Derek Gallimore – The Payoneer Forum 2019

In the recent Payoneer forum in Manila, Derek Gallimore talked about statistics and strategies of selling businesses to the audience. He also mentioned the opportunity of business process outsourcing to the creation of jobs in a few years.

“The key to any business is getting people through the sales funnel, then effectively, everything else can just fall in place,” Derek stated. He then explained that concept of sales funnel that in every audience that a business attracts, only a few will be interested, then fewer will engage, then less than 1% will buy the product. “The bottleneck of any growth is getting people at the top of the funnel, getting people on the phone, getting the attention of people, because everyone is busy,” he added.

And how can they fill the funnel and attract customers with this situation? By focusing on the strengths of the business, building trust and relationships, and building an online presence. 

Focusing on strengths

“Factories do what they do best: they manufacture stuff. They become specialized in doing what they do. And they go, ‘Look, I don’t know anything about branding, I don’t know anything about sales. I don’t know how I connect with my audience. I’m just going to concentrate on the manufacturing, you then have distributors’.”

Forward to the marketplace nowadays, Derek verifies that this rings true with four of the biggest companies in the world: Booking.com, Amazon, Airbnb, and Uber. In general, these companies don’t have their products (except for Amazon that has recently built their own line of sales). However, by focusing on selling, they gained their reputation of becoming one of the biggest companies. 

Building relationships and trust

He also noted that building trust is another aspect that these companies work out. “The Philippines is in one country and your consumers, maybe in the US, or a completely separate country, they will likely never physically meet you certainly before the sale. It’s likely they don’t even know where the Philippines is. And it’s likely they might not ever come here. So it’s a unique market that by definition, the supply is in a completely different space, both geographically and culturally.”

As trust comes into play, most businesses are not likely to outsource since (1) they don’t know the country, (2) it is still an emerging economy, (3) they do not understand how outsourcing works. With this, outsourcing sells by building trust and relationship with their clients. 

Building an online presence

Derek also mentioned that businesses need to get online as a platform and individually. “The critical thing is that we are here and they are there. Geographically we are separated. So this has to be a major digital push,” he stated. “That is the only way that you can cost-effectively access these markets.” 

He stated about how building inbound and outbound marketing is important in selling a business. From its website, the brand, identity, and how knowledgeable they are with their products, to building a connection with other relevant businesses.

Outsourcing opportunities

He then ended his speech with a glimpse of the outsourcing opportunity in the Philippines for the coming years. “…there are another 40 million jobs coming over to the Philippines.” He then continued that the outsourcing won’t be gone over the next 20 years since the first wave was with the enterprises. “…40 to 50 million small and medium-sized businesses in the West (that) have not yet outsourced and are not aware of it. 95% of big enterprise outsources and 0.5% of small and medium-sized businesses…” 

Derek said technology, globalization, and all other aspects that made outsourcing expensive and difficult at first will bring the second wave of outsourcing. With this, everyone can see a bright future coming before our eyes.

About Payoneer Forum 2019

The Payoneer Forum in Manila gathered different entrepreneurs, BPOs, and market experts to tackle global outsourcing. It took place at the premier Ascott Hotel in Bonifacio Global City last November 29, 2019. Among the participants include the IT and Business Process Association of the Philippines (IBPAP).

The forum aims to discover the best practices of scaling a business and learn how global outsourcing and Payoneer helps in making this happen. It consisted of two tracks: the Human Resource (HR) and Operations track and the Sales and Marketing track. Here, businesses learn how to create effective sales and marketing strategies and have an efficient operation and HR management.

About Payoneer

Payoneer is the leading global payment platform for businesses, marketplaces, and BPOs. They aim to empower and encourage businesses to grow regardless of borders and expectations. Currently, they have 4 million customers and hold Payoneer forums in different parts of the world.

Outsource Accelerator featured Payoneer in its podcast series. Derek Gallimore, founder and host of the show, interviewed Miguel Warren, VP, regional head of South East Asia, on the first of the two-part episode.