Zim Business Ideas and Network (ZBIN)

Farmer of the month : Kundai Musarurwa

by Victor Muchemwa on December 9, 2016

ZBIN will be profiling members every week. We are inviting you to submit videos of your projects for hosting on the website. We will review and post your videos for free. Video footage will enable you to reach out to a large pool of potential customers and partners.

To kick-start the video promotion, we have chosen this profile of a young lady called Kundai Musarurwa. Great stuff from her and we hope that she can inspire a lot of young people so that they can venture into farming.

Diaspora Matters

Pepper Business in Zimbabwe

by Victor Muchemwa on December 9, 2016

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HoOSla9cVPU

Diaspora Matters

What is Crowd Funding and how does it work?

by Victor Muchemwa on December 9, 2016

Until recently, financing a business involved asking a few people for big sums of money. Crowdfunding is turning this idea on its head, using the

Diaspora Matters

Fifty Chickens Wanted in Harare

by Victor Muchemwa on December 9, 2016

Do you have 50 Chickens available? A ZBIN member based in Harare is urgently looking for chickens. If you have them then put your contact

Diaspora Matters

Money for talented writers

by Victor Muchemwa on December 8, 2016

Every week ZBIN will try and help talented writers with resources on how you can earn an extra dollar. We start with 5 ideas below

Diaspora Matters

The Pros and Cons of Starting a Virtual Call Center Business

by Victor Muchemwa on December 8, 2016

call

By Alyssa Gregory

Updated September 19, 2016

A virtual call center involves representatives who answer and monitor calls from anywhere in the world, instead of being in the same geographical location as each other, or as the business. A virtual call center business can cater to businesses who handle incoming customer service or technical calls, but don’t want to incur the investment of a dedicated in-house staff. This type of business can be started quickly and relatively inexpensively, and it has the potential to produce significant levels of income.

If you are reliable and have a highly professional telephone presence, a virtual call center business is a business idea you may want to explore.

The Pros of Starting a Virtual Call Center Business

As you get started researching a virtual call center business, here are some of the benefits worth considering:

Startup costs are low, and there is the potential for high profits.
Virtual call centers are typically operated as home-based businesses.
There is a growing demand as businesses are reverting to live help for their callers.
It’s an excellent business for people who are outgoing, and love to talk and help others.
You can service local clients as well as remote clients via the Internet.
You can expand as the business grows by using other virtual workers.

The Cons of Starting a Virtual Call Center Business

A virtual call center business has many benefits, but it’s not without challenges. Some of the potential challenges of starting a virtual call center business include:

You need to have a consistently pleasant voice, professional phone etiquette and excellent organizational skills.

You need standard office equipment, including a computer, fax, printer, good quality, and a multi-line phone or virtual phone system.
You may need an initial investment for home-based call center equipment.

You may need to be flexible on your hours of operation and willing to work evenings and weekends to accommodate clients in different time zones.
The greatest competition comes from offshore services, so you need to find a way to differentiate yourself.
It can be challenging to market your business and find clients.

Recommended Resources for Starting a Virtual Call Center Business

The resources below provide a great starting point for conducting research into your virtual call center business idea:

As you get started with making your virtual call center business idea a reality, take time to create a business plan to guide you, even if it is a quick streamlined version. And learn from these common startup mistakes so you don’t make the same errors when getting your business up a running.