By Erika Morphy CRM Buyer Part of the ECT News Network
01/05/06 9:45 AM PT
Home-based agents are quickly becoming an accepted part of outsourcing, now that there is general recognition that they can reduce the cost of a contact center's workforce -- the most expensive item in its budget -- and technology is up to speed. Ironically, they may even rehabilitate the practice's tarnished reputation, as it becomes a source of job gains instead of losses.
How Much is 'Free' Costing You? Learn how DaveRamsey.com saw a 567% uplift in ROI with Omniture. This complimentary guide and webinar cover the most important factors in selecting an analytics solution. Download Now.
The home-based customer care market -- a small but quickly growing niche of the contact center industry -- could triple by 2010 to 300,000, according to a new report by IDC.
"Current estimates put the number of home-based agents at 112,000, so that is a strong growth rate," Stephen Loynd, senior analyst for IDC's CRM and Customer Care BPO service, told CRM Buyer.
The study, "Home-Based Agent 2005-2010 Forecast and Analysis: Converging Economic Forces to Drive the Expansion of Homeshoring in the United States," marks the first time IDC has quantified the market. In its previous look at the sector, the research firm examined the business case for using home agents.
The Case for Home-Based
Though still in its nascent stages, it has been clear for some time that home-based customer care could change the business case for the contact center , Loynd said. "There are a number of situations in which using a home-based agent model is more appropriate than outsourcing customer care to a center staffed by agents," he noted.
Briefly, these include lower overhead costs for the contact center, greater flexibility in filling peak call times, the ability to attract a more qualified workforce and less turnover.
"These factors are even more important now with the higher energy costs," Loynd said. "Having to drive long distances to work is definitely a drawback."
The Tech Factor
Avaya Proactive Contact 3.0, a predictive dialing software application released in September, can support home-based agents, for instance.
LiveOps provides another example. Its on-demand contact center application offers companies a hosted tech platform that supports distributed agents. One of its strong selling points is that it can integrate with existing systems, such as scheduling or workforce management, CEO Bill Trenchard told CRM Buyer.
"We have integrated not just the telephony components but the entire suite of applications to manage an agent network remotely," he explained.
The growing trend among contact centers to use home-based agents is fueling the company's growth, Trenchard said. Launched in 2001, it has doubled its headcount and size every year since.
New Associations
Home-based agents are quickly becoming an accepted part of outsourcing, Loynd said, now that there is general
recognition that they can reduce the cost of a contact center's workforce -- the most expensive item in its budget -- and technology is up to speed. Ironically, they may even rehabilitate the practice's tarnished reputation, as it becomes a source of job gains instead of losses.
Five9, a provider of on-demand call center applications, points to its contract with the Military Order of the Purple Heart (MOPH) Service Foundation, a veterans organization dedicated to combat-wounded veterans, as an example. Late last year, Five9 announced that MOPH selected its Virtual Contact Center to train veterans to work from their homes as help
desk advocates, service coordinators and customer research technicians.
"We wanted the virtual training experience to be as realistic as possible and to mirror the pace and volume that veterans can expect from any call center organization," said said Ken Smith, Program Manager, MOPH Service Foundation. "We needed a call center solution with predictive dialing technology that we could use for these virtual home-based agents."
Other vendors or providers active in this space include Alpine Access, Aspect Software, Intellicare, LiveOps, VIP Desk and Willow.
McAfee Agrees to SEC Fine, Looks to Future January 05, 2006
McAfee already faces an uphill battle against larger rival Symantec and is now part of a security industry that has seen widespread consolidation, with firms rolling up various technologies -- anti-virus, spam blocking, firewalls and so on -- to create broad offerings.
Related Stories
Measuring Customer Satisfaction Like You Mean It June 24, 2005
You have to wonder where all that customer satisfaction data goes once collected. The cardinal sin of customer satisfaction surveys is that they literally end up in the closets, abandoned cubicles, long-term storage, or just thrown out -- and the internal teams that really need them -- engineering, support, and most of all sales -- are denied this data.
Streamlined Customer Care with VoIP June 23, 2005
The cost benefits of VoIP make it very attractive for online retailers and call centers that contract with online retailers to adopt this emerging technology for their customer care applications. Moreover, VoIP enables retailers to offer streamlined customer care, combining "instant messaging" with "live chat" to provide customers a rich shopping experience, and enhance brand loyalty.
HPshopping.com's Nikhil Behl Reveals E-Tail Strategy February 28, 2005
Hewlett-Packard has been able to channel its technological background and expertise to enhance its customers' online shopping experience, Nikhil Behl, vice president of strategy and development at the Sunnyvale, California-based HPshopping.com, said in a recent interview.
The Insane World of Home Electronics: Home Automation November 22, 2004
The traditional home automation technology, and the one I've been using since the early 80s, is X10. Yes, this is the same company that drove us crazy a few years ago with pop-ups suggesting we hide cameras in inappropriate places.
Building Reliable Customer Data Tools October 26, 2004
Like plumbing in a house, the tools that push data through the pipes are not representative of the overarching blueprint needed for customer data integration architecture. The cornerstone of the architecture is the recognition that different types of data need to be treated separately.
Related News Alerts
More by Erika Morphy
Roku Channel Store Hangs Out Shingle November 23, 2009
Roku's new channel store is based on a "one screen in the cloud" business model, said Michael Gartenberg, vice president of strategy and analysis with Interpret. "Essentially, what they are doing is taking the TV set -- whether it is a standard appliance or a high-def monster -- and enhancing it with content the consumer wants to see."
Ballmer Gives Shareholders - and Dell - Cause for Optimism November 20, 2009
Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer was all smiles at the company's shareholders meeting, as he touted the early success of Windows 7. Ballmer's cheer may have been contagious; after posting a massive earnings decline for the third quarter, Dell needed some good news to latch onto, and the prospect of broad enterprise adoption of Windows 7 could spur PC sales.
AA.com Sucks the Fun Out of Trip-Planning November 20, 2009
Using AA.com to book a flight was a painful experience. Densely packed, disorganized information was displayed in an unattractive format. On the plus side, it did seem as though the deals American Airlines advertised were real and not mere bait-and-switch lures. For anyone who wants a travel-planning Web site to inject a little pleasure into the experience, though, I say look elsewhere.
Headline Feeds
care market -- a small but quickly growing niche of the contact center industry -- could triple by 2010 to 300,000, according to a new report by IDC.
Talkback: 
