When to Use Answering Services vs Call Center Services

Answering services and call center services both help with customer support, but they serve different purposes.

Answering services are best for handling basic inquiries, taking messages, and forwarding calls outside of regular business hours. Call center services are more comprehensive, handling a wide range of customer inquiries from technical support to order processing, often across multiple channels.

At a glance: Answering services vs call center services

Answering services are basically an extension of your business. They handle incoming calls when your staff is unavailable.

They offer several key functions, including:

• Taking messages: They act as your receptionist, fielding calls, recording messages, and delivering them to you through your preferred method (phone, email, text).
• Forwarding calls: Many providers intelligently route calls to your team, ensuring callers reach the right person as fast as possible.
• Appointment scheduling: Some answering services offer appointment scheduling, allowing callers to book appointments directly with your staff.

Call center services provide a more comprehensive suite of services, often managing customer interactions across various channels.

Although they can help with just about anything, they usually help with:

• Customer support: Call center representatives are trained to address customer inquiries, troubleshoot problems, and provide general assistance related to your products or services.
• Order processing: They can handle orders over the phone, process payments securely, and answer any questions customers might have about the ordering process.
• Technical support: For businesses with complex products or services, call centers can staff specialists who offer in-depth technical support, guiding customers through troubleshooting steps and resolving technical issues.

Making the best choice for your business requires understanding the scope and complexity of the services you need.

Answering services are ideal for businesses with basic needs. Call centers cater to those requiring a more comprehensive approach that often extends across multiple channels, including phone, social media, email, and chat.

Four use cases for answering services

Wondering who uses answering services and why? Understanding common use cases can help you understand if they’re sufficient or you need something more.

1. After-hours and weekend service

For better or worse, customers expect accessibility beyond the usual nine-to-five schedule. If your team only works between those hours, this obviously presents a problem.

Answering services are a way to fill this gap. They offer after-hours and weekend support that ensures no call goes unanswered, no matter the time. This around-the-clock availability is not just about taking messages. It’s also about building trust with customers and showing them you prioritize their needs regardless of the time of day.

Expanding your hours with answering services is also an opportunity to capture leads, schedule appointments, and provide basic customer support. It extends the reach of your business without extending your operating hours.

While answering services can efficiently triage calls and capture critical information, they may lack the expertise to handle more complex situations.

2. Handling peak call volumes

Seasonal peaks, product launches, or promotional events can all cause a surge in call volume. This can challenge the capacity of many customer service operations.

Answering services are helpful here because they offer a scalable solution to manage this overflow, ensuring customer service levels remain high even during periods of higher demand. This helps maintain customer satisfaction by minimizing wait times and ensuring every call is greeted with a prompt response.

It also helps prevent lost sales opportunities and mitigates the risk of customer attrition due to poor service experiences.

Answering services can capture information and provide basic assistance, but the service typically stops there. Complex queries or issue resolution often require follow-up from specialized staff, which can still lead to delays.

3. Small-business support

Small businesses often operate with limited resources, including staff. This leads to employees managing multiple roles. An answering service can help even the smallest businesses get more out of their team without hiring in-house.

It’s a strategy that can optimize operational costs while still ensuring every customer’s needs are handled. Plus, the in-house staff you have can focus on what they’re best at.

That said, many customers opt for small businesses for a personal touch and deeper interactions that they can’t find at bigger brands. Answering services typically lack the depth and expertise that customers crave when it comes to more complex issues. So you might be compromising some of your value proposition here in an attempt to scale.

4. Emergency call triage

For businesses in sectors like healthcare or property management, emergency calls need to be sorted and addressed promptly, regardless of the time of day.

Answering services can provide essential triage, determine the urgency of calls, and escalate them according to predefined protocols. This ensures critical issues are addressed immediately while less urgent matters are scheduled for follow-up.

Imagine it’s 3 a.m. and a tenant calls, reporting a burst pipe in their apartment. This is a clear emergency that requires immediate attention to prevent water damage throughout the building.

In this case, the answering service might:

1. Patch the call directly to the emergency on-call maintenance staff.
2. Send an automated text message or phone call to the maintenance team, ensuring they’re aware of the problem.
3. Leave a detailed message for the property manager, outlining the emergency and requesting a response.

5 use cases for call center services

Call center services are highly skilled and spend time getting to know your business. Here are some of the most common use cases.

1. Comprehensive customer support

Does your business offer complex products or services? If so, you likely require a depth of customer support beyond just answering calls. Call center services are built for this. They give you a comprehensive suite of support functions from technical troubleshooting to detailed product inquiries and effective complaint resolution.

Beyond merely resolving issues, this extra level of support from every interaction can turn challenges into opportunities to build customer loyalty.

The biggest drawback is cost. Committing to a full-service call center model is more expensive than basic answering services.

2. Multichannel support

Consumers expect to interact with your business across a spectrum of platforms — from social media and email to live chat and beyond.

Call center services can help you meet this expectation.

By offering integrated support across many channels, you can ensure consistent customer service no matter where your customers choose to interact with you.

Imagine a customer who starts their journey by browsing online FAQs. If they have lingering questions, they might switch to live chat for a quick conversation with an agent. An effective call center seamlessly connects these touchpoints.

On the other end of the spectrum, a customer considering purchasing a new laptop might initiate contact through social media. A call center equipped with multichannel support would allow a qualified agent to pick up the conversation, answer questions in real time, and offer  personalized product recommendations.

The multichannel support that call centers offer helps create a frictionless experience.

3. Technical support and troubleshooting

Businesses that sell technical products, like medical devices or industrial equipment, often require real-time problem-solving and hands-on help.

Call centers can bridge this gap with a team of agents trained on your products. It’s not uncommon for them to spend several weeks getting up to speed with what you sell.

Say a customer encounters an error message on their MRI machine. A call center staffed with the right agents can walk the customer through troubleshooting steps, diagnose the issue, and even offer remote technical assistance if necessary.

This not only resolves the immediate problem but also demonstrates your commitment to customer success.

4. Integrated customer relationship management

If you already have a built-out CRM system, call centers can leverage it to help you provide better customer service.

Many call centers integrate seamlessly with CRM systems, giving agents a wealth of customer data at their fingertips. This empowers them to personalize their support interactions beyond a standard answering service.

You may even be able to integrate your CRM with your call center’s IVR.

Picture a customer calling in with a question about their recent order. A call center integrated with a CRM allows the agent to access the customer’s purchase history, preferences, and past interactions. Armed with this information, the agent can address the customer by name, reference their specific order details, and even offer personalized recommendations.

5. Outbound campaigns

An outbound call center helps your business take a proactive approach to customer interactions, feedback, and even lead generation through outbound calls.

If you’re looking to grow sales through strategic outreach, this is a powerful option that answering services can’t match.

Outbound campaigns can take several forms:

• Market research: Need to gather customer insights for a new product launch? A call center can conduct targeted outbound surveys, reaching out to specific customer segments to gauge interest. This way you can gather feedback on prototypes and identify potential areas for improvement before a product even hits the market.
• Customer satisfaction surveys: Proactive outreach isn’t limited to pre-launch research. Call centers can also be used to conduct customer satisfaction surveys after a purchase or service interaction. By doing this, you can see where your business is excelling and areas where it could improve.
• Promotional campaigns: Call centers can also be a powerful tool for driving sales through targeted promotional campaigns. Imagine offering a limited-time discount on a popular product or service. A call center can be used to reach out to qualified leads or existing customers, informing them about the promotion and answering any questions they might have.

Putting it all together

Answering services and call center services both offer valuable capabilities — choosing one or the other is all about getting clear on your business requirements.

Go with answering services if you:

• Need basic call management and message handling for after hours or weekends.
• Experience seasonal peaks in call volume and require a scalable solution.
• Are a small business seeking to optimize operational costs without dedicated staff.
• Deals with emergencies requiring call triage and prioritization.

Choose a call center if you:

• Offer complex products or services requiring in-depth support.
• Want to provide multichannel service across various platforms.
• Sell technical products that require specialized troubleshooting.
• Need to leverage CRM data for personalized customer care.
• Want to add outreach to your research, feedback, or sales processes.

Overall, answering services are more cost effective but limited in scope. Call center services cost more but are able to solve a wider range of challenges for your business.