The Customer Support Landscape in Mexico and Central America
February 17th, 2012log in or Register to Download the WhitePaper ( - PDF )
By Jones Lang LaSalle
The nearshoring of customer service operations is an increasingly important part of a global customer service delivery platform. Companies seeking low-cost, Spanish-English, or multilingual labor are discovering opportunities in Latin America, particularly Mexico and Central American nations such as Honduras and Costa Rica. The customer support industry is now widely distributed across nearly all major cities in the region.
This report provides a timely overview of customer service trends, crucial issues such as scale and sustainability, and foreign direct investment in the customer support industry.
Can Latin American Providers Meet the Demand?
February 2nd, 2012
By Bill Huber, Partner, ISG, and Kristen Elvinger, Research Associate
Concerns exist over the capacity of Latin American service providers to absorb rapid growth. Several global providers currently have a presence in Latin America, and tax and other trade incentives will help attract more outsourcers to the region. And, many Latin American countries are positioned to further develop emerging areas of specialization. Indeed, lessons learned from India, China, and some Eastern European countries suggest that specialization and quality-focused differentiation will be the keys to success, especially for countries with small populations.
El Salvador’s Effort to Improve English Starts to Have Real Impact
November 25th, 2011By Jon Felperin
One of the most pervasive and challenging issues across the Nearshore region is establishing English language training programs that actually do work – and actually produce well-trained professionals. One country that has been working on this in a sincere way for over ten years in El Salvador – in large part because of the commitments several major contact center players have made. The results of focused collaboration between private industry, federal government and USAID is beginning to show good results.
Latin American Economies Gain in Global Competitiveness
October 3rd, 2011
By Robert L. Scheier
The World Economic Forum essentially gave a big round of applause to the tiger economies of Latin America recently, with it annual Global Competitiveness Report. Chile, Mexico and Brazil showed strong advancement – but one Caribbean country also is rising in the ranks, despite a bit of a quiet demeanor.
Uncontrollable factors such as rising commodity prices, as well as intentional choices such as business-friendly policies and modest levels of public debt, have set a foundation for the region to boost the fortunes of its economies and populations. But to take their game to the next level, the WEF recommends, these countries should focus on improving education, trust in public institutions and their transportation infrastructure.
KOLKATA, India — The Central American republic of El Salvador is keen on trade and investments from India and stronger bilateral relations between the two countries.
Speaking at an interactive session fielded by the Indian Chamber of Commerce in Kolkata on Wednesday, the ambassador of El Salvador to India, Dr Ruben Ignacio Zamora Rivas said that the nation can open up the vast markets in Guatemela, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama, besides being an ideal hub for access to the US and European markets.
Dr Rivas said that currently India exports pharmateuticals, fabrics, textiles, electrical goods and auto parts to El Salvador, but there is ample scope for trade in the areas of IT, agro-chemicals, BPOs and medical services from India. He said advanced countries of the world have realized that the future of global trade and commerce lies in China and India, and given proper importance, …
A Human Perspective on the Evolution of New Technologies
June 15th, 2011By Rodolfo Salazar
The rules for doing business will continue to change because technology is changing faster and faster every day. The cycle of technological innovation will not wait or stop for anyone. This cycle revolves around three factors.
#1. Moore’s Law: Every 18 months the capacity of microprocessors doubles — this means either double the power or half the price and/or size. Just take a look at your smartphone, MP3 player, or camera. It will be obsolete in less than two years because we will have devices in the market that will be twice as small or twice as powerful. We can see this computing power at a lower cost moving fast in Latin America, where giants like Dell and HP report sales of mobile computers rising higher than sales of desktop computers.
Can a Regional Alliance Lift Up Central America?
May 25th, 2011
By Brendan Wolters | The Solace Group
There has been a push toward regionalization in Central America. Government and business leaders understand the importance of uniting a region inhabited by an estimated 42,000,000 people. Officials believe they must work together to build economies that compete on a global scale.
As El Salvador President Mauricio Funes said at a summit meeting in 2010, “Only by joining forces would we be able to lift our peoples from . . . poverty.” But, much like everything else in Central America, regionalization has moved at a snail’s pace. Each country faces political, social, and economic challenges that hamper development. (See the section at the end of this article for a snapshot of each country’s current economic situation.)
El Salvador President: We Can’t Solve Latin America’s Problems Alone
September 14th, 2010No matter how many walls are built or laws passed, immigrants will continue to leave Latin America as long as there is political and social instability at home, El Salvador President Mauricio Funes said Monday.
Speaking to a group of policymakers and economists at the Americas Conference in suburban Miami, Funes said the map of immigration is similar to the map of poverty, each existing where the other is present.
In order to build a region that is safer, and where fewer feel compelled to leave, access to public services and wages must be guaranteed, Funes said. This, he argued, is what the United States and the international community need to keep in mind when trying to help the region combat problems like organized crime and terrorism.
Funes also said the issue of drug trafficking can’t be solved by Latin America alone, noting that large amounts of consumption and money laundering …
Searching for Skilled Multilingual Agents
November 18th, 2009By Jeff Pappas, Executive VP, Arledge Partners Real Estate Group
What is a “Multilingual Call center”? Well, one that provides services for various languages, apart from the global language, English. When a US based BPO requires a global presence, then it is pays to obtain services in different languages like Spanish, German, Portuguese, French, etc. Providing services in different languages will improve upon the service quality, expertise and experience of the contact center.
Many contact center services, including inbound, outbound, order fulfillment and other activities are provided by multilingual call centers as niche marketing.
A BPO could save upwards of 25% or more on the operating cost to run a Portuguese center outside of Brazil and Portugal.
Language Complexities
Successful BPOs provide services to their customers in the language which is well-understood by them. Thus, it is difficult to establish a multilingual call …
El Salvador’s BCC Opens a New Bilingual Center, Servicing US and UK Clients
November 12th, 2009(Espanol Version Below)
El Salvador continues to emerge as an important destination for contact center services and one of the leaders in the market is Business Communication Center (BCC), which is now recruiting bilingual staff for its newly opened facility, said the company’s administrative manager, Guillermo Alfaro.
With an initial investment of $350,000, the company has hired 40 agents and will hire another 100 as part of its first stage. It is expected that within a year the firm will have about 500 open jobs for people who speak and write fluent English, Alfaro said.
“Every three months we expect to hire about 100 new employees, to complete the remaining 400,” he said, adding that the company’s vision is to expand in 2011 to other parts of the metropolitan area of San Salvador.
Currently, the top 40 operators and agents are doing pilot tests and support sales management functions for two …
