Hi Mike

I run an outsourced call centre that looks after many virtual businesses / ecommorce sales order lines etc.

We have been working closely with some of our key e-tailer clients recently and have found that on average sales through the call centre tend to be around 25% high in order value than through the website.

There are several reasons for this - I think one of the most prominent is that there is research that proves that over £50 order value there is a resistnace to order directly through the internet site by a significant proportion of users, especially where there is a lack of brand image to support the trust issue.

Also, 1-2-1 conversations allow a better opportunity to apply cross and upsales to the purchase.

My recommendation is - if your average order value is less than £30 - the cost of the resourcing of call handling support compared to a completely web based model starts to become significant. Over £50 - the additional revenue that can be gained through telephoine support changes the model from being a cost centre to a potential profit centre.

Ensuring that the call handlers are well trained and versed with the product offerings is extremely important.

What can inflate the call handling costs are the post sales support. That said if there is a general bad set of experiences being had with your customers - increased post sales customer support handling soon alerts you to ensuring that the post sale experience gets rectified ASAP. Normally the issues are delivery and returns.

Let me know if you need any furhter information regarding this.

regards

Mark Kirby
0870 777 0277
www.goresponse.co.uk

On 09:07:54 27 April 2005 mikehayes wrote:
>Hi All,
>
>Telco looking for some benchmarking information around
>online shop and online customer self-serve.
>
>Looking for stats around propensity of customer to
>purchase mobile/broadband services online and when
>provided the likelihood of using a website for self-serve
>rather than calling into a call centre?