Outsourcing is Not Just for the Big Daddies

The value chain for any business runs across the top to bottom. There are premium players who provide 'A' set of services/ product offerings/ propositions and these are followed by many service providers which are active at the lower end of the value chain, providing supporting services/ creating innovative/ niche service offerings.

Outsourcing: the business case:
With Small and Medium Enterprises there is a peculiar catch of bandwidth and critical human resources. While serving customers to the best of the possible nuances which the SME has, achieving the ultimate customer satisfaction levels always remains a challenge with the rising expectations. Customer retention is critical for any business, but is all the more necessary for SME's. A major part of retaining the best customers includes serving them with the best you have.

Source: http://www.webdesigndev.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/outsourcing.gif

Got, it, so how do we solve the challenge and reign supreme?
Lets first break the mold that outsourcing is the game for only the big daddy of the market. Today, many smart SME's are outsourcing work to niche 'smaller' players in the market. For example: we recently got to know of an educational institution, which runs career oriented degree courses. To ensure quality, they call proven experts in their respective domains as visiting faculties from the top institutions from India and abroad. This is apart from the full time faculty they have.

Now, its not that the college cannot afford full time faculty. They very well can, but the full time resources may not have the real hands-on experience of the emerging domains/ subjects which the college wants to include in its curriculum. This approach helps the college in quality delivery of the course and hence the word of mouth publicity resulting in creating a solid brand positioning and more registrations for their future batches.

But we want to grow, why outsource?
Lets create an expectation head on, any business grows if the related ecosystem grows. Hence outsourcing, as a part of your services to niche players in the market will not only help you grow but also help in delivering quality at affordable prices.

And how to find trustworthy partners?
We want trust-worthy partners and not just a company which we can outsource to. We want people who are passionate towards mutual growth and really making things work. The first and the most obvious choice as we have seen from our experience of closely working with the SMEs is 'personal references', options from friends and family. The second best option nowadays is to go online. There are many B2B exchanges and crowdsourcing platforms online, which have lakhs of sellers/ service providers listed with them, which can deliver good quality at affordable prices.

Let us know if you have any questions/ queries by dropping in a comment to this post. The IndiaMART Knowledge Services team will get in touch with you, to understand your business better and further suggest you a customized solution.