This chart is a representation of Athena’s model and what we believe is a best practice approach to establishing a sustainable and effective new business development effort.
Below is a list of the pros and cons for implementing a new business development model from the ground up internally versus choosing to outsource to a provider like Athena SWC.
| Internal Implementation |
Outsourced Solution | ||
| Pros | Cons | Pros | Cons |
| Management and accessibility to a direct employee(s) | Time consuming to train staff effectively | A proven, best practice process that provides the discipline and capability to quickly implement and go to market without extensive “ramp up” time. (45–50 day implementation) | Initial knowledge of client and/or learning curve for the outsourced provider |
| Full-time employee(s) dedicated specifically to your new business development efforts (for your capabilities, products, markets, etc.) | Time and money spent researching new business development strategies and learning how to properly implement. (processes, software, etc.) | Template and foundation for the client to implement internally in the future (if desired) | Access to a percentage of an outsourced team’s time |
| Expansion of new business development initiative is highly controlled by management | Employee burnout and turnover due to working on the phones, which could lead to unexpected costs associated with refilling the position | 60-day opt-out, which provides a risk-averse, cost-effective option to test a best practice lead generation approach | Sales leadership’s time commitment for proper implementation during initial launch (approximately 3hr./week in first 45-50 days) |
| Control the investment in salaries, benefits, and software | Failure of FTE(s) to achieve sales goals, resulting in the need to restart the hiring and training process | Software, tools, printing and postage included in the investment | Sales staff “buy-in” and understanding of the process model |
| Professional growth of employees within the organization | Need to hire multiple individuals with various skill sets to implement a new business development infrastructure (list clean, inside sales, marketing/content and graphic design) | Ownership of all data, prospect lists and marketing/sales collateral | Lack of on-site resource, which can impact communication between the outsourced provider and client |
| Cost of full-time employees and software and technology (estimated between $250K – $350K annually minimum) | Market intelligence, sales statistics, and analytics (to track, measure and monitor ROI and effectiveness) | ||
| Immediate access to a team of experts with various skill sets without having to hire/manage employees (list research and development, inside sales, marketing and graphic design, and project management) | |||
| Mitigates management’s time and investment in hiring, supervising staff and managing the flow of activities | |||
| Mitigates the risk of staff turnover that can disrupt the flow of activities | |||