Dialing Up a Location: Research Helps Land Ideal Contact Center Destinations
By Miguel A. Ramos
What do contact centers and customer service representatives in Guatemala, China, Texas, the Philippines, Utah and Bulgaria have in common? While these markets represent highly effective onshore, nearshore and offshore contact center markets, they are unique in their attributes to any particular contact center client.
Each shares the attributes that comprise a successful customer engagement facility. For one customer contact center provider, each was planned, developed, equipped, staffed and deployed after intensive research to ensure the market fit customer needs.
With an approach that incorporates both quantitative and qualitative research - and even the discipline of Socratic questioning - an organization can site, source and create a suitable contact center destination that meets a variety of essential business and workforce needs.
The decision of where to place a contact center requires intensive research and investigation that addresses key issues that can determine the program’s success. These include physical location, geographic and geopolitical variables, available suitable real estate, the local population’s education and language proficiency, the depth of the labor pool, and the market’s cost of business. This “defined process” incorporates intensive research and forethought so a suitable location can be scouted, created and staffed as a long-term solution.
Contact centers can vary by industry, customer market served, and specific needs of the organization, but the process of site selection begins the same: by the provider asking the client about the type of work, data sensitivity, and nuanced requirements of the center. This first inquiry is a starting point that will guide every subsequent step of the process.
For example, high-value or elite customers might prefer to have their calls handled by native English speakers, whether from the US or Canada. Additionally, centers serving the banking, financial services, insurance or healthcare industries often must abide by state or federal regulations regarding customer privacy or the handling of private data or in some situations my require specific state licensing. In such cases, this could mandate that contact centers be stationed domestically.
Whether the center is offshore, nearshore or onshore can affect travel times and time zones, both of which can impact timely interaction between US operations from contact centers.
With distance and potential regulatory matters addressed, the next step in qualitative analysis is finding a country, region, then city with attributes matching the client’s stated needs.
Working closely with a commercial real estate advisory firm that can provide detailed labor and location analytics, as well as local economic development organizations and local employers, site selection teams perform quantitative research of markets by analyzing a variety of characteristics.
In a fairly rigorous process, analysis explores real estate availability, incentives and costs, and the infrastructure to support contact center operations. Do buildings exist with sufficient square footage or even available parking spots to accommodate a fully occupied contact center? Does mass transit exist to facilitate commuter traffic to and from the facility?
Research also includes business costs and the general business and political climate. Is the market perceived as safe or relatively crime free? Is it known for a strong work ethic or a multi-lingual workforce?
Availability of labor is essential to any successful center. Labor and employment levels, prevailing wages, even whether the labor force is suitable for contact center work must be explored, as must educational opportunities in the local market. The greater the availability of higher education, the higher the likelihood of recruiting a skilled or more easily trained workforce.
With these answers in hand, weighed and tied to the specific opportunity, the information is taken to the client for approval before moving to qualitative assessment. Due diligence and data analysis can help verify quantitative findings. Any concerns raised are addressed. Once approved, the process moves to qualitative analysis.
Qualitative research should help support the quantitative findings. For example, though research may reveal a deep labor pool of seemingly qualified workers, the Labor Analytics team can talk with other organizations or complementary industries can help validate assumptions. Job fairs, open houses and employee candidate interactions can help perform a more detailed assessment of the assumptions. A deeper labor market study of hundreds of candidates can further confirm or refute findings.
Even the existence of other contact centers in the market can help capture the market’s nuance. For example, if a market is saturated with centers, this could lead to centers competing to retain qualified reps and the escalation of costs. Conversely, research might reveal whether the presence of other centers has infused the market with experienced reps and a robust talent pool.
Such interactions can drive local market interest. For example, a job fair and open house held in one US market prior to the opening of a local 700-seat contact center saw in excess of 1,000 attendees waiting the morning of the event. Further qualitative research by the Talent Acquisition Group helped determine whether the candidates had the right skills, backgrounds, education and personality for customer interactions by telephone and computer.
In all, this process can take upward of three to six months. Starting with a broad list of cities, regions or metro areas in general, sites then are narrowed by client preference to a short list of candidate locations using market attributes and competitive forces. In the end, using a defined process to delve into the research to evaluate market attributes can help pick the ideal contact center location - whether across the country, across a nearshore border, or halfway around the world.
###
Miguel A. Ramos is Executive Vice President of Corporate Development with C3 / Customer Contact Channels. The Fort Lauderdale, Florida-based firm helps Fortune 500 corporations maximize customer relationships across all channels, including voice, the web and social media.