Dealing with email backlogs is among challenges online retailers face when they return from their vacation. However, busy retailers without a customer service team frequently disregard these emails. In fact, it’s been estimated that 10% to 14% of customer emails are deleted without being opened.
An email could be an opportunity to build long-term customer relationships. It could also be a chance to upsell or cross-sell a product your customer may need. When you delete a customer email, it can cost you another loyal customer that can bring more sales to your business.
If emails are getting piled up and consuming your most valuable time, it’s a sign that you need to start outsourcing your email support functions. This blog post provides an in-depth explanation of email support outsourcing and how it benefits your customer service.
What Is Email Support Outsourcing?
Email support outsourcing is the process of subcontracting your email support functions to an outsourcing company. An outsourced email support agent assists customers with queries including but not limited to the following:
- Answering general product or service inquiries
- Setting up customer accounts
- Troubleshooting customer issues and providing resolution
- Order taking and tracking
- Order status processing(claims, cancellations, refunds)
- Creating simple quotations and sales orders
- Abandoned cart follow-ups
Aside from inbound customer support, email support service providers also offer outbound services to help businesses generate leads and increase sales:
- Upselling and cross-selling emails
- Market research
- Appointment setting
- Customer surveys
- Post-sale follow-ups
Google, the world’s top search engine, had outsourced its email support for their Adwords account management to the Philippines. This strategy has helped the company reaped positive ROI and improved their customer satisfaction scores.
What Are the Top Benefits of Email Support Outsourcing?
1. Save on operational costs
An entire in-house email support operation can be costly for a business to run. Your bottom line may suffer as a result of the expense of purchasing the infrastructure, paying agents on the payroll, and offering recurring benefits to employees. If you want to save up to 70% on your operational costs, then consider email support outsourcing.
When you outsource your email support function, you only pay for the service you need. Other business requirements such as recruitment, training, office space, and equipment are covered by your outsourcing partner. This helps you minimize your labor costs and allocate more budget on your high-revenue generating activities.
If your company is based in the US, it’s wise to choose the Philippines as your outsourcing destination. The lower exchange rate of the Philippine Peso versus the US Dollar makes outsourcing email support more cost-efficient.
2. Access industry-leading software
When unanswered emails get piled up, it’s a best practice for a business to install email response management software. However, this software may cost a business from $15 – $39 per agent per month. If you want to access industry-leading software to make your email management more efficient, then hire a reliable outsourcing provider.
Email support outsourcing companies ensure that all your emails are correctly responded to by using the best tools in the market. They have tools that can generate data reports that give your business better insights on the effectiveness of your staff. This can assist you in raising your CSAT rating and improve your staff’s productivity.
3. Free up internal resources
According to email receiving statistics, the average person receives more than 100 emails every day. Certainly, anyone from your customer service team cannot check all your emails as their attention is divided over other communication channels. Hence, there are important emails that don’t get prompt answers which can lead to lost sales opportunities.
Outsourcing email support frees up your internal resources and uses them for other customer service functions. This allows your in-house staff to focus on their field of expertise while an email support agent handles your email management. It guarantees that all emails get answered in real-time and no other customer support functions get abandoned by the lack of resource flexibility.
4. Boost online sales
Your email support function does more than providing assistance to your customer’s inquiries. It could be fully utilized to boost your sales with the right upselling and cross-selling techniques. If anyone in your team doesn’t have expertise in email marketing, you may want to partner with a service provider.
An outsourced email agent can suggest other products with better usage and benefits when addressing a customer's inquiries. They might also recommend alternatives in the same price range to sell products that are not frequently purchased. In addition, they can promote your special offers to encourage customers to buy products more than they had originally intended to.
5. Increase customer satisfaction
Email is the most accessible channel for your customers. When they can’t reach you out via telephone, they opt to send emails and wait for your immediate response. However, after your business hours, none of your in-house staff will check on your customer emails. Without any response in less than one hour, a customer may lose interest in your business.
You can only increase your customer satisfaction by providing after-hours customer support. If you want to extend your email support beyond the traditional business hours, consider hiring email support agents in the Philippines. They can work on night shifts, weekends, and even holidays to provide your customers with uninterrupted customer support. This will result in happier customers and reduced email backlogs.
How Much Does It Cost to Outsource Email Support?
According to Glassdoor, the average monthly salary for email support agents in the US is $3,083.75. Other benefits like health insurance, paid time off, wellness programs, allowances, and incentives are not included in this.
You can hire a skilled email support agent at a fixed monthly charge of $1,425 when you outsource to a Philippine-based outsourcing company like ManilaPros. That amounts to less than half of the wage rates for email support roles available in the US.
Every email support agent you hire with ManilaPros comes with training, quality assurance, backup support, and a dedicated account manager. We can assist you in scaling up your customer service team quickly while reducing your labor expenses by as much as 70%.
Hire the Best Email Support Agents in the Philippines
Do you want to see faster ROI on your email customer support? Then, partner with a BPO company in the Philippines. Hire Filipino email agents with superior communication skills and work ethics.
At ManilaPros, we offer five-star customer care for retailers aiming to deliver high-quality responses to their customers’ inquiries. Our customer care Pros are thoroughly vetted by our recruitment powerhouse and will be certified for your brand through on-brand training and rigorous assessments.
Book a call with us today to learn more.
