Frequently Asked
Questions

CustomerServ is the "anti-broker" and if you're leery of brokers, we don't blame you-- so are we. "Me too" brokers try to emulate us but the broker model is flawed and exploitative.  

Many brokers are newcomers that will sling false claims and random vendors at you, hoping one of them sticks. CustomerServ is real, with a legacy, pristine references, strategic, curated, vested, accountable and not desperate to close a deal like brokers are. 

A simple "vendor referral" won't cut it in our world and we won't "shop" your valuable business around to 2nd rate vendors who pay to play, like brokers do.   

Founded in 2006, CustomerServ is the BPO industry's authentic ecosystem for discerning brands to discover their best vendor partnerships. 

We can go on but we think you get the picture. 

The vendor landscape is changing faster than ever. As an individual client or buyer of outsourcing, it can be a challenge to stay current on vendors. And even if you know the call center BPO landscape well, we live in it all day, monitoring who is winning and losing deals, which individual vendor site locations should be avoided, what management changes will impact a vendor and so much more.

Because our industry is overcrowded with vendors, you can truly miss the best options for your needs. That's why your peers count on us to recommend vendors they may have incidentally overlooked. Even the savviest and outsourcing buyers trust us to match them with "hidden performers" - making a dramatic difference in their outsourcing results.

Our full-time world is the call center industry. We're embedded at the front-lines, analyzing the marketplace, watching who is succeeding, struggling, growing… who is excelling for which clients and which vendors are really making a splash in the industry. We closely track the progress of our current and prospective vendors, and  never take our eyes off the rapidly changing vendor universe.

We are speaking to other leaders, monitoring which vendors are delighting their clients and constantly looking for new faces and rising stars. From that intelligence, we utilize well-proven evaluation techniques to identify “standout” vendors who undergo our rigorous due diligence process before making it to our elite list of providers.

No.

We do not take over your vendor selection process. We help you discover credentialed vendors that you may not be aware of. We recommend vendors based on your needs and our matching process-- then you decide. You remain in complete control of your company’s due diligence, RFP and purchasing procedures so nothing in your internal process changes. Our recommended vendors will undergo your evaluation as if you selected them independently of us. You can negotiate terms directly with the vendor or with our guidance. You contract with the vendor directly not through us. There is no obligation to select any of our recommendations and you always make the final decision.

Every CustomerServ vendor is visited on-site and a due diligence assessment is completed by our team long before the point of inclusion in our portfolio and recommendation to you. Our rigorous vetting process includes well-proven methodologies accrued over decades of experience in analyzing the key differentiators between call center BPOs.

We leave no stone un-turned in our evaluation process of prospective vendors. We don’t score on size alone; magnitude does not equate with performance or quality. Our driving force in vendor assessments is totality, meaningful data and a scoring system that demands the very best from our vendors. And our vetting process isn’t a one-time thing. We work alongside our clients, analyzing results, engaged at all levels after vendor selection to support the success of the vendor relationship.

Our team has vetted over 600 call center BPO vendors since 2006. Our active portfolio is fewer than 100 who have passed our rigorous due diligence process. Our vendor group reflects our high standards combined with the needs of our clients and their evolving demands for specific skill sets, sophistication level, geographic locations, price points and expertise.

CustomerServ is continuously vetting call center BPO providers with an eye for rising stars and emerging leaders. Since we don't "place projects" like one-and-done brokers do, we prefer to maintain an elite group of vendors with a broad set of skills that we match with precision and accuracy with our client's needs. 

CustomerServ’s vendors range in size from $20 million in annual revenues to $200 million in annual revenues. We have developed a vendor profile and rating system which categorizes our vendors by size and industry position.

Our vendors offer a broad range of client expertise from Fortune 50 outsourcing buyers all the way to tech startups and everything in between. Our clients are generally seeking vendor relationships that meet their staffing and growth requirements along with better customer intimacy and a nimble culture.

CustomerServ helps organizations of all sizes and every level of sophistication across a wide spectrum of industry verticals with discovering the right call center vendors. We will not consider helping companies in financial distress or, companies without the budget to support a minimum outsourcing headcount that our vendors may require. 

Our clients consist of Fortune 100 companies to well-funded startups—from companies outsourcing for the first-time to the savviest and most experienced “buyers” of call center outsourcing services. We evaluate each client’s outsourcing needs on an individual basis before recommending the right vendor(s).

Yes – this is part of our investment in you, at no fee. We are experts in designing and administering an effective RFI and RFP process in conjunction with our clients. We maintain a database of RFP questions and templates that we have written for our clients across multiple vertical industries. Our custom RFPs are created specifically for our clients with carefully crafted questions that will extrapolate the data points needed from a vendor in order to help our clients make a well-informed decision. We are happy to assist in writing the RFP, compiling a short-list of suppliers, creating your scoring templates and administering the process for you or in conjunction with your team.

Yes. The CustomerServ team has extensive expertise in conducting vendor site visits. We joke that our team "lives" at our vendor sites. Nobody knows our vendors better than we do and we invest heavily in frequently visiting, conducting focus groups and keeping up with our vendors' growth and development.

We often accompany our clients on site visits and assist with on-site due diligence if you would like us to. Keep in mind that our vendors have already undergone rigorous on-site due diligence by our team even before they are recommended to you. Therefore, our providers are thoroughly screened by us, prior to your visit.

CustomerServ is geographically diverse-- our vendors provide US onshore, nearshore and offshore sites. Our philosophy is centered on matching the best geographic solutions that meet our clients' needs. The rightsourcing concept that we talk about focuses on the perfect combination of customer experience, agent skill sets, culture, pricing, total cost of ownership and a number of other variables that help our clients determine which country and vendor(s) are the right options. At the present time, our engagements are 50% domestic US and 50% nearshore/offshore. We’ve cultivated emerging offshore markets as well, and we consult our clients on the right de-risking strategies.

Yes.

Nearly 35% of CustomerServ's clients are outsourcing for the first time with our expert guidance in designing an outsourcing roadmap with the right call center vendor(s). CustomerServ alleviates "outsourcing anxiety" with a prescriptive solution including perfectly-matched vendors experienced with insourcing to outsourcing migration.

Whether you’re considering a single line of business as a proof of concept or larger initiatives, we know what is at stake and we can help you obtain stakeholder buy-in. And we’ll raise our hands and tell you if outsourcing might not be the right solution at this time, if we determine this to be the case.

Testimonials are on our website already - from real leaders with real-world experience working with us. We encourage you to review our testimonials and, upon request, we’ll gladly furnish references from your peers who have found the right vendors with our guidance. We encourage you to speak with our clients to better understand the value we bring in your vendor search. Case studies are also available on our website for your review.

No, you do not. If you engage us to help you find the right call center vendor(s), there is no contract between you and CustomerServ only an NDA. There is never any exclusivity and you are not obligated to select our vendors or go with our recommendations - but we think you will. We're confident that if you choose to engage us in your vendor search, you will be delighted with the outcome.

There is no obligation on your part to select a CustomerServ vendor - but we think you just might. At the point of recommendation, our vendors are selected 94% of the time. We will not engage in a vendor search for you unless we have total confidence in matching you with a vendor that gives you a great chance of outsourcing success and a lasting partnership. Our discovery process focused on better understanding your needs will help us determine the right solutions.

There’s never a fee to utilize us in your search. When we engage in matching you with the right vendor(s), CustomerServ is responsible for all the costs we incur. We invest heavily in our due diligence process and the "science" behind the match. And this investment is ongoing.

CustomerServ's fee is covered by our vendor only when, and if, our vendor is selected. After which, our fee is remunerated under the vendor's normal, planned SG&A budget so it’s completely seamless for the client. In CustomerServ’s client-vendor engagements we do not permit the involvement of the vendor's internal commissioned salesperson - this is non-negotiable. 

By eliminating the salesperson and requiring our fee to be planned for as part of the provider’s normal budget line item for marketing, this ensures that your contract rate reflects the price points that you desire with no incremental fees to you.

Being an elite call center vendor doesn’t always mean that you are equally strong in marketing your services effectively. In fact, in our experience some of the best vendors in the call center industry are the weakest in telling their story effectively.

Elite vendors often fly under the radar, reinvesting in their people and operations instead of salespeople and glitzy marketing pitches. As a result, most of the time our client didn’t know that our recommended vendors even existed.

The advantage to our vendors is the CustomerServ "seal of approval" if they pass our rigorous due diligence. Representation by us is a meaningful endorsement in a vendor and we make it easier for our clients to discover new faces that they have not considered or may overlook without us.

When you proceed with our recommended vendor(s), they will engage with you and your procurement group directly. Any vendor recommended by us will undergo your vetting and due diligence process irrespective of our pre-screen and heavy due diligence conducted before the point of recommendation to you.

Nothing will change in your normal due diligence of our vendors, including the completion of RFIs, RFPs and any other requirements that your organization has. Our role is to support the process in any way that we can - remaining as involved or involved or uninvolved as you want us to be.

Not everything is “outsourceable," we get this. The CustomerServ team will recommend the best strategy for your individual needs, including the possibility that your organization may not be ready for a 3rd party call center vendor relationship. We’re pro-outsourcing but also pro-transparency. We’re in the very fortunate position of not being salespeople with a quota to fill. A responsible pro-outsourcing leader like CustomerServ is smart enough to know when outsourcing isn’t the right move for an organization - and we’ll be upfront about it.  

Most of us won’t make a purchase in our personal lives or in business without first going to a review site or asking an expert that has properly vetted the product or service that we wish to buy.

The ecosystem that we have created enables discerning buyers to discover the right outsourcers that we have hand selected based on our expertise.

We invest heavily in our vetting process and advocate for the vendors that pass the rigors of our due diligence and will only recommend vendors that match your needs perfectly. We will not “sling” vendors at you like one-and-done brokers do. And it is ultimately your decision to accept or reject our recommendations - you have no risk and no obligation.