We Blog CRM

Even South Africa, where only 10.8% of the population uses internet, needs to be operating in the cloud. With the influx of 300,000 soccer fans for the 2010 World Cup, South African Tourism, the lone customer service company catering to the masses, has turned to Salesforce.com for a CRM solution.

The government-licensed office had in place an aged, legacy CRM system built on Microsoft technology. The call center was clearly unprepared to handle the estimated increase from 1,000 – 2,000 calls per week to 15,000 per week during the World Cup, with customer requests ranging between travel logistics, accommodations and ticket availability. William Price, global manager of e-marketing at South African Tourism, thought to turn to cloud computing, and the agency chose Salesforce.com. The company’s CRM application was one of seven considered.

“When the world comes here for the games, we want to create amazing, life-changing experiences,” says Price. “With travel being a social experience unlike anything else, we want to provide amazing customer service with relevant, real-time, and easy-to-access information that helps people find the best there is to see and do in South Africa. Service Cloud 2 lets us not only leverage social media platforms to engage visitors in a way that is familiar to them, but also quickly reorients our organization and operations to meet that opportunity without the cost and complexity of software.”

Salesforce.com’s CRM solution is expected to improve the company’s customer service visibility and analysis. Calls can be more easily categorized so that they are directed to the right representatives. Trends in repeated requests can be picked out and resolved.

A particular point of interest was using the CRM application for social networking analysis. South African Tourism wanted to monitor online buzz generated from World Cup tourists on sites such as Twitter and Facebook. Salesforce.com was able to set this up for the agency and provide integrated management for their Twitter and Facebook profiles.

And though the World Cup is fleeting, South African Tourism plans to retire its old CRM system (still in operation for calls from outside of South Africa) in favor of Salesforce’s cloud CRM. The company will take this opportunity to modernize its systems.

Siemens has announced an upgrade of its OpenScape Contact Center. The Version 8 (V8) release will be available to the public on May 18^th with virtualization from the server and client directions. The V8 upgrade will also be compatible on any device with a USB port, including netbooks and smartphones.

The new virtualized servers allow data centers to use a software-based contact center solution. The new solution will help to optimize server load and reduce the cost of disaster recovering planning. Using hypervisors, the CRM solution allows for multiple operating systems and application software to run on the same physical server.

The open CRM solution enables easy deployment, simplified management and cost savings through server consolidation. Through a partnership with VMware, the software and server virtualization company, Siemens is able to run different operating systems on the same physical machine. This will allow data centers to deploy software in a way that will balance workloads instead of segregating software per operating system. “If you think about a server in a conventional way, you would have one application on a server running Linux and another running on a Windows server” explains Ross Sedgewick senior director at Siemens. “Virtualization allows you to spread those applications evenly over multiple servers.”

Virtualization will also allow companies to load their contact center software onto data center machines, instead of having to add onto proprietary hardware at each location. The physical barrier between the contact center and the data center will be eliminated.

The V8 update also offers a web-based agent interface. Users can still used the windows-based client, but have the option of deploying the contact center solution through a browser as well. The web-based agent interface will allow contact center agents to view real-time availability of enterprise workers. Through the agent interface, companies can promote team-wide collaboration to optimize customer service.

OpenScape Contact Center V8 also has Interactive Voice Response (IVR) capabilities. The capabilities are only available on the software and entirely SIP-based. The company boasts that IVR functionality will lower costs instead of using more expensive proprietary hardware. “With this latest version of OpenScape Contact Center, not only do we provide Web-based desktops and an integrated IVR to bolster the classic contact center goals of productivity and customer service, we provide IT with the flexibility to meet business goals quickly and cost effectively,” said VP and GM at Siemens Enterprise Communcations, Scott McDonald. “Since it is optimized for virtualized environments, it gives IT managers increased deployment flexibility and easier management, all while saving money.”

For more info visit: www.siemens-enterprise.com

A report commissioned by Royal Mail has found that a staggering 90% of the companies in the UK are not making the best use of customer data at their disposal and in the process they are collectively losing out on millions of pounds in sales. A little more effort on part of the companies in understanding the customer data at their disposal could lead to a 30% increase in value.

According to Colin Bradshaw, head of data strategy at Royal Mail, hardly 15% of the companies that they investigated considered their data to be a valuable intangible asset. But not everyone is in favor of assigning a value to data; the question raised by some people is that how does one assign a value to something as intangible as data. Yet all agree that data needs to be managed better if it is to be of more use as information. Most companies err in using overly simple statistical methods to understand data and they do not use data for running most of their applications.

High street British optician Specsavers, which has around 600 stores in the UK, has decided to deploy Infor CRM Epiphany. The CRM system is expected to help the company achieve that most desired position – one where it has a single view of its customer. Specsavers intends to use the Sales and Service modules of Epiphany to boost its call center program with a view to support its client retention efforts. Epiphany is a big leap forward from the spreadsheets and notepads which the company used to process customer data. Infor CRM should enable the company call center to react more swiftly and with greater certainty to customer queries and resolve issues faster.

In-depth, real-time customer information will surely enhance the staff working experience as well as the customer experience fostering loyalty amongst both for Specsavers. Another advantage is that with accurate customer information, the company can personalize its services to suit the needs of the customer. 

 An interesting study conducted by the Ponemon Institute has thrown up some interesting facts regarding the (mis)use of customer data. Sixty two percent of the companies that were questioned by Ponemon stated that they used real and sensitive customer data while testing and developing applications.

Given the fact that the data includes employee, vendor and customer records, and credit card and Social Security numbers, it is a little surprising that companies are loath to use duplicate data for testing purposes.

The report states that 52% of companies outsource application testing and 49% of those questioned revealed that they shared sensitive data with the outsiders working on the application testing. Disregard for data security comes across quite strongly in these situations where companies are lazy enough not to use dummy data. This easy access to data can tempt unauthorized people to abuse the data.
Shockingly, well it is shocking you know, 50% of the companies interviewed had no idea if their data had been compromised during the testing and a third were not sure if their data had been lost or stolen during the testing and development phase.

FTS, a global provider of Business Control, Billing and CRM solutions for service providers has announced that Globalcom Inc. has selected the FTS Leap Billing RC for its billing platform.

FTS’ Leap Billing RC (LBRC) is an end-to-end billing and customer care solution designed for the American market. FTS’ LBRC platform is to be integrated with Globalcom’s existing back office platforms including order management.

Chicago, Ill.-based Globalcom is a provider of telecommunications services, offering a portfolio of VoIP solutions, broadband and IP Telephony integrated from a single provider.

iCongo Inc. closed out the week with the announcement that Lecavalier Auto Parts, reportedly Canada’s leading distributor of recycled auto parts and equipment, has selected the iCongo ICE3 suite of collaborative e-business systems. Lecavalier will be employing iCongo e-commerce to conduct customers’ order entry and order management processes online.

The applications being implemented by Lecavalier include iCongo’s ICE3 Business-to-Business Catalog and Online Order Entry System; the ICE3 Business-to-Consumer E-Commerce System; the ICE3 Customer Portal; and a suite of marketing and collaboration modules.

Lecavalier Auto Parts was founded in 1942 by Fernand Lecavalier and was acquired by Roger Fugère Sr. and his brothers in 1965. In 1982, Roger Fugère Jr. joined the business, followed a year and a half later by his brother Philippe. Lecavalier acquired the Centre de recyclage St. Jean in November 1999, and Ford Motor Company bought Lecavalier in November 2001. Lecavalier’s four facilities process approximately 15,000 vehicles a year to provide professionally cleaned and thoroughly tested parts to body shops, garages, dealerships, insurance companies, and individual consumers.

That sober note you hear sounding emanates from Accenture, that international management consulting, technology services and outsourcing company. A recent study outsourced by the firm and undertaken by BPRI Group implied that, overall, tech firms are alienating customers with customer service that is average at best. Firms supplying such average or below-average service risk losing up to 73 percent to competitors.

The research was based on a survey of 1,200 technology consumers in North America, Europe and Asia, and interviews with executives at vice-president level and above at 35 global consumer technology companies, each with at least $1 billion in annual revenue between August and November 2006.

The survey of customers of consumer technology companies was fielded between January and March 2007 by the Lightspeed Consumer Panel and included consumers in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, France, Italy and Japan.

Other statistics revealed an interesting perception gap between those on opposite sides of the buy-sell equation:

? 81 percent of customers surveyed who rated their service satisfaction as “below average” said they will purchase from a different supplier the next time.

? Although 75 percent of executives said their companies’ provide “above average” customer care, 58 percent of consumers rated their satisfaction with customer service as average or below average.

? When consumers rate their service satisfaction as merely “average,” the likelihood of their buying again from that same company falls by almost half from 51 percent to 27 percent.

? 48 percent of consumers surveyed said they share their negative customer-service experiences with friends and family.

? 42 percent of customers surveyed said they had to access customer-service channels multiple times to resolve their problems.

? 61 percent of consumers surveyed said they believe that technology has not improved customer service.

? And as for that 78 percent mentioned above, here it is: That 78 percent surveyed said the service they receive is “at or below” the level competitors offer.

Upon releasing the results, Brett Anderson, managing director for Customer Relationship Management in Accenture’s Communications and High Tech Practice, declared the numbers to be “a wake-up call that customer service should no longer be relegated to a mere instrument for extracting costs out of the business. Instead, this service should be a powerful and crucial investment target for accelerating full-throttle toward delivering high performance.”

For more information on Accenture’s “Customer Service” report, click here.

A pair of announcements came out of the Nielsen Company today. The company’s cross-discipline initiative known as NielsenConnect has released a suite of company-wide services.

Initial services in the offering will include NielsenCombine, a consumer insight service that integrates data sets such as that of a client’s database with Nielsen’s “National People Meter” data used in collecting information for television audience ratings; NielsenConnections, a tool used to evaluate consumer activity across media; NielsenHealth, specialized CRM for various healthcare industry segments; NielsenTrend, which provides analysis of dynamics between demographics, ethnographic trends and attitudinal shifts; NielsenLinx, designed for marketers, retailers, media and advertising agencies in organizing and managing data on brands, locations and media analysis; and Nielsen In-Store, a specialty product for marketing in retail outlets.

In a second announcement, the Nielsens came together with Experian Marketing Services in telling a strategic alliance to provide CPG businesses with a “new, holistic” consumer relationship marketing solution.

Announced at Nielsen’s annual Consumer 360 Conference, the joint solution seeks to assist marketers in more effectively targeting and establishing direct relationships with consumers at the household level.

“Household targeting has become the goal for savvy CPG marketers,” said Tim Kregor, U.S. president of Nielsen Homescan and Nielsen company service Spectra, and NielsenConnect chief executive office Jon Mandel also stated that “As a company, Nielsen knows more about consumer behavior than anyone else.”

The Nielsen Company, most famously known for its American television audience ratings, is a global information and media company with recognized brands in marketing information (ACNielsen), media information (Nielsen Media Research), business publications (Billboard, The Hollywood Reporter, Adweek), trade shows and the newspaper sector (Scarborough Research). The privately held company employs more than 41,000 and is active in more than 100 countries, with headquarters in New York and Haarlem, the Netherlands.

Experian is a specialist in providing analytical and information services; clients include organizations from financial services, retail and catalog, telecommunications, utilities, media, insurance, automotive, leisure, e-commerce, manufacturing, property and government sectors. Experian Group Limited is listed on the London Stock Exchange and has corporate headquarters in Dublin, Ireland, with operational headquarters in Costa Mesa, Calif., and Nottingham, UK. Experian employs more than 12,500 in 34 countries worldwide, supporting clients in more than 60 countries. Annual sales are in excess of $3.1 billion.

DST Systems, Inc. has unveiled its DST SalesConnect data management and CRM solution this week at the ICI General Membership Conference in Washington, D.C.

The SalesConnect solution features a central repository of firm, office and representative information that systematically matches trades coming into DST’s shareholder TA2000 record-keeping platform to the correct representative.