There are many reasons to run a business online instead of having a store. There are fewer overheads and you can reach a wider audience. Unfortunately, however, you can’t build a relationship with your clients, so you have to offer outstanding customer support.
You might try outsourcing your ecommerce help desk as a way to fill the gaps. This will give you instant access to the customer service skills you need. That said, you must consider the potential security risks.
In this article, we’ll look at how you can minimize these risks. Doing so will also ensure that you’re able to maintain compliance when you’re handing over your customer data.
What are the Security Risks of Outsourcing Ecommerce Support?
You’ll have to worry about a few things here. You can mitigate these risks if you carefully check out any company you work with.
Data Breaches
Ask yourself the following questions:
How secure is the company you’re dealing with?
How will they protect the customer data that passes through their servers?
Are their team members trained to deal with phishing attempts?
Do they actively monitor for hacking attempts?
Do they regularly review their cybersecurity?
Are their offices secure?
How do they vet their employees before hiring them?
Compliance Violation
Compliance issues can easily arise when your provider is in a different country from yours. You might, for example, be based in California, where the CCPA applies. If your provider is overseas, they need to be up to date with these regulations.
You should ensure that your outsourcer is compliant with any laws in their home country, your country, and that apply to your clients.
Loss of Control
When you hand over your support functions, you go from having full control to having input. This is why it’s imperative that you choose your outsourcing partner carefully.
Vendor Mismanagement
This often occurs with newer companies, but you should be wary of it in every candidate. In such cases, they may not have the right security protocols in place or have unpatched vulnerabilities.
How to Check Out Candidates
You should always take your time to properly evaluate each company you’re thinking of working with. Here’s how to do this.
Evaluate Their Security Policies
The team might not give you a copy of these documents. They should, however, give you an idea of how they protect their data. Ask them to provide proof of security certifications like ISO 27001, SOC 2, or, where applicable, PCI DSS.
What kind of training do their staff undertake? Are their offices secure? Ask to do a walk-through so you can see for yourself.
Assess Past Security Incidents
Ask if they’ve had any data breaches in the past and how they’ve dealt with them. It’s not necessarily a red flag if they’ve had issues. What counts is how they responded. You want a company with a clear action plan if a breach occurs. The better they plan, the less damaging the issue is.
Review Compliance With Privacy Regulations
You need to ensure that the vendor complies with the relevant privacy regulations. If you operate across different regions, they must be compliant in all regions.
Ask About Third-Party Audits
Many reliable vendors hire pen-testers to validate their security measures. You should ask for the results of those audits.
Establish Clear Data Security Protocols
You’ll need these to ensure a mutually beneficial relationship with your chosen candidate. Here’s where to start:
Data Encryption: Make sure the company uses strong encryption protocols. Ask them how they protect data in transit and at rest.
Limit Data Access: You should ensure that the company restricts access to your information to those who need it.
Implement Multi-Factor Authentication: The team working with you should use MFA to access your systems. For example, they can pair a password and fingerprint or randomly generated number.
Secure Cloud Storage: If your ecommerce support team uses cloud services, which provider do they use? Are they reputable and how do they protect your data?
Conclusion
You can improve customer satisfaction by partnering with a reputable outsourcing company. However, this isn’t a process you can rush. You’ll need to evaluate the candidate’s security carefully. After all, a chain’s only as strong as its weakest link.
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