Writing a call center business plan helps you stay organized and forces you to think through your business model, financials, and company structure.
You’ll find boilerplate business plan templates and information just about anywhere. Fit Small Business has a great guide to help you get started with the basics. To keep things short and sweet, I’m going to focus on the specific business plan elements you should focus on when starting up a call center.
Step 1 — Identify your service model
First, figure out what type of call center you’re interested in. There are four main options to choose from, including inbound, outbound, hybrid, and omnichannel.
Inbound call centers
Inbound call centers work well for customer support, appointment scheduling, reservations, billing services, and order processing. Your staff will only answer incoming calls without having to worry about outbound.
Aside from general customer service, inbound call centers are also great for after-hours answering services that take over outside of normal business hours.
Outbound call centers
These are most commonly used for sales and telemarketing.
But they can also work well for market research surveys, political campaigns, debt collection, appointment reminders, and follow-up surveys.
Hybrid call centers
Offering a mix of inbound and outbound is called a hybrid call center.
This is a more challenging place to start as there’s a lot more to think about, but they open the door for multiple revenue opportunities. For example, you can run outbound campaigns whenever call volume is low and automatically switch to inbound when you get a heavier influx of incoming calls.
Most call center solutions offer features for both but some cater specifically to hybrid set ups.
RingCentral, for example, offers a helpful “call blending” feature that allows staff to answer incoming calls and make outbound calls too.
SEE: Check out our in-depth RingCentral review to learn more about it.
Omnichannel call centers
Talking to people on the phone is one channel. But there are dozens of others. Omnichannel call centers handle them all, including live chat, text, social media, email, and more.
This works best for large brands providing customer support at scale, and it’s commonly used for technical and general support.
Like a hybrid approach, omnichannel is a tough place to start. There are a lot of moving parts and you’ll need more expensive software to streamline operations. On top of that, most businesses that need this tend to take care of it in house because of its complexity.
Step 2 — Choose your workspace setup
Next, decide how you want to set up and deploy your call center. You can run it in a traditional office, as a remote company, or a combination of the two.
A traditional environment makes training, managing, and collaborating easy. However, it’s more expensive, doesn’t offer flexibility to your employees, and limits who you can hire. You’ll need to pay for rent, electricity, additional insurance, other utilities, cleaning services, trash removal, and dozens of other expenses.
Remote call centers are far easier to start and much cheaper. This is how I run all of my businesses and I can’t recommend it enough.
I save thousands of dollars every month and my team appreciates that they get to work from home. Because your expenses are lower and your employees are happier, the path to profit is a lot shorter. Plus, you can hire anyone in the world.
There are times I wish we could meet in person, but the benefits of remote work far outweigh the drawbacks.
If you absolutely insist on having an office, consider a hybrid approach. You may require a certain number of in-person days per week, require specific employees to come to the office, or make it optional.
Step 3 — Identify your software and hardware needs
Next, think about the type of software you’re going to use. Cloud-based VoIP call center software is the way to go. There’s no need to consider on-premise or any other type of phone system.
Operating from the cloud makes it easier to scale, deploy new agents, and keep costs down as you grow.
SEE: Check out the best call center software to see which is right for you.
For that to work, you’ll need high speed internet. If your team is working from home, you can consider paying for them to upgrade their internet services to ensure crystal clear call quality no matter where they work.
Depending on your model, you’ll likely also need collaboration software along with business essentials, like accounting software, payroll software, and project management software.
Aside from software, you may also need:
- Computers, monitors, and laptops.
- Desk phones.
- VoIP headsets.
- A VoIP router.
- Switches.
- Network cables.
- Surge protectors.
- Notebooks and pens.
- Office chairs, keyboards, and mice.
If your agents are working from home, you may want to think about a one-time stipend or work-from-home bonus that allows them to buy the things they need to do their job.
Step 4 — Plan your staffing strategy
Recruitment strategy is a separate topic altogether and far too much to cover here. But it’s an incredibly important aspect of a call center business plan so I didn’t want to leave it out. You should have a staffing plan for your initial launch and a flexible plan for the next 6-12 months.
To do that, make sure you can easily answer the following questions:
- How many employees will you need on day one?
- Do you want to hire a bunch of people all at once?
- Are you going to start smaller and grow from there?
- Where are you going to find new hires?
- What will your hiring process look like?
- What qualification criteria are you looking for?
- Who’s going to conduct your interviews?
You’ll also need to factor in how you’re going to train new call center employees and how you’ll manage scheduling, time off, and day-to-day operations.
It’s not enough to say “I need 7 agents.” You should know who’s going to do what, how you’re going to onboard them, who’s going to hire them, how you’re going to keep them, and how the entire hiring process will look.
Step 5 — Develop a financial framework
The financial element of a call center business plan is where most people fall flat. Like with any new business, it’s important to understand the numbers and validate that you’ll actually make money before you move any further.
It’s easy to rush through this but I encourage you to take the time to do it right. Look things up, write it all down, and create a spreadsheet to help you out.
To simplify things, we’ll break it down into three parts.
Startup costs
Getting started is often the only thing new business owners consider. It’s a big part of it, but it’s only the first step.
The first thing you should do is understand how much you need to get off the ground. Although adding numbers together is easy, it’s just as easy to forget critical elements and drastically under estimate startup costs.
Be sure to consider:
- Call center software.
- Usage costs.
- Equipment.
- Licenses or permits.
- Insurance.
- Business formation costs.
- Rent and utilities (if in-person).
- Hiring and employee training costs.
- Other types of software.
- Hardware.
- Labor.
Several of these things incur ongoing costs as well. Before you move on, you should understand day one costs, month-to-month costs, and your runway if you make $0 every month.
Revenue model
The next step is figuring out how you’re going to make money. There are a lot of different ways to do it and it’ll likely change numerous times.
Rather than just randomly picking one, I encourage you to think about what it will take with each model for you to cover your operating costs. From there, you can decide which one is the best place to start.
Here are some common call center revenue models to think through:
- Per minute — charging clients based on actual talk time.
- Per agent per hour — clients pay a fixed hourly rate per agent.
- Per interaction — clients pay a fixed fee for different types of calls.
- Commission — clients pay a percentage of closed deals.
- Hybrid — a combination of the above.
For each one, figure out what you’d have to charge to break even in different scenarios. You can also start to think about what it would look like to add new pricing models, raise those rates over time, or deploy other tactics to increase your margins.
Forecasts and break-even analysis
The final step is making sure you have enough runway to make it to your breakeven point. This requires forecasting and analyzing your numbers in even more scenarios to make sure you can survive for the long haul.
This also means preparing for agents leaving, raises, bonuses, commissions, and any other expenses you haven’t already accounted for.
You should also keep in mind that your costs will likely increase over time. You may start with three agents but if you plan to grow to six by the third quarter, your salary, benefits, and software costs will double.
It’s important to include this in your forecasts so you aren’t blindsided later. I recommend estimating on the conservative side to give yourself a buffer.
SEE: Learn how to perform a break even analysis step by step.
Step 6 — Establish operating procedures
How will your call center operate on a day-to-day basis? You don’t have to have this entirely nailed down from the start but it’s important to iron out the basics and understand that these are things you’ll regularly work through as you go.
Don’t forget to think about:
- Whether or not you’re planning to operate 24/7.
- Will you have full time employees or contractors?
- How many managers or supervisors you’ll need.
- How you’re going to train employees.
- Script templates or intake forms for your clients to fill out.
- SOPs and documentation.
- Quality monitoring and adherence.
- Data security and privacy policies.
- Call escalation protocols.
- Regulatory compliance.
Some of these things should be figured out on day one, like security, privacy, and regulatory compliance.
Others, like documentation, quality monitoring, and business hours can ebb and flow as your needs change. You’ll figure out a lot as you go so it’s important to be flexible and implement feedback from your team.
Step 7 — Create a go-to-market strategy
The last step of your call center business plan figuring out how you’re going to get your first clients. They aren’t going to magically appear, despite the famous saying.
You’ll need to think through who your audience is, how you’re going to reach them, and how you’re going to prove your value to them despite having no actual proof you know what you’re doing.
The more specific you can get about who you help and why, the easier this will be.
For example, say you’re an inbound call center that focuses on after-hours calls to doctors, dentists, and private medical practices. Maybe you’re an outbound omnichannel call center focused on helping politicians collect donations.
Knowing this makes it easier to nail your go to market strategy. As you grow, you can zoom out and target new audiences.
A go to market strategy template is a great place to start.
