By Mark Angus
Global business buyers face many pain points and challenges when finding suitable service providers. Research conducted by GBS.World noted that they can take anything from three months (48%) to six months (7%) before they find a right-fit supplier.
When asked what pain points they experience when finding suitable service providers, over 360 global business buyers from Australia, Canada, the UK and the US said they often lack suitable service provider research/market intelligence (60%). Notably, a further 58% stated that they did not have one central place to go to source services, while 56% indicated that they battled to shortlist best-fit service providers.
Despite this, the global business process outsourcing industry was valued at over $232 billion in 2020 by Grand View Research and is predicted to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 8.5% from 2021 to 2028. This growth matters because it is hugely important in making the world a more equitable place.
In fact, low-income countries typically find it very difficult to compete on a global stage where high-income countries have all the advantages of size, technology, education and, above all, money. The one field where low-income countries can compete and excel in the provision of business services on a global scale.
A bit like sport, the industry is a great leveller and one that is much needed. By outsourcing, high-income markets can (indirectly) support economic and youth impact sourcing job growth in low-income markets, but make no mistake; they wouldn’t be doing so if their cost performance and service delivery were not up to par.
Why do companies outsource?
Companies that outsource business services do so for many reasons. The most common are reducing their costs, accessing value-add services and mitigating business continuity risks. But there are other good reasons too.
For example, many large multinationals don’t want to find and retain, what is often considered support staff, in an increasingly competitive world yet they want to improve their customer experience lifecycle management and service delivery.
As the outsourcing industry has developed and become more effective and productive, it has proven that it can meet all these needs effectively and productively, all while offering a speedy way for clients to reach their target consumer groups and markets.
The range of outsource-able services is another area where the industry has developed. Customer support, contact centres and HR processes are typical services the sector provides, but these now include vertical-specific, value-added functions such as digital channel fulfilment, analytics, training, consulting and optimisation. Technology is also becoming an increasingly significant service offering as it grows and changes at ever-increasing speeds.
Why does the industry need a global online marketplace?
The challenge, of course, is how to unite buyers and service providers of business services for both of their benefit.
While various companies and consultants offer to help buyers decide on outsourced service providers, there are not many comprehensive interactive platforms that let buyers go beyond a search-and-match service. Or, in fact, anything that intelligently sources and matches across the wide-ranging offering of global business services.
I’ve always thought that such a big and significant industry would benefit from having a formal way to introduce buyers and service providers who often operate in very different parts of the world. And now they can through a platform called The World Source Marketplace for Global Business Services – or GBS.World for short. It’s a global online marketplace that enables buyers to find and engage service providers across 12 categories in 70 countries on six continents – and growing.
It’s a bit like a (business) dating app for the Global Business Services sector. Crucial to its success is the tender management and sourcing technology that match buyer requirements to service providers. Service providers are validated, and a host of decision-making tools support the matching process, including consumer and industry research, location analyses, benchmarking, sourcing and advisory services. Both sides of the market can also engage on requests for information and proposals too; it’s a genuine matchmaking service.
GBS.World enables intelligent buying decisions through intelligent matching. But what it’s also doing is further professionalizing the industry to facilitate growth even beyond current predictions, particularly in countries whose economies and people need it most.
Mark Angus is a CEO, a researcher and strategist of Genesis Global Business Services
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