Evolution
As the economic slowdown casts a dark shadow over industries across the country, the light at the end of the tunnel may seem a long way off. However, businesses cannot afford to rest on their laurels and wait for the gloom to lift, they must take control and illuminate the way forward themselves. This is precisely what many businesses are doing with regards to outsourcing their customer communications.
A time of crisis encourages a business to reassess its current operating model and to streamline and optimise its operations wherever possible. Companies need innovative ways to reduce operating costs without compromising on the service levels and quality provided to their end consumer. This desire is leading to outsourcing partnerships with specialist managed service providers, who already have the requisite platforms and process management expertise in place to allow organisations to balance creativity, cost, quality, responsiveness and risk.
The traditional approach of using a design agency to produce the creative solution and then engaging with a separate print management company to look after the rest of the marketing value chain is changing. An increasing number of companies are looking to partner with outsourcing vendors who can provide an extended solution portfolio that encompasses the complete customer communication life-cycle of design, production, delivery and in-bound document processing.
Faster
There are significant productivity benefits to be gained by challenging the traditional multi-supplier approach. This evolution has led to the creation of an extended print management service which pulls together a wider spectrum of customer communication management services. Bringing creative design, document production, print management and distribution under one contract, and managed by a single vendor, can save a substantial amount of money, as well as delivering an efficient, faster and more transparent way of working.
Some of the key questions that organisations need to ask when embarking on an outsourcing partnership are:
• Does the vendor have a strong track record of delivering innovation in both design services and operational management?
• Does have vendor have a first class design pedigree?
• Does the vendor have a proven and flexible outsourcing platform that spans the complete customer communication life-cycle?
• Does the vendor have the requisite technology infrastructure to provide leading edge solutions, for example incorporating digital asset management, workflow, colour and brand management, e-procurement and warehousing and logistics management?
Does the vendor have the ability to manage customer communications across multiple channels, including hard copy, SMS, email and web.
Outsourcers can use their specialist knowledge to help organisations develop a strategic approach to customer communication management to ensure that their end customers remain satisfied. These companies can also help to improve a client’s business resilience through continuous monitoring of the services and equipment it provides. This constant review process allows the outsourcer to evolve the contract according to the client’s needs, while delivering real cost savings but without compromising on flexibility.
The extension of the print management outsourcing model will create new dynamics in the market as an increasing number of companies start to adopt a “one stop shop” strategy. How this will impact the traditional design agency model over the next few years will be an interesting trend to monitor.
Traditional design agencies may have to develop and expand their services in order to move further across the supply chain and print management companies will have to move up the value chain to embrace creative services in order to meet the growing sophistication of client demands. The prevailing outsourcing vendors will have to have the ability to tailor their solution to meet the exact needs of the client across the complete communication life-cycle, eliminating all unnecessary costs, whilst at the same time delivering greater accountability, transparency and operational efficiency.
Getting Close
As businesses’ buying criteria become more sophisticated there is an increasing requirement for vendors to get as close to their clients as possible and to really understand their business and the challenges they are facing. This deep understanding will result in more compelling creative output and more efficient and effective process management. The size of an outsourcing provider is not a barometer of how responsive or flexible that vendor can be in meeting their client’s needs. Rather it is the culture of agility within the vendor and their commitment to provide tailored solutions that will be the measure of their success.
The key to on-going success for any organisation, irrespective of what sector they operate in, is to continually evolve to meet the changing needs of their target markets. For design agencies, and broader based customer communication management outsourcing companies alike, the speed and effectiveness of how this challenge is met will determine who sees the light and who remains in the gloom.
More information about RR Donnelley GDS’ customer communications outsourcing services is available at www.rrdgds.com