Analyze This

Another sign that e-service and e-support technologies are maturing are the sophisticated analytics functions springing up around them — businesses have collected scads of data from their operational CRM initiatives and now they want to put it to good use. In doing so, they’re discovering which initiatives are working and which aren’t, not only enabling them to improve service delivery but overall marketing efforts. In fact, according to John Ragsdale, a vice president at Forrester Research, marketing is emerging as a key influencer of e-service purchasing decisions. While call deflection and other cost-saving measures remain leading drivers, corporate brand reinforcement is an increasingly important factor behind e-service initiatives, along with revenue growth and improved customer experiences. Among other functions, analytics, according to Ragsdale, will enable support and service organizations to identify and generate cross-selling and upselling opportunities at the point of contact.

“What’s been buried in all the e-service stories until recently is the analytics piece, which is getting bigger and far more meaningful,” says Sweeny. Traditionally, he says, the service and support industry has set metrics for every function handled by contact centers and help desks and relentlessly measured their performance against them, but the functions they’ve been measuring don’t necessarily give any true indication of how the business is performing. Managers have used the first iteration of service-based analytics to review these metrics — hold times, abandonment, first-call resolution rates — but often don’t know how the data gathered could correspond to business improvements.

Now, Sweeny says, organizations are starting to use more sophisticated analytics to better tie how satisfaction with service translates to, say, more product purchases or renewed maintenance contracts, and understanding how they relate to increasing revenues and improving the bottom line.

“The analytics path we’re headed down is to use them to translate transaction metrics or indicators to business results,” says Sweeny. “Analytics is actually taking the next leap to enable users to learn something meaningful about how the data they’re looking at affects the business, and that’s particularly true in self-services.

“I think self-service is at a crossroads,” he continues. The basic technology is maturing and has significantly improved deflection rates, grabbing much of the low-hanging fruit. Analytics processes, he says, are ushering in the next phase of self-service, where the examination of performance indicators determine service and marketing improvements and future investments in technology, people and process.

Indeed, customer service and support as a whole is changing, according to Aldrich. The past tendency to consider support as a function that occurred only when a customer had a problem is giving way to a new view — one that encompasses a cradle-to-grave approach to service, from product consideration forward. “We see customer support as a series of capabilities that span the entire customer lifecycle,” says Aldrich.

Improving Service Delivery Vendor consolidation, evolving technologies, and increasing demand for multiple delivery channels create an ever-shifting landscape for businesses trying to differentiate themselves through their service and support initiatives, according to Forrester Research Vice President John Ragsdale. In a recent report reviewing trends in e-service, he outlined steps business should take if they’re working to improve the support experience they provide for their customers and partners. If the service organization doesn’t have a close relationship with the marketing department, develop one. According to Ragsdale, those businesses whose marketing and service organizations don’t collaborate are either already battling for customer ownership or will ultimately do so. The service organization should ask for marketing’s input on competitors’ strategies, customer behavior and satisfaction, and other pertinent details if, for example, they’re rolling out self-service initiatives. Cooperation and collaboration among customer-facing organizations will only strengthen strategies and technology deployments. Contact centers with a heavy reliance on phones should expand their channels. Forrester’s research reveals that many contact center managers believe their customers aren’t interested in any service channel beyond the telephone, but that view, says Ragsdale, is short-sighted. If customers don’t appear to be interested in email or chat as a service delivery channel, they will at some point, and the support organization may be behind the technology curve by the time they realize they need to react. Establish audit trails for Web collaboration activities. To avoid legal troubles and customer dissatisfaction, service organizations should ensure they have in place strong tracking mechanisms— either packaged in their e-service applications or designed in-house — for Web collaboration. These audit capabilities enable organizations to track account activities so they can defend themselves against customers complaints or even lawsuits about “slamming,” in which agents push customers into new accounts or options without their approval.

 

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