Keeping a Strong Vendor-Client Relationship
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The relationship between vendor and client in offshore outsourcing is described as a rocky marriage.
But industry experts liken the stages of offshore outsourcing to the seven phases of a broken marriage: courtship, wedding bash, costly honeymoon, cohabitation quirks, minor irritation, major frustration, and finally, divorce.
A failed vendor-client relationship is like a broken marriage. But if your vendor keeps you satisfied, the thought of changing him already hurts.
Unlike marriage you don’t need a marriage counselor to fix a souring offshore outsourcing partnership. If your offshore partner isn’t happy about how things are going between you, how do you keep him happy? Let us count the ways, then:
1. Communicate openly. You share very important information and work with your vendor. For the most part you will be working with him over the entire period of the project. What better way to keep up by talking to each other often.
Engage your vendor in a dialogue. It may not be about business operations all the time-you can digress a bit by talking about work-related but light subjects such as common management issues or your best personnel, or how you perceive other, among others.
2. Know your vendor’s corporate character. When you know and understand how your vendor works and treats its clients, and what’s its place in the market, you have something on which to build a clear strategy. ‘
Then you can afford to keep working with your vendor in the long run. You need to have a picture of your vendor’s character from the micro to macro scale. Relay that knowledge to your local team. Have some of your team work in parallel roles with the vendor’s team.
3. Build up your vendor’s ego (read corporate reputation). Work with your vendor in building up a strong reputation. You can give them honest and well-timed feedback when it’s needed. Look at it this way: You invest in your vendor in the same manner you invest in your local team.
The only limit is knowing when to hold back–you don’t want to totally depend on your vendor nor to overshoot your investment in them.
4. Use your vendor as a referral. When you and your vendor have been working for some time, you’ve surely gained each other’s trust. And from this trust comes many opportunities that the two of you can take advantage. You can help your vendor’s sales by referring would-be clients to them.
When your vendor gets more clients, it gains a solid stance in the market and it returns your favor by building a stronger give-and-take relationship. Don’t go easy on reference accounts, however. They can backfire to you and your vendor.
5. If your vendor fails, get a disposable one. If your vendor doesn’t deliver, change it. This is the stickiest part but also the most realistic. As in marriage, you expect rough times with your spouse, but it if it’s rough times since day one, there there’s no use holding on to him or her. This is what offshore outsourcing experts call the Disposal Outsourcing Model. You get the vendor that meets your needs best but when it’s no longer capable of meeting your desired results, it’s time to say good bye.
As in real marriage, it takes hard work for both parties to make it work and last a long time. It’s because everybody loves a happy ending. Not even offshore outsourcing is exempt to that.
Mel is the resident blogger and writer at Web Agents Pro, an offshore staff leasing company based in the Philippines. Our team consists of business and Internet marketing specialists with have one goal in mind: to help our clients grow their business. If you are looking to hire your dedicated webmaster, web content writer, link builder, SEO specialist, virtual assistant, graphics designer, and web designer, go to http://www.webagentspro.com for more information.
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