. They easily get clients because they have a name. Small players players still have to prove themselves, so they usually go for the outbound. (By Outbound we are referring to call center agents calling persons abroad trying to sell something or offering a service whereas inbound refers to catering to the needs of already existing clients of big companies who outsource their customer support to call centers.) There is no question that money can be made in outbound calls. However take note that most outbound agreements are performance basis. So if your agents sell a lot of products you make a lot of money, but if they don’t then you loose. It may take a while for small players to show the client that they can be trusted with the outbound before clients give them the inbound.

With all these in mind, before you jump into the bandwagon of the business process outsourcing industry especially call center operations, think before you leap !

Tags: Business

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