Dovetail Software

Dovetail Links 2008-11-17

Dovetail Software — Mon, 17 Nov 2008 20:52:00 GMT

"These 'Laws' highlight hidden pitfalls the hurt many projects, and help explain why some projects succeed while others fail. They recognize that successful IT project delivery is primarily about managing people, process, and deliverables. Yes, technology is important, but the people side comes first."

Sour Tweets Get Sweet Results

"Don't be surprised if a comment left on Twitter gets a faster response than a call to customer service. Companies are increasingly monitoring social media sites like Twitter, Facebook and blogs for negative customer comments and then responding directly, even publicly, to those comments within minutes."

The Two Key Elements of Customer Orientation

"According to the study 'Customer Experience Maturity Monitor,' however, the philosophy of trust and the ideal of a customer-centric culture exceed the actual practice of both. More than three quarters of respondents to the study said that their companies motivate employees to treat customers fairly, yet only 62 percent provide employees with the necessary training, tools, and level of empowerment to earn customers' trust."

New research: Customer Experience Maturity Monitor

"The research confirmed something that many of us intuitively believe: companies that have better customer experience management capabilities, along with a strong customer orientation, enjoy a real competitive advantage. 81 percent of companies with a 'high customer-experience maturity' reported they outperform their competition...and, here’s the kicker...companies that reported outperforming competitors also reported plans to spend more on future investments in customer experience capabilities.”

Four Tips To Getting More Out of Your ERP System

"Given today's uncertain economy, many of our clients are looking at ways they can get more out of their current ERP system rather than investing in an entirely new one. Unless your organization has simply outgrown its ERP system in its entirety, this may be a very feasible option. In fact, our experience with many of our clients is that their operational pains lie not in the system itself, but in broken business processes and misuse of the system."

Dovetail Links 2008-10-26

Dovetail Software — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 23:27:00 GMT

Business Intelligence: Data Users Supply the Brains

"Everyone knows banks are awash in data. Now, some of them are starting to figure out how to transform that data into intelligence. As it turns out, more refined analysis of the data does not necessarily lead to greater intelligence. Far more important, bankers say, is to define processes that dictate how the data should be used. This insight has come after years of disappointing forays into customer relationship management projects that managed to amass a lot of data, but never had an impact on sales or service. Now some banks have realized they must give staffers step-by-step blueprints on how to use data before it can become meaningful."

Can I Please Speak with a Live Agent?

"Forester’s study finds that 45 percent of consumers prefer to speak with a customer service agent to answer questions and resolve service issues, yet most walk away from customer service agent interactions disillusioned, disappointed, and disgruntled."

Why Talking To Your Customers Is Ruining Your Business

"To fix these problems and deliver extraordinary customer service agent interactions, customer service process and application professionals should tackle five key initiatives: 1) mapping out proper customer routing logic; 2) modernizing call center infrastructure; 3) beefing up agent management; 4) embracing natural language and intent-based knowledge management; and 5) fixing self-service customer interactions."

Are Your Live Agents Helping or Hurting You with Customers?

"The report makes some specific observations that reflect the lack of decision management in most call centers. Clumsy self-service to live service transitions and bad call routing reflect a lack of thought and management of these critical routing decisions. Bad knowledge management can also be seen as a lack of focus on decisions - after all it is the decisions your agents make that the knowledge management process is meant to improve."

SOA Performance Shouldn’t Sentence You to Re-living "Groundhog Day"

"After all the features are checked off on the desired list…after all the internal discussion and debate…after all the soul-searching about whether particular SOA technology is the right fit for a specific application or business, what matters most? And what’s the word SOA software vendors run fastest from? It’s the "P-word:" performance."

Are You Still Observing Customer Service Week? We are.

Dovetail Software — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 12:38:00 GMT

Even though the annual Customer Service Week runs for only the first full week in October, it deserves year-round observation. With that in mind, we recently published Five New Reasons to Celebrate Customer Service Week all through the year. We've already covered reasons one, two, three and four, so here's one more:

5. Employ a CRM solution that not only manages Sales Force Automation (SFA) but also the largest segment and most important part of customer relationship management, Customer Service and Support (CS&S).

If your company is already observing the first reason, "Show, don't tell customers how committed you are to their satisfaction," then a company-wide commitment to emphasizing the "customer" in Customer Relationship Management should be a no-brainer.

And it's great to see a consultant like Patricia Seybold, author of bestsellers like Outside Innovation, Customers.com and The Customer Revolution, agreeing on this customer service and support-centric approach. In Ms. Seybold's free-but-you-have-to-register report, "Rethinking CRM: Provide Customers the Information They Care about in a Seamless Fashion," her executive summary lays out the critical requirements to make the customer an important part of your CRM strategy:

"Provide a seamless cross-touchpoint, cross-channel and cross-lifecycle experience. Let your customers manage their relationships with you, not the other way around. We recommend that you focus first on customer service, not on sales or marketing. Why? Customers (or prospective customers) will provide you the most information when they need help from you in selecting, evaluating, purchasing, learning, using or optimizing a product or service. They're much more likely to provide rich information about their situation and context when they're looking for help. Today, the scope of a CRM strategy extends well beyond marketing, sales and service."

Ms. Seybold is actually somewhat of a CRM prophet. The report cited above is an updated version of a report she originally crafted way back in 2004, which is practically the Mesozoic era of CRM. In that report, she wrote:

"At some point in the early 2000s, customer relationship management (CRM) became synonymous in many peoples’ minds with sales force automation (SFA). [...] We, at the Patricia Seybold Group, have never equated CRM primarily with sales force automation or opportunity management. We view CRM as the acronym that most organizations use to describe their customer-centric strategies and the business processes and technology infrastructure they use to support those strategies."

We're pretty certain that Ms. Seybold's company, the owners of the URL "customers. com" doesn't celebrate her customers for just one week in October.

Dovetail Links 2008-10-19

Dovetail Software — Sun, 19 Oct 2008 20:44:00 GMT

The Challenges of Business Intelligence

"The typical business intelligence (BI) architecture can be seen as having a stack of layers. The base usually comprises source data systems, from where data is processed by 'extract, transform, load' (ETL) software into a data warehouse. Above that are the BI and application layers and then at the top there is the presentation or delivery layer, which can include executive dashboards, scorecards and other decision-making tools."

CRM: Not Ineffective, Just Misused

"CRM systems in contact centers get a lot of bad press, but mainly because they aren't delivering results -- not because they are technically inferior. Often, the technology needs to be accompanied by a set of policies that will make it much more effective."

The 5 Things Your ERP Sales Rep Doesn't Want You to Know

"Many businesses are turning to enterprise resource planning systems to help manage their business processes. Once the sale is over, however, the ERP sales rep most likely won't be there to help with integration, and that's no easy task, writes James O'Leary of Extol International."

Consumer or Customer?

"The political pros are saying that this is a seminal year in the arc of American history, not just in politics but also in our fundamental understanding of and relationship with the world. As I look at it, even CRM is involved, which I think only proves the pervasiveness of the paradigm shift. In my humble opinion, all of this is reflected in how you view the business processes that CRM mediates."

The Secret Relationship Between Hedgehogs and Knowledge Management

"Knowledge is like a spiky ball. As the body of knowledge gets larger (i.e. the balloon gets blown up) so specific fields are pushed further and further outwards. The domain of knowledge in each instance gets smaller and smaller, and fields get further apart. Thus each field is a spike, and there are gaps between them. Thus we have a hedgehog."

Customer Service Week, All Year Long

Dovetail Software — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 19:54:00 GMT

Last week was Customer Service Week and customer supports reps around the US and across the globe were partying like it's 1999.

At Zappos, they dressed in lederhosen. And they got free pizza at Telus. In several call centers they played bingo. At another, they decorated cupcakes.

It sounds like everyone had fun last week but let's not forget the fact there are 51 other weeks in the year that require the same commitment to excellent customer service and support. And that level of commitment can only be maintained with C-level buy-in, as discussed yesterday in our series on Five New Reasons to Celebrate Customer Service Week.

Reason number three, "Create a customer-centric culture from the top down," is necessary to make reason number four a reality:

4. Incentivise frontline reps all year long, not just the first full week in October.

Treat your call center as a profit center, not a cost center. Take care of your customer service people and they'll take care of both you and your customers. And this doesn't mean give them more cupcakes or they'll have trouble fitting into the lederhosen.

Doug Meacham was right, "Shouldn’t Every Week Be National Customer Service Week?"

Customer Service Week: C-Level Muscle Needed

Dovetail Software — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 01:16:00 GMT

Tomorrow in honor of Customer Service Week, Robert Norley, will be riding with one of his garbage collection crews and emptying the trash bins of his customers, the good citizens of Exeter. This is perfect example of creating a customer-centric culture from the top down, reason number three in our series on Five New Reasons to Celebrate Customer Service Week.

Here's hoping that while Mr. Norley collects the trash he will also take the time to talk to his customers, fulfilling reason number two, "Listen to your customers and take action upon their complaints and suggestions." Here's also hoping that Mr. Norley rides with his employees frequently, not just during Customer Service Week.

One CEO who applies come C-level muscle the other 51 weeks of the year is Steve Jobs, who is rumored to respond directly to customer queries. And Steve Loring cites the CEO of a credit union who

"...routinely listens in as his 200 agents take calls. He uses a scoring system for every one of the 20 calls he listens to each month, and then uses that information to modify the way the credit union is delivering service to its members. So whether the CEO’s analysis results in a change to training programs or a shift in using different agents for different levels of customers, executive level involvement is more than a marketing slogan with this credit union."

Apparently this investment of the CEO's time and attention paid off with a positive ROI in 5-6 months and the credit union increased its membership by 22% in a year.

So "How many people are there between your customer and your CEO?" asks InfoWorld's Bill Snyder. He believes that

"The problem with many businesses is that they have too many customer service firewalls in place. There is no accountability. There are no common complaint-routing protocols, and escalation procedures for getting things resolved are spotty at best. Many businesses think nothing of spending hundreds or even thousands of dollars on customer acquisition, but when it comes to spending on customer retention, there isn't any calculation on what it costs to reduce churn."

And he's right. According to research out of the U.K. The Ken Blanchard Companies found that even though good customer service is an essential competitive advantage in a downturn, only 10% of businesses reported customer service as important challenge in 2008 and, "only 38% recognized it as any kind of priority at all."

Moreover, a study by Oracle found that while 83% of the managers felt that customer satisfaction is important, more than half of their customers, "did not judge customer service to be effective - a quarter viewed them as ineffective with a further 29% judging them to be neither effective nor ineffective."

So, what can fix this disconnect? A CEO who isn't afraid to roll up his or her shirtsleeves and take out the trash.

Customer Service Week: Listen, Act or Learn to Like the Taste of Insects

Dovetail Software — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 18:41:00 GMT

While you observe Customer Service Week, please take the time do this:

2. Listen to your customers -- be they in person, on the phone, online or twittering -- and take action upon their complaints and suggestions.

This is reason number two of our Five New Reasons to Celebrate Customer Service Week -- but honestly, if listening to your customers and taking action is not something you do during the other 51 weeks of the year, perhaps you should consider another line of work. Just sell off all your assets, chain the doors shut and go be a hermit because you'll be happier living off the land, than making a living via the patronage of customers.

Period. End of discussion. Stop reading and go listen to your customers.

And since none of us at Dovetail Software are particularly suited for living in caves and eating insects, we listen and we want to know what you, our customers, think about our customer service.

Frederic Premji said it best:

"It is extremely important to mold & adjust your business in the liking and the vision that will appeal to your customer base. This is why it is crucial to hear what they have to say about every aspect of their experience dealing with you. Sometimes, when you run a business, it is hard to have an unbiased opinion on things. We tend to think that everything we do is right. This is why getting feedback from your customers can open your eyes on things that may require changes or improvements. Doing this will better your business and provide an even better experience for customers. There is always room for improvement no matter what we think and getting feedback from our clients proves to them that we take this seriously and that customer service is a priority."

So dear customer, please take a few minutes for this survey and tell us what you think.

Dovetail Links 2008-10-08 -- Customer Service Week Edition

Dovetail Software — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 18:47:00 GMT

Seven Tips to Make the Most of Customer Service Week

"Being a practical sort, I look at something like this and ask myself, how can we get the most from this? What can people do to create some tangible value beyond recognizing the importance of customer service? So here are 7 things you can do to both honor the spirit of service but also produce something of value for your organization as you celebrate Customer Service Week..."

Customer Service Champs

"Good customer service would seem to be a simple matter. Make policies flexible. Don't force customers to play call-center phone tag. Hire friendly people, train them well, and reward them with healthy pay and benefits. But delivering the right level of customer service turns out to be hard."

A Week of Strong Customer Service

"Customer care representatives have it tough—so it’s no surprise to discover that companies are having a harder time holding onto them. In 2007, the attrition rate for contact center agents was 27 percent, a 93 percent increase from the rate in 1997, according to Dimension Data. With this in mind, Margaret DeWitt, program coordinator at the Customer Service Group (CSG), a Boonton, N.J.–based organization serving contact centers, believes it’s critical to devote time to appreciate those on the front lines."

Social Media as Customer Service

"Social media is the new customer service. When social media-driven customer service is combined with the work of citizen marketers, it becomes a force for more credible problem-solving (and less expensive customer service costs). With its inherent market research opportunities, social media has crossed over to the category of obvious strategy."

10 Rules To Give Great Customer Service

"When you run a business, one of the most crucial areas in which you must excel in order to ensure your survival is customer service. Over the years, I have always made sure that this area was going to be a priority of mine. I have gathered some insights into this subject, and thus I would like to share with you what I call my 10 Rules to provide amazing customer service..."

Customer Service Week: Actions Speak Louder Than Words

Dovetail Software — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 00:33:00 GMT

It's day two of national Customer Service Week, so let's explore reason number one in our Five New Reasons to Celebrate this annual event -- while bearing in mind Doug Meacham's challenge to show our customers our appreciation every week, not just the first week in October.

1. Show, don't tell customers how committed you are to their satisfaction.

"Actions speak louder than words," is something Stephen Lynn, our CEO, emphasizes almost daily and action has become a huge part of our culture. In this post, he wrote,

"Most companies will tell you how important customer service is to them, and keeping their customers happy is paramount to them. However, often when you investigate further, you find that while they say this, their actions don’t follow their words."

Another canon of our culture is "Practice what you preach." And if you really care about your customers, it's not that hard to do. BusinessWeek, however, thinks differently:

"Good customer service would seem to be a simple matter. Make policies flexible. Don't force customers to play call-center phone tag. Hire friendly people, train them well, and reward them with healthy pay and benefits.

"But delivering the right level of customer service turns out to be hard [emphasis added]. Some companies struggle to find smiling teenagers who are willing to work for the minimum wage flipping burgers. Others have the difficult task of ensuring their customers get the same message whether they're online, on the phone, or in the store. Slip up, and your service snafu becomes a tale consumers tell with relish over and over again."

BW did manage to find 50 companies like USAA, LL Bean and Fairmont Hotels that the magazine calls the Customer Service Elite, because they, "know how to keep front-line folks happy, make tech investments that help rather than hinder consumers and have leaders who make service a priority."

One of these elite companies, Wachovia, is ranked 18th and in honor of Customer Service Week, the embattled brokerage house is practicing what it preaches with its second annual "Who Would You Thank?" essay contest that can earn customers and non-customers alike a cool $10,000. Note that if your essay is some smartypants thank-you to the regulators who allowed Wachovia to collapse, it's doubtful you'll win the 10K.

Still, it's walking-the-walk, talking-the-talk actions like this contest that earned Wachovia the number one spot on the American Customer Satisfaction Index for seven years in a row.

Does your company show, not tell its customers how committed you are to their satisfaction? If so, feel free to comment and let us know how your actions speak louder than words.

Every Week IS National Customer Service Week

Dovetail Software — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 00:36:00 GMT

Customer Service Week starts today and runs through October 10th. This event began back in 1992, thanks to both a Congressional proclamation and even earlier support from the International Customer Service Association (ICSA). This year, particularly with the credit spigot turned off and the economy circling the drain, appreciation for your customers is more important than ever.

Last year, back before so much economic uncertainty, Doug Meacham asked a very important question in his post, Shouldn’t Every Week Be National Customer Service Week?:

"To use this week as the only time to 'let your customers know about your commitment to customer satisfaction,' or to 'raise company-wide awareness for the importance of CS,' leaves 51 other weeks of opportunity on the table. What would happen to an organization’s culture if they took advantage of that opportunity? What if the tag line was 'Doing Our Best With Every Request, Every Day?'"

In his this quote from his 2007 post, Mr. Meacham refers to CSWeek's Five Reasons to Celebrate Customer Service Week:

   1. Boost morale, motivation and teamwork.
   2. Reward frontline reps for the important work they do all year long.
   3. Raise companywide awareness of the importance of customer service.
   4. Thank other departments for their support.
   5. Let customers know about your commitment to customer satisfaction.

Even though customer service and support has changed substantially over the last decade, CSWeek for some reason has offered up the same list year after year.

So, inspired by Mr. Meacham plea to not leave 51 other weeks of opportunity on the table, we'd like to suggest Five New Reasons to Celebrate:

Show, don't tell customers how committed you are to their satisfaction.
Listen to your customers -- be they in person, on the phone, online or twittering -- and take action upon their complaints and suggestions.
Create a customer-centric culture from the top down.
Incentivise frontline reps all year long, not just the first full week in October.
Employ a CRM solution that not only manages Sales Force Automation (SFA) but also the largest segment and most important part of customer relationship management, Customer Service and Support (CS&S).

Throughout this week -- and throughout the year -- we'll be exploring each of these five reasons in individual posts. Please come back and we heartily encourage your comments.