For a startup business like yours to grow, getting a good first impression from customers is just the start. You also have to nurture those early impressions into lasting relationships with them. However, customer relationship management requires a considerable amount of effort, something you might not always be able to provide in the early stages of business growth.
Luckily, outsourcing can help you in this situation. Let’s look at what it has to offer for your CRM needs and learn how to use it effectively.
Why Outsource Your Customer Relationship Management Duties?
With it being vital for building your startup business customer base, you might be wary of handing over CRM duties to an outside firm. But there are several reasons why doing so will be a good move for you.
Access To Better Talent
Building long-lasting relationships with customers require a lot of skill. And isn’t just about providing adequate support but also in guiding them to get the most out of their purchase journeys. However, that talent comes at a hefty price, something that you might not yet be able to afford for hiring.
With outsourcing, the cost of accessing that talent is much lower than having to hire them. CRM outsourcing providers invest heavily in training their agents. That means that you are getting great value for your money even at a lower price point.
Greater Efficiency In Engaging Startup Business Customers
Outsourcing CRM isn’t just about getting the talent. You also get access to expert strategies. Those will help you better build up your connection with customers. Additionally, they have the tech to understand customer behavior more, resulting in better delivery of your services.
Relieving In-House Burden
As mentioned earlier, customer relationship management is a tedious operation. And for a small startup business like yours, multiple departments can often be affected. Your staff might have to take in more roles than they could to meet the needs of customers.
There is also the challenge of employee turnover, as people leave for better opportunities. Outsourcing can help you lessen these problems while ensuring that good customer relationships continue prospering. You can also quickly scale the operations to match company growth.
How To Start Outsourcing Your Startup Business CRM
Since it is a crucial part of startup business development, you need to lay the CRM outsourcing plan strategically. The first thing to do here is determine the goals that you want for the outsourced CRM.
These goals will decide the overall strategy that an outsourcing provider will employ and the specific functionalities they need to include in your system. Thus, you need to have a clear set of priority goals to emphasize.
For instance, you might want to focus on speed of delivery. Define clear benchmarks that providers can use as a guide. You would also need to show how these goals connect with each other and your larger business strategies.
Defining The Level Of Customer Relationship
Another important consideration is the level of customer relationship you want to maintain. Three different metrics will help you gauge the intensity of the relationship you have.
- Adoption: How much customers have been using your products/services.
- Customer Success: How many tangible benefits customers gained from your business.
- Retention: How long the customer has been staying with you.
By taking these three factors into account, you see the level of investment that customers have made into choosing your brand. That will give you a clear idea of the relationship strength that you have with them.
![\"Typical](\"https://ujet.cx/files/image-10.png\")
Customer interactions. Image from Ujet.
You can then use this to map out the interactions you will have with them. For instance, a customer that has strongly adopted your product will likely want more frequent interactions with you. With this frequency in mind, you can assess how outsourcing will be needed to accommodate each customer.
Determine The Level Of Control You Want
As customer relationship management has a significant impact on your business operations, you would want to have as much control of it as possible. But outsourcing will require you to relinquish some of that control to the team handling the work. The question here is how much control you are willing to give up.
For that, you should have a clear idea of what CRM tasks to outsource. Some of the essential duties that you can consider sending out include:
- Handling client issues throughout the customer lifecycle
- Scheduling and conducting status meetings with customers
- Recording and maintaining client correspondence data
- Creating client-related reports
- Creating customer education content (Videos, tutorials, FAQs)
Note that different departments often handle these tasks. This highlights the fact that relationship management is often a company effort. By determining which departments might need external help, you can decide which sets of tasks to outsource. Look for a balance between control and autonomy to get better results.
Set The Right Expectations For Your Startup Business CRM
You also need to make your expectations clear to the CRM outsourcing provider. As you have already defined your goals, state how you want these met. You need to make sure these expectations are reasonable and within the stated capabilities of the provider.
You also need to develop a set of best practices and standards that will guide the provider in meeting your CRM goals. Work with them to better outline things like when you should receive updates and how customer communications are handled. Once in place, you should review these practices routinely to ensure that they are still meeting your goals.
Get The Right Outsourced CRM Team For A Strong Start
The last thing you would want to weigh is the kind of provider to get for your customer relations management efforts. Opt for one that has diverse experience in different industries. This way, they can better cover the various aspects of your customer engagements.
Virtua Outsourcing Solutions can offer you that level of experience. Our team of agents has worked with different clients, allowing us to participate in varied customer scenarios. Get a strong start building your long-term customer relationships with our help.