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Case Study: Consumer Products & Services

This Fortune 100 technology company providing wireless service and equipment to over 65 million consumers relies on Working Solutions for additional sales specialists during peak demand.

The Challenge

Like most technology and service providers, the client has a seasonal sales cycle with annual sales weighted heavily in the fourth quarter. Prior to teaming with Working Solutions, they had scheduled a major marketing campaign in the fall to maximize sales opportunities in that crucial fourth quarter. The problem they faced was a greatly increased call volume to their call centers that would need to be handled by limited capacity.

The client needed to have adequate fourth quarter staffing in order to not lose sales due to long wait times created by increased call volume. However, their existing call center was at maximum capacity. They had several options to consider and needed to make a decision quickly.

The logistics of expanding their in-house resources in such a short timeframe led them to immediately consider other options. However, ramping up, only to downsize after the marketing campaign, would require a huge capital outlay that might not be offset by the anticipated profit of the marketing campaign.

Offshoring was considered, but did not meet the timeframe or standard of quality care the company wanted to maintain. After considering all possibilities, the company chose to partner with Working Solutions to meet their needs. They were impressed with the depth of expertise and quality of service provided by Agents OnDemand, and intrigued by the pay structure of base, plus incentive – a structure that was beneficial to both the specialists and the company.

The Solution

The program with Working Solutions was so successful that everyone involved from my company wanted to take credit for the project. Senior Executive

The client was not accustomed to outsourcing and often relied on internal resources to fill a traditional brick-andmortar facility, but they needed to find a cost effective solution to quickly augment their existing staff without sacrificing quality. Knowing that Working Solutions offers highly skilled specialists with industry-specific experience – Agents OnDemand – the client asked Working Solutions to find sales specialists to fill their need.

Drawing from their community of more than 76,000 experienced agents, Working Solutions deployed 200 sales specialists within a mere three weeks, all of whom had industry expertise – most with 5 to 8 years of experience.

The benefit of experienced staff was a corresponding reduction in preparation time of 25 to 30 percent, allowing implementation of the program in a shorter timeframe.

In addition, many of the agents selected for the project were already customers of the company, who therefore understood their billing, plans, phones and other equipment – further reducing preparation time and improving service levels.

The Result

With optimum staffing levels to meet call projections and highly experienced sales specialists fully prepared, the client was able to leverage their fall marketing campaign. When the call volume increased, appropriate staffing ensured that customers were able to speak to an agent quickly and receive valid information once the call was in progress.

Strong listening skills and superior product knowledge enabled the Working Solutions’ agents to provide customers with comprehensive information upon which to base buying decisions, leading to:

• Increased sales conversion rates and average order values
• Reduced churn during the first 90 days post-sale
• Improved overall customer service resulting in increased customer loyalty

With the help of Working Solutions, the client was able to meet their targeted sales projections, increase their client base and build customer loyalty, while staying within their budget.