These set of attitudes with social media reflect the cliché “the customer is always right.”
Nonsense. Balderdash. Rot.
The “social customer”—like any other customer—is not always correct.
Just ask anyone who deals with customers i.e. the public: counter/front desk/retail staff and contact center agents. And they will tell you that a fair chunk of the complaints that they get from them are not valid: either from misinformation e.g. about hours, offers, prices and features or mishandling i.e. they didn’t read the instructions. Customer tech support experts guesstimated a long time ago that some 75 percent of calls received by support centers can be classified as "RT(F)M". Namely did they “read the (friendly) manual”?
Moreover, in most instances the individuals making such inaccurate complaints are cranky and obnoxious. Too many of them are trying to get discounts or other financial gains and will bluff and scream to get what they want.
And to top it off those obscene customers are more often than not the marketers’ sweet spots, the ones that outfits are fighting to attract and retain. These are the affluent and influential, the ones who expect forelock-tugging and kowtowing from others below their station. They are accustomed to bullying and lying (outright or by omission) to get their way even for the smallest purchases: techniques no doubt used well in their professional lives. They not surprisingly treat customer-facing staff like serfs. These individuals get a perverse satisfaction from haggling over pennies. For them winning no matter how trivial or upsetting to others, is all what counts.
Of the customer abuses product returns are the worst. Too often the goods are returned damaged not because of flaws but because the customers abused them. One of the biggest scams in womens’ apparel (I know people who work in that industry, I started out in the "needle trades") are customers buying expensive outfits then returning them several days later, whining about the color, fit and quality—when what they did was to “borrow” them for a wedding, job interview, important meeting etc.
Individuals' behavior on social media is no different than that on the other channels. Anyone can go and post and Tweet a comment. Whether these are accurate, have value or are not part of any scams is another question altogether. There is so much muck out there that it takes an immense amount of precision sifting to get to those messages that are worthwhile e.g. a “United Breaks Guitars”. Alas in too many cases the social statements can be distilled to “(fill in the blank) sucks”. The volume of dreck and trivia on Facebook, just to name one example is so high that there are users like my wife have practically given up on it.
Rarely do I comment on sites. There are only so many hours in a day to deal with sifting through this information and commenting and responding in kind. I will though when I am looking to buy products and services visit review sites and sift through them. I have a well-developed nose for paid puffery, dealing as I do with PR flaks and having been one myself.
The one great advantage of the social channel as opposed to in-person and contact center phone is that there is a briefly-opened window in which the winners can be sorted from the whiners sight unseen. Here are two excellent indicators for such analysis: sentence construction and word choice. When one writes in proper sentences one has previously thought through what they are going to say. When the language selected is in the midrange between formal and informal, reflecting conversation and conveying the right amount of emotion to the matter being dealt with, it indicates authenticity rather than canned responses.
There are a growing range of social media monitoring and sentiment analysis available. In sourcing, specifying, purchasing and configuring these solutions firms should consult with those who work directly with the customers i.e. in-person and contact center staff.
Moreover, and equally more importantly firms should ask the sales associates and the agents what they can do to minimize misunderstandings and complaints. Like clearly posting business hours, applying the KISS principle to offers and terms and above all making, delivering and pricing the products and services right.
After all it is those who interface with customers who know more than anyone else in the organization when the customer is (and isn’t) right. And it is they who will have to deal with the customers directly—in their face or over their screens--before and after they post on social media or read the comments of others.
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One of the best (and the most affordable) answers to customer service issues--from basic product information to fixing problems—may come from each one of us, which can be termed as peer service or peer support. That is provided that this method is set up and managed right.
Peer service/support is exploding in popularity thanks to social media which has taken it from the rarefied confines of IT bulletin boards, whose establishment predates the Web and whose participants were likeminded geeks to the hoi polloi in the virtual universe. The social media/channel has virtualized a core human behavior i.e. reaching out to others for help just as it has done for buying decisions.
Look at our own experiences. Who knows a product or service better than those who buy and/or use it? Who else is intimately acquainted with their benefits, flaws and quirks and workarounds? Where do we often go first when we have questions, need assistance or gripes? Our colleagues, family, friends and acquaintances…
Let’s face it, do contact center agents, or the individuals who write and update the automated self-service tools have firsthand familiarity with typically the higher-priced goods and services that customers are contacting them about and where the pain points are? Can they then directly relate and empathize with the customers’ inquiries and issues?
This affinity-to-customers matter has been one of the knocks against offshoring, as demonstrated with considerable humor on the series Outsourced that NBC has alas hung up on i.e. the often sexually-charged novelties that the Indian agents were taking orders for. Can those who live/work in hot climes truly relate to customers residing in Minnesota or Montreal calling about their furnaces breaking down? Or sell credit cards when they do not use them?
(NBC ought to change its mind about Outsourced. I would have liked to see episodes featuring the contact center being threatened with speech rec in the form of--what else—a blowup doll a la Airplane (call her “Janet”, the cousin to Amtrak’s “Julie”). And how about this for a series finale: Mid America Novelties coming home but managed instead by Todd Dempsy’s grandmother and her knitting circle, sitting in their rocking chairs on the front porch in Kansas, sporting headphones and laptops…)
The benefits of peer service/support via social media are clear and obvious: quick answers and solutions at little or no cost to organizations. IOW it provides the gains of automated self-service tools without the soulless canned responses and the sometimes disconcerting experiences of talking to machines.
Yet peer service/support has its challenges, hence the qualifier “provided”, and to meet them incurs investments. The biggest issue is accuracy. While typically if a respondent provides what may be a wrong answer others will often correct them there needs to be some authoritative means to judge and state which is the right one. There is also the risk of disinformation from competitors. That means organizations need to put in and maintain integrated thread/matter monitoring, tracking, alerting, moderation and intervention and in realtime knowledgebase updating; the knowledgebases need to be accessible via every channel.
Corporate-sponsored social collaboration sites arguably provide the best venues for peer service and support because the issues can be carefully monitoring and intervention is easy. They can create formal user communities. Firms can readily offer discounts to customers once issues have been resolved or make and at the right time cross-sell/upsell offers. They must be careful to avoid during such sites as sales venues as this would turn customers and users—and those they influence--off at light speed.
Organizations can though also use “open” social media i.e. Facebook, TripAdvisor and Twitter to monitor and respond to issues. Many customers prefer these sites rather than go to sponsored forums.
In both cases, the employees handling the moderating and the responses should be named for credibility and personalized and have their contact information displayed. They must also be trained on social media as media i.e. they are acting as spokespeople whose words may well impact their employers’ brands, reputations and sales/revenues.
Will peer service/support eliminate the need for live agents or automated self-service? No because there will always be questions and issues that can be best managed by directly interacting with customers via professional live agents or tightly scripted machines.
What peer service/support can and is doing—again provided that it is done right—is to improve the customer experience and with this retention, loyalty and referrals while shrinking customer contact expenses in the fastest growing channel there is.
More legislation is in the works. The release said that the Sen. Rockefeller’s committee is also working on comprehensive legislation to increase cybersecurity following scores of high-profile hacking incidents against individuals, government and the private sector.
“Consumers have a right to know when and how their personal and sensitive information is being used online—and most importantly to be able to say ‘no thanks’ when companies seek to gather that information without their approval,” said Rockefeller. “This bill will offer a simple, straightforward way for people to stop companies from tracking their every move on the Internet.”
Predictably the Direct Marketing Association, reflecting the wishes of its members, has come out to oppose Do Not Track saying it is unnecessary because of industry self-regulation, that it will cost businesses and hurt consumers and the economy.
The DMA points to its Self-Regulatory Program for Online Behavioral Advertising, launched by the DMA and four other leading trade associations last year. It says the Rockefeller bill fails to recognize this strong and effective self-regulatory program, instead calling for a massive government program to provide protections that industry already offers to consumers.
“The DMA and its thousands of member companies have spent countless hours and considerable resources developing a system to provide real and meaningful choice to consumers about the way their information is collected and used across the Internet,” said DMA CEO Lawrence Kimmel in a press release. “I can say with certainty that business is safeguarding consumers’ privacy without any cost to taxpayers while protecting the economic interests of all Americans.”
This is a boilerplate argument against any such legislation and it has the same holes no matter what issue it is applied against. Namely that there are many firms that don’t belong to associations like the DMA et al and do not abide by their principles and practices and that outfits members and nonmembers alike who will be tempted to ignore them because the short-term money is too tempting. Just think of the brave but futile attempts to ward off Do Not Call like the ATA’s much-vaunted TeleWatch program announced with fanfare in October 1999: undermined by the teleservices companies that would whine when regulations were later imposed on them.
Sen. Rockefeller’s bill has another benefit: it may ward off state legislation, like California’s Senate Bill 761, (which Facebook and Google are reportedly not too keen about, according to a KEYT.com story). Does industry really want yet another lawyer-enriching patchwork of state laws or would it prefer a comprehensive federal law?
Do-Not-Track Online is not perfect. It should be made opt-in. It also needs companion legislation prohibiting tracking wireless devices, enforced by the FCC, unless consumers also opt-in.
Opt-in is better than opt-out because it gives consumers respect through giving them control over their behavior. Asking is someone first is always nicer,--and will result in a more positive, productive relationship--than telling them you’re going to do something unless they say no.
The corporate “Nasty Sisters” needs a smack: just as the teleservices industry was asking for it with too many unwanted calls, abandoned calls and pushy agents.
Do Not Call didn't kill but instead it helped shape up the teleservices industry, making telemarketing less of an annoyance and instead more of an assistance to consumers. For example outbound calls both live agents and automated has become a boon to customers and the firms they do business with through notifying them of service issue. Do-Not-Track-Only will do just that for Internet firms and advertisers. There will be similar ways found to make tracking--through permission—helpful. And that is good news for companies that truly want to have meaningful, prosperous relationships with customers.
Customer relationships are—and should be—based on honesty and respect. Tailing and bugging customers is not how you keep and build them. Listening to them, letting them dictate how they do business with companies is how you accomplish this.
Of the two Nasty Sister is more evil because “she” on the surface is sweeter and seemingly more benign. After all, “she” can’t put you in jail or rob you of your freedoms.
Well…that’s not exactly the case…because the data collected by “her” can and does impact individuals’ abilities to obtain and keep credit, pay bills, acquire housing and get and retain employment. Instead of the authorities that are making these life-changing judgements based on information collected by the police it is companies relying on their own internal spying, data acquired from other firms and from credit reports.
What makes Nasty Sister especially dangerous is that there is relatively little oversight on how this data is used and handled and what is collected. In contrast “Big Brother” does have to answer ultimately to the public. With government you can turf the political lowlives out of office, even cause a revolution. You can’t storm the corporate boardroom as readily as the Bastille.
The recent controversy over cellphone tracking is just one very public example of this invasion of private lives by firms. It follows on the other hot issue of tracking individual online activities.
Yet there are other private sector invasions of personal lives that are just as insidious. One of which is the recent trend to require job applicants to their previous addresses with companies for background checks. Not just for high-risk employment that stipulate security clearances—where the “bad guys” could cause loss of life, injuries, harm national security and damage property--but for $10/hour typical contact center customer services, support and sales work.
The address tracking follows on the equally odious practice of performing credit checks on prospective employees. This last one is the reeking house arrest equivalent of Victorian-era debtors’ prisons. What is the logic in denying employment to someone who is otherwise qualified who was late paying their bills? Hmmm…wouldn’t giving them a job help them to repay their debts???
There is no overriding necessity for these intrusions. Are for example contact centers hotbeds of crime? Are agents and their unwitting supervisors putting their nations at grave risk by deliberately or carelessly having information fall into the wrong hands? Have there been widespread outbreaks of ID, asset and corporate documents theft, insider trading, reputations destroyed, property damaged and lives lost and individuals maimed via unscrupulous contact center staff?
Contact center agents are arguably one of the most carefully and extensively watched positions there is. Any risk factors--however slim--are mitigated by the extensive array of already-required and proven call and contact monitoring, data blanking and IT security tools such as secure desktops.
One can make the argument that “there is no such thing as too little information on prospective employees”. Also that “we know the risk is slight but what happens if something does happen?”
The problem with this logic that it is the equivalent to “there is no such thing as too little security” e.g. like requiring reception staff to wear Kevlar vests and having Uzi-toting guards patrolling call floors. It covers and lines the butts belonging to lazy, and/or incompetent management who can then abdicate their responsibility to properly assess risks and fairly screen individuals as individuals to vendors who profit from this insecurity and paranoia.
There are reasons for companies to be afraid but it isn't from the people they track, and collect data on. Instead it is from outside thieves that hack into private networks to steal data. What's valuable to companies is equally if not more valuable to crooks.
There is a public interest in tracking the activities of criminals and suspects. There is also a public good in uncovering and monitoring demographic trends i.e. where individuals as an aggregate are living, working, going to school, commuting and spending, whose information is vital for efficient allocation of both public and private sector resources. There are long-responsible and trusted mechanisms for both: law enforcement agencies and the Census Bureau that are overseen by departments that respectively that report to the public via their elected officials.
At the same time there is a public interest in the ability of firms to effectively market and serve their customers including determining their suitability and value. This creates economic value, activity, jobs and taxes.
There is however, no public interest in private data being used to unfairly restrict individual freedom. No more than there is for governments to go snooping into personal lives beyond what can be justified in a court of law.
Big Brother is answerable to the public in a democratic society. What is needed is an effective mechanism to make Nasty Sister equally responsible through a comprehensive, integrated, coherent and fair set of laws and regulations that can adapt as practices, technology and society change.
I have been warning of the risks of having individuals who lack this training, discipline and experience, namely contact center agents, to go on social media. Why? Because I know firsthand as a reporter, as a spokesperson and as a political and community activist and as a onetime public office candidate how careful you must be when making media comments. This doesn't mean the language has to be bland and/or content-devoid. It means that the messaging--especially in a public interplay that can get hot-and-heavy--must be accurate, kept consistent and be delivered calmly.
The impacts of poor social media commentary was brought home in March by a pair of 'misTweets', one by an employee of an ad agency the other by a well-known comedian--individuals who know the power of language--that embarrassed their organizations and which led to their dismissal.
The New York Times, in an excellent article by Stuart Elliott
“When the Marketing Reach of Social Media Backfires” published March 15 reported that these fates befell an employee of the ad agency handling the Chrysler consumer brand’s Twitter account after posting a comment that read: “I find it ironic that Detroit is known as the #motorcity and yet no one here knows how to drive.” “Between “to” and “drive” was a vulgarity.” They also struck Gilbert Gottfried, the voice behind the AFLAC duck when he “started to post at least 10 jokes to his personal Twitter feed about the earthquake and tsunami in Japan — a market that accounts for 75 percent of Aflac’s revenue,” said the Times.
“The incidents, involving remarks on Twitter that were judged to be tasteless, inappropriate and insensitive, point out some inherent risks of social media,” said the Times.
“One challenge is the “amplified effect” of social media, said Ian Schafer, chief executive at Deep Focus, a digital agency in New York, citing how, on Twitter, “you put something out and it can be retweeted thousands of times.”
“It’s an age when anybody can communicate to an audience,” he added. “It didn’t used to be that way.”
“The relative newness of that phenomenon, said George E. Belch, a marketing professor at San Diego State University, means “there are people in your company who forget when they post on a blog, on Twitter, on a Facebook page, that it’s out there — and it’s out there at warp speed.”
"Another risk with social media is how many users vie to be first with what they consider clever comments on news stories and other subjects their friends and families care about."
“I’m concerned,” said Daniel Khabie, chief executive at Digitaria in San Diego, an agency that is part of the JWT division of WPP. “I think you should think before you speak, and you should think before you tweet.”
“We, as people, have a social responsibility,” he added. “What you say in social media shouldn’t be just a chain of thoughts.”
“Brands need to “establish a social media policy,” Mr. Khabie said, because without such precautions, “we’re giving people loaded guns to do incredible harm.”
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The Times article then cited Craig Macdonald, chief marketing officer at Covario who "said he would recommend that marketers pursue a strategy of “controlled chaos” in social media."
“Offer employees some sort of certification course and tell them, ‘We’ll tolerate some negativity and dumb stuff, and we’ll course-correct as we go along,’ ”Mr. Macdonald said. "Then monitor what they say, course correct — and do better next time.”
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The social channel appears on first glance to provide a readily-extracted motherlode of information and insights that can help firms retain and build relations with customers and attract new ones. For in the huge volume of conversations: blogs, comments on sites e.g. TripAdvisor et al, Facebook postings and Tweets are concerns, complaints, experiences and ideas about companies’ products and services that are waiting to be mined, assayed, processed, refined and used.
Yet as one spends any time on the channel knows, going through it is akin to mining in another way: there is an awful lot of raw ore that must be processed to obtain a few ounces of valuable commodities.
I recently asked enterprise feedback management (EFM) solution providers for a story on EFM in the February issue of Customer Interaction Solutions about replacing customer feedback surveys with social channel comment harvesting and analysis.
After all if customers and prospects are already remarking about firms on social sites why not capture these comments instead of spending scarce resources on reaching out to and getting them to respond to questions?
The doubting responses from these fine suppliers’ executives would, if I could see their faces, no doubt be accompanied by eye rolling and eyebrow raising: or attempts to stop them from happening.
These companies have a point. Facebook conversations and Tweets are so weighed down with and focused on with to others seemingly trivial details on individuals’ lives that they are often useless for meaningful personal let alone for commercial interactions.
My wife has practically given up on Facebook because it has become such a time-waster. If anyone wants to reach her they can send her an e-mail. Or call. The same goes for me. My TMC blog and the odd comments on media sites are about the extent of my social media interactions. When learning from others or offering my suggestions to them I prefer long and in-depth discussions.
And when there is commercially valuable information is it what firms need to know and use at that time? For with the social channel, like any resource, what is there is all that there is: take it, work with it or leave it. There is nothing companies can do to change the composition or the location.
There is the issue of whether what is said on the social channels accurately reflects marketplace sentiment; are the comments and posts instead examples of “empty cans rattle the most?” Who actually listens and more importantly heeds their messages? Are the people who use them also sought-after customers, possessing the right income, interests and demographics?
Moreover because these posts are typically anonymous how can firms find out these individuals’ identities and from there determine their value to their enterprises without arousing their suspicions other than approaching them head-on and only if they agree to reveal who they are?
The majority of the working population rarely has time during business hours--which are becoming longer as are commute times—to spend much time on social media. Stringent corporate policies and tougher laws that rightly restrict communicating in motion are going in place to limit such activities, though their success in doing so is debatable.
More seriously, too often the remarks made about firms on social media are unhelpful and worse yet occasionally inaccurate, which could harm brand and company reputation.
The social channel's anonymity opens the door to concerted guerrilla marketing warfare where commenters would be paid to build up their clients and tear down competitors, with language specially shaped and sharpened to get through the sites’ hosts’ screens. As these posts are anonymous the perps make their attacks and slip away into the ether.
Don't believe me? Since when have there truly been open and honest all-candidates' meetings, online media surveys and comments both call-in and written on public policy issues?
If that were not enough spam has already infested social channel sites, requiring accurate filtering. Suspicious-sounding responses have been sent to blog entries; it takes a careful eye and ear for language to diagnose and remove them.
The social channel, for all its ability to give consumers a global voice, also has its limits in influencing buying behavior; which makes it no different than any other channel. Customers will, for all their squawking, tolerate mediocre products and services if they marginally perform better for the money compared with the competition.
For example United Airlines has been taking a beating rightly or wrongly online. Yet as long as the carrier represents the best choice to get people and their luggage to get to their destinations when they want and reasonably on time and in fair comfort at viable fares it will stay in business.
Companies that want to tap the social channel had better be prepared for the hard work and are willing to invest in top-grade harvesting and analysis tools to extract wealth from these veins. They should must retain and expand their use of traditional voice of customer means and tools, like EFM-launched-and-managed surveys and interaction speech and screen analytics on calls, e-mails, chats and texts. They need to watch for, analyze, investigate and act on negative comments ASAP.
Even more important than that though outfits must design, engineer, deliver, price and support their products and services right. For there is no surer means than that to attract and retain customers: who will encourage others via the social channel to join them, resulting in a wealth of positive, reinforcing feedback that can create a virtuous cycle of prosperity.
‘Tis the gift giving season. For the OEMers and resellers of audio-, web- and videoconferencing equipment their presents have come early thanks (unwittingly) to the U.S. and Canadian governments.
For their actions have pushed adoption and use of video especially to their tipping points where they start to become the norm in business but even in consumer personal interactions.
For if air travel weren’t a nightmare already what with painfully cramped seating, made worse by salt-laden food at airport concessionaires (airline food was for the most part remarkably healthy with sensibly controlled portions), long delays, frequent cancellations, high fares and other examples of lousy service…and if going through security wasn’t a hassle and humiliating enough…now there are the intimate “pat downs” that the overworked and customer-abused American and Canadian personnel have to inflict on fliers when the computers tell them to.
This procedure may well be the last straw for travelers and organizations that are already fed up with travel. Enough.
I suspect that for many travelers and their families even the thought of having their most private parts of their bodies and those they love—like their 80-year old grandmother--being “checked out” is enough to make them cry “Skype”…and start searching for conferencing equipment and services.
The public-perceived creepiness of this screening procedure cannot be underestimated. Is it really worth it any more flying to a business meeting or a conference or taking a trip to see family –on top of all of the other issues with that form of travel--when there is the spectre of being de facto groped in the name of national security?
The policy of patting-down airline passengers is an admission of failure by American and Canadian authorities. The only people who are truly happy are the terrorists for the practices demonstrate in the most humiliating fashion possible that they have won by succeeding in limiting our freedoms.
Pat-downs are security fig leaves. They demonstrate an obscene failure of intelligence-gathering, analysis, reporting and action: just like what had happened prior to 9-11… If a terrorist has gotten as far as arriving at the scanning devices with C4 packed into their crotch it is already too late because their plans have been advanced to the point of execution.
The British, French, Irish, Spanish and of course the Israeli authorities who have been dealing with terrorism and along with this human and other smuggling for many years must be smirking at their American and Canadian counterparts. Here’s another example: if you take Amtrak to cross into Canada you must be screened either at a 20 minute-30 minute stop at the border (for Montreal or Toronto trains) or at the terminal (Vancouver). To go to the U.S. on the train requires screening at the border, plus pre-screening at Vancouver.
Yet there is swift but effective on-board examination on French-Spanish and Northern Ireland-Irish Republic trains despite the years of violence in which the rail systems themselves have been targets. On-board examinations occurred on U.S.-Canada trains in the 1950s and 1960s and early 1970s during the Korean Conflict, Vietnam and the Cuban Missile Crisis. Go figure.
On the subject of rail the new GOP-controlled House plus several new state administrations are naturally enough driving more people to conferencing solutions by promising to derail the Obama Administration’s plans to expand passenger trains: which are far more comfortable and do not—at this point—require arduous boarding procedures. Their “answer” is more highways—the same “solution” that led the country into the high-tax, environment (and individual)-killing, productivity-crippling (via congestion—new roads become clogged 4-5 years after building) and community-destroying mess it now is in. One that threatens to leave the nation’s economy even more dependent than it now is on the less stable parts of the world for energy or on obscenely-destructive sources like the Canadian tar sands. And unlike taking public means of transportation, working while driving is deadly and unlawful.
Canadians are not much better. The country has “higher” i.e. 95 mph tops rail and that only on short sections between Montreal and Toronto on a corridor that stretches from Windsor (opposite Detroit) to Quebec. There hasn’t been passenger rail between Edmonton-Calgary, Alberta: the second largest travel corridor since 1981. And only the Obama Administration officials screaming at their Canadian counterparts saved at the last minute in October the second Seattle-Vancouver, B.C. passenger train that operates on the Administration-designated Cascades high-speed rail corridor that begins in Eugene, Oregon. Canada was balking at absorbing $800,000/year in Customs costs—costs that it regularly sucks in for the others modes as does the U.S. for all travelers. This in the face of the U.S. federal and Washington and Oregon state governments paying for most of the capital investments and all of the operating subsidies on the trains, with Canada getting a practically free ride.
Not that the conferencing solutions are free from hassles, witness the Skype outage, and they do take getting used to if one is setting, moderating and conducting meetings via them. Video-to-the-desktop conferencing technology, especially to the home and to mobile devices, is where VoIP was at six years ago but as demand climbs so will the improvements while costs will drop.
Yes, nothing beats face-to-face especially for non-work interactions. After all: there are practical limits to what one can do over the voice/video interface—though one can argue as do the science/speculative-fiction writers that what our brains perceive and act on is based on electrochemical inputs and outputs.
Even so, when faced with the possibility having one’s dignity stripped away—on top of all the other humiliations and the costs and hassles—the benefits of being there in-person as opposed to being there virtually fade even quicker for an increasing number of engagements.
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This is the time of year where all bells should be ringing in tune at and at the right times: church bells, those of the Salvation Army volunteers, those at the cash registers and those at the homes from telemarketers and other contact centers making unsolicited calls.
This is also the time of year where children are reminded to "be nice, not naughty": a reminder that grown-ups should be given too. That includes those who manage contact centers.
For the laws regulating calling hours, whom to call and what devices to be reach are strict and are enforced. The lumps of coal in one’s stocking for being bad is nothing compared to those received from publicity-seeking elected officials: which are in comparison mere taps to those that can be wielded from annoyed customers via comments delivered through Tweets and posts.
Here are some of the common areas that poor judgement in which can make good contact centers into bad ones:
* The U.S. federal laws permit telemarketing calls between 8am and 9pm. However many states strict these further. For example, in Connecticut (where TMC is headquartered) prohibits calling for such purposes before 9am, while Alabama and Louisiana limit calls during prescribed state holidays
* Calls to Canadians are permitted between 9am and 9:30pm. The smart organizations cut them off after 8:30pm
* Calling hours are the called parties’ local time (I reminded one firm of just that earlier today). IOW it may be 9am in Portland, Maine but it is 6am in Portland, Oregon
* Calling cell phones, those on do not call lists, using automated voicemail delivery systems like live agent calls and exceeding limits on abandoned calls
Fortunately there are excellent resources to keep telemarketers and other contact centers in tune with the laws and with customers. PossibleNow, from I sourced the federal and state information provides the DNCSolution suite that covers calls (landline and wireless), faxes and e-mails. It also enables firms to comply with Canada’s regulations. And it makes sure that postal mail isn’t sent to those who do not want to receive it. To stay good PossibleNow also offers the compliance management, auditing, consulting and training services.
Placing companies like PossibleNow on your holiday list, to clean calling lists--to keep predictive dialers and autodialers in tune with the laws and regulations--is a holiday “gift” that your organization and your customers will appreciate.
In this way you’ll ring up customers when you’re allowed to, and how and when customers want you to, and you’ll both be happily ringing in the holidays.
]]>My observation and reports say that more consumers are like me, or the other way around. Thanks to the Web and social media we, and I, have now taken charge of our own interactions and are setting the terms.
This trend of control and privacy has been demonstrated by the rise of do not call, fax, spam and now do not track and personal information opt-out and opt-in i.e. ask permission legislation that I and many others use and support. It has been reflected by the disappearance of door-to-door sales, affirmed by no trespassing rules.
Yet I (and others) have no qualms in having my information obtained by census takers even it means having marketers having seeking if not getting access to me. Which means I don't think highly of the decision by the Canadian government, led by Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper to make the country's long-form census voluntary (yes, I live in Canada).
Mr. Harper's moves are a triumph of a narrow extremist anti-government libertarian ideology over logic, the public good and ironically (given the so-called free enterprise bent of his party) business sense and needs.
The personal data others from government researchers to advocacy organizations and yes marketers have are about individuals, not on individuals. Filling out census forms provide vital data education, ethnic origin, income, housing and transportation on a long form. A marketer or anyone else with this data will know how many people like me live where I do and how we get around but they will not know who I am. It is not like keying the same or similar information on a warranty card. It is no-brainer what happens to that data i.e. checked your inbox lately?
As my recent TMCnet article reveals, this move will unnecessarily hinder businesses by adding costs and complexity to their marketing at a time when the economy is struggling. Forcing them by denying this resources to blast everyone in a wide range of media to try and make the same profits unfairly takes away resources that could be spent in improving products, service and customer service.
Moreover by forcing companies to increase their mailings only end up costing society i.e. each one of us more. How? By wasting energy and creating more environmental harm at public as well as private expense by logging, transporting, processing, delivering and yes recycling paper goods that are unready and unwanted.
Equally if not more importantly such census information enables a civil society whose privileges we all enjoy and which offers an infrastructure on which we can enjoy our freedoms.
How can vital services: communications, education, emergency services, healthcare, environmental (air quality, sewer/water), healthcare, social services and transportation and trade that we rely on if those that we have entrusted to make those decisions do not have the data to make sound tax-dollar-respecting choices?
Comments have been made that making the census mandatory (with the threat of fines and a jail time--the last one to be removed in a Liberal party bill ) skews the data. Nice assertion but if that were the case wouldn't businesses that rely on targeted marketing--to sell goods and services to those who are likely to buy them (even if they say no, like me), and other governments that depend on accurate census data for decision--be jumping on the Canadian government's bandwagon worldwide?
Living in a society has responsibilities as well as rights. Providing governments with the information they as the enablers of a free society needs--including permitting commerce that pays the bills in our market economy, and advocacy and political organizations to reach out to the public as part of the democratic process--is one of them.
I may not want to receive marketing pitches targeted to me from businesses and others but I strongly support the right of marketers to make them, just as long as I can say no up front.
If there is a need--and I'm convinced there is--for tougher legislation it should be in the form of "Do not bother" i.e. opt-in legislation covering all media, channels and data: including charities, newspapers and yes political parties and existing business relationships that are typically exempt from do not call/e-mail lists. Give companies one free call, e-mail, or "snail mail" to introduce themselves, ask permission and if they hear "yeah" continue to direct market or "nay" end the contact there. If customers contact them make that opt-in question available passively i.e. on their websites.
Opt-in is arguably the ultimate direct marketing business tool in that the individuals who want to be reached are most likely to buy, which increases ROI. These are the "raving fans" who will gladly do the marketing gratis via social media.
Yet while the Canadian government has introduced and re-introduced electronic communications privacy legislation it is the census matter that has preoccupied its attention and which has done the impossible: uniting individuals and organizations that would never share the same street corner--academics, businesses and social concerns groups in a common cause to fight it. One that the Opposition Liberals, coming off a successful cross-country tour by its leader, Michael Ignatieff, are keen to exploit when Parliament resumes sitting next month.
The bottom line is this: people like me have the right to opt-in or out when it comes to being pitched whether by printed or electronic mail, fax or by phone, on how firms use our data and how we use the Internet. I and others don't have a choice of opting-in, or out, of society.
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Are we at last seeing a similar evolution with inbound and outbound IVR systems?
IVRs speech rec as well as DTMF have been and still are the ogres of customer service. Customers are tossed into and pummeled by these virtual creatures if they fail to fall into the elite 20 percent that produce 80 percent of profits--i.e. the infamous "Pareto Principle" --that makes them worthy enough to be given the attention of a live agent jammed inside a cube somewhere in the world. Customers flail against nightmarish menus, limited libraries and bad grammars while frantically and some cases fruitlessly trying to find agent opt-outs which may not exist.
Speech rec promises and has often made IVR customer-friendlier yet at considerable expense and lead time. Yet these applications are still far from perfect. And there is also a creepiness factor with speech systems like Amtrak's "Julie" that purport to promote a cuddly human relationship when you are really chatting to a programmed chip housed on a server in a climate controlled room somewhere in the universe.
(Hmmm...is Julie HAL's cyber love child from an illicit coupling with a Sperry Univac machine??)
And that's just on the inbound side. On the outbound route, well if you think agents spitting off scripts, driven by predictive dialers that drives their output like feeding amphetamines to hamsters in cages well it can be worse: it can be the machines that are robocalling you at dinner time.
There appears to be a rough correlation between the advent of IVR, and CRM systems that have ruthlessly applied the former, that match what appears to be increased customer dissatisfaction and annoyance with the firms they do business with. Is this just coincidence, is it the result of the downturn that makes individuals edgy or an increased impatience by the populace or is it the hard hand of logical consequences of corporate actions i.e. employing irritating IVR systems?
One of the shining silver linings from the economic slump is that it forced companies to quit taking customers for granted. For if these outfits tick buyers off they will go elsewhere, tell the world about it via the new social media sites, resulting in fewer others that will be suckered in to replace that lost business.
The smart companies are getting it: that the loss of revenue from turned off existing and potential customers exceeds the cost savings from overeager IVR deployments. They and their suppliers are turning their attention at last to their IVR systems by making them into constructive tools that can actually improve customer service and retention as well as lower expenses and boost productivity.
As revealed in recent TMCnet.com and Customer Interaction Solutions news and articles, IVR and speech suppliers such as Angel.com, Avaya, Convergys, CosmoCom, Nuance and Voxeo [to name a few] and/or their customers are designing better inbound applications including improved workflows, routing and grammars. They are employing analytics tools to understand where the sticking points are in automated interactions and finding solutions to them. Companies are also integrating IVRs with business systems that enable customer self-serve tasks such as order entry and delivery status, bill payment getting and changing customer information.
At the same time outbound IVR is rapidly becoming a customer friend rather than a foe by being repurposed by firms from thankfully-lawfully restricted marketing purposes to rapidly-becoming-invaluable alerting tools such as for credit card balance exceeds and potential fraud, flight delays and opt-in special offers. Outbound IVR when so employed is multi-win by delivering improved service while cutting costs through avoiding inbound calls.
There is also a growing understanding by suppliers and buyers alike what functions that each of these tools: DTMF and speech rec, automated voice, text and web, and live agents can do best at it and are deploying them accordingly. No one channel or solution fits all customer interactions.
Customers may not exactly be a fan of IVR systems but if they are programmed right, with their needs in mind, they can actually do some good by enabling them to get the services and items they need with minimal waits: and aggravation.
Now comes the disturbing if not unexpected report from The New York Times that firms have been attempting to SLAPP consumers they appear to have annoyed and who have in turn posted comments on social media sites. Nothing like making the world think everything is OK with your company, generating nice publicity, ensuring strong customer satisfaction and retention, and making buyers feel happy about your company than bludgeoning those who feel otherwise.
Yes, when an individual gripe about a company online it can cost them business, as the SLAPPers and their pinstriped henchpeople claim. Sometimes the remarks are inaccurate and unfair. Yet this is no more so than what they say in private, by phone and e-mail and wherever they gather.
So what "rights" do such companies expect and want: the same as those enjoyed by repressive dissent-curbing regimes? Hey if they don't like freedom of speech there are plenty of countries who will be happy to accommodate them, with public servants that even more openly take their money to render services in kind.
If you're in business, you promote your firm in your marketing and PR, and in sales pitches, you're therefore visible, providing products and services whose consumption (as in the case of the towing firm mentioned in the Times article) directly impacts others. So if others think what you do is terrible and say so then suck it up. And maybe instead of making the calls to your lawyers maybe you ought to man up and look at what you did--however minor--to cause or exacerbate the situation, resolve it and learn from it so that such events won't happen again.
There are clear differences in free speech regarding libel and slander between what journalists can say in a story and in an editorial, regardless of media, what public officials can utter in the course of their responsibilities and what residents, legal or others can remark on, regardless of media. The standards vary in all three cases and for good reason. Journalists are expected by their work to be upheld to a higher level, with some leeway in fair comment, compared to those of residents; elected officials have privileged speech in their chambers.
Many U.S. states, such as California have anti-SLAPP laws, reports the Times and that there is a bill in Congress, sponsored by Rep. Steve Cohen (D-Tenn.) and Charles Gonzalez (D-Texas), that would create a federal anti-SLAPP law "modeled largely on California's statute. "
(The bill, H.R.4364, the Citizen Participation Act of 2009, has been referred to the Subcommittee on Courts and Competition Policy.)
"Because state laws vary in scope, many suits are still filed every year, according to legal experts," says the Times. "Now, with people musing publicly online and businesses feeling defenseless against these critics, the debate over the suits is shifting to the Web.
"We are beyond the low-tech era of people getting Slapped because of letters they wrote to politicians or testimony they gave at a City Council meeting," said George W. Pring, a University of Denver law professor who co-wrote the 1996 book "Slapps: Getting Sued For Speaking Out."
Consumers' comments about companies on social sites or other venues is free speech and as such perform an invaluable public service in a function democracy. For the smart firms it enables them to hear what the people are saying so that they can gain insights on their products, services, performance and service to improve them. That's the key to productivity, and prosperity. Free speech (and free trade) go hand in hand.
U.S. President Barack Obama, who is one of the country's most social media-savvy elected officials, should urge Congress to pass such legislation prohibiting SLAPPs. Other democratic freedom-loving countries such as Canada should do likewise. We can't afford to get SLAPPed into corporate-dictatorial silence.
(On the topic of social media and the social channel, TMC has an exciting new event where you can learn more about them, the Social Customer Summit that is taking place at ITEXPO West Oct.4-6 at the Los Angeles Convention Center)
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Lyndsey Parker's Reality Rocks blog, carried on Yahoo!, reports that the song, a cover of Miley Cyrus's 'The Climb' sung by X Factor champion Joe McElderry has been beaten out by a 17-year-old Rage Against The Machine track, 'Killing In The Name' 500,000 copies sold, compared to 450,000. RATM fan Jon Morter instigated the drive in what the blog reported was "a protest effort to stop Simon Cowell's empire from dominating the music industry--since Simon is the main X Factor judge, and X Factor winner McElderry just signed to Simon's SyCo record label.
"Eventually some big-name rockers--including the Foo Fighters' Dave Grohl, Sir Paul McCartney, and Rage's own Tom Morello--pledged their support to the campaign, the goal of which was to make RATM's 1992 political anthem "Killing In The Name" Britain's Christmas number one, instead of the expected X Factor single," says the blog. "For the first time in five years, an X Factor champion has not snagged Britain's coveted Christmas number one spot, thanks to Morter's Facebook campaign."
What makes the Facebook-driven move all the more interesting is that the RATM's song has a political bent and language that does not exactly offer the warm and cuddly ambiance that one expects for Christmas, or from Simon Cowell's pop music machine. That is unless one wants to become a more successful successor to the famed English icon, Guy Fawkes with the warmth coming from the ensuing firestorm.
McElderry could not have said it better, reports the blog: "Joe recently told British newspaper The Sun that he hated the RATM song, saying: "They can't be serious! I had no idea what it sounded like. It's dreadful and I hate it. How could anyone enjoy this? Can you imagine the grandmas hearing this over Christmas lunch? I wouldn't buy it. It's a nought out of 10 from me. Simon Cowell wouldn't like it. They wouldn't get through to Boot Camp on The X Factor--they're just shouting."
(OK, I confess I have a fondness for the Sex Pistols, the Dead Kennedys, DOA, The Clash, and Green Day, hired local punk bands for community fundraisers, one of my favorite movies is Repo Man, and I helped carry the student association banner to a massive protest at the legislature buildings against provincial restraint policies that we had hoped [alas!] would turn into a general strike, so you can see where my bias lies.)
Not that there has been any hard feelings from Simon Cowell, whose typically British calls-it-as-he-sees-it commentary, occasionally laced with sarcasm for those who deserve it both offends and thrills Americans, capturing their churchgoing/'shine-swilling/Puritan-and-pleasure dichotomy. Reports the blog:
"As for Simon Cowell's reaction, he is probably taking the news in stride, judging by a recent conversation he had with campaigner Morter. Morter told the British music paper NME that Simon personally phoned him the night before the chart numbers were released, to wish him well in this bizarre sales battle. "Simon was very sweet and it was lovely to talk to him," said Morter. "We had a good chat about music in general and just wished each other good luck. I've got total respect for him. That was a really nice thing to do."
Then again Mr. Cowell, as an extremely savvy businessperson, was more likely quick to recognize a smart campaign. A tip of the hat to the new order.
And that's the lesson with social media. If individuals can topple the best efforts of an industry giant like him--with the lovely touch of beating the musical equivalent of saccharine with Semtex--imagine what those who believe or dislike other products and firms can do if they can gain support for their campaigns via the social channel.
Canada's CBC reported Thursday that Nortel's management approved a plan earlier this fall to reward themselves with salary increases, investments or bonuses. An internal document obtained by the broadcaster outlines a new compensation scheme for 72 Nortel executives that will see them get a total of $7.5 million on top of their current salaries in 2009.
Of those 72, 14 will be getting compensation of $500,000 or more. The fattest feaster is former treasurer John Doolittle, who took over from its last CEO Mike Zafirovski. Doolittle's total compensation has been bumped to $1.68 million this year, an increase of 1.12 million over 2008, when he earned $390,000 in salary and an estimated $170,000 in investment and bonus money.
This greedy self-serving, yet not surprising move given Nortel's record of incompetent, questionably ethical governance--one whose carelessness, shortsightedness and stupidity is matched only by its board who failed in its duties to properly oversee this outfit--comes out at a time when those that actually did their jobs well--its pensioners and long-term unemployed--are being denied what is rightfully theirs.
"I am shocked," Melanie Johannink, who worked for Nortel for 18 years before being laid off in the spring, told the CBC. "It kind of makes you wonder where the money is going."
Former Nortel president Bob Ferchat told the CBC he was also surprised at the extent to which executives at a company in bankruptcy protection were rewarding themselves.
"My reaction, frankly, to the document is 'Here we go again'," said Ferchat. "It's another round of people dividing the proceeds, eating the carcass of the company before it's even dead."
If there is any justice the cretins responsible at Nortel will never see another management-level paycheck or other forms of compensation for the rest of their miserable lives, that they will be forced to live at a standard that the ones they've discarded have to survive on and that their holiday stockings be laden with coal, which at least they could burn for heat.
Alas such endings are for storybooks. Such successful practitioners of the Peter Principle usually find gainful employment in other outfits who are eager for their 'expertise' with expectations for short-term stock profits before the long-term pain of having these fine individuals aboard sets in.
Leave it up to Nortel to make Ebeneezer Scrooge look good. If the famed Dickens character had been a Nortel senior exec he would have 'borrowed' Tiny Tim's crutches and sold them for firewood.
Happy Holidays!
That's what may be in the process of occurring to Nortel right now. The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reports that the communications firm, which is under creditor protection, has attracted several possible purchasers of its high-value enterprise and wireless equipment businesses.
According to The Canadian Press, the WSJ's website named Avaya and Siemens Enterprise Communications as potential purchasers of Nortel's enterprise product line according to well-placed sources. Cisco looked at the unit as well but is not expected to bid. Nortel is also is in talks to sell its wireless voice equipment division to firms such as Nokia Siemens Networks. Nokia Siemens Networks, which long has sought to expand its presence in the U.S.
The dilemma faced by Nortel, which is under creditor protection, is that by selling its most valuable units, which posted $6.7 billion in sales last year, is what it has left worth continuing in business for?
``'What we are finding is that there may be a lot more value by selling rather than emerging,'' said an unnamed source quoted by the paper. ``'The company was surprised by the amount of interest and the number of calls.''
``Selling the wireless gear business, which generates most of the company's cash, would complicate any plans to emerge from the bankruptcy process as a stand-alone company.'''
Appropriately enough the WSJ story comes on the heels of Nortel's latest financial results, released last week. The firm reported a $2.1 billion net loss in the fourth quarter 2008 (4Q 08) compared $3.4 billion in 3Q 08. This improvement lies in the shadow of a net loss of $5.78 billion for 2008 compared to that of $957 million for 2007.
4Q 08 revenues were up to $2.72 billion from $2.32 billion in 3Q 08, but down 15 percent from $3.2 billion in 4Q 07. Full year 2008 revenues of $10.42 billion represent a 5 percent decrease compared to that in 2007. A portion of that revenue growth came from contract completion and with this realization of previously deferred revenues rather than from sales.
Nortel's orders paint a similar picture. They were $2.64 billion for 4Q 08, up from $2.02 billion in 3Q 08 but down from $3.24 billion for 4Q 07. It cited lower orders for wireless and enterprise equipment for the drop between 2007 and 2008.
The firm is still hoping to pull itself up without breaking apart but that prospect appears to be less likely. The Globe and Mail reports that debtor-in-possession financing -- the lifeblood of most bankruptcy restructurings -- has all but disappeared this year.
"'Banks aren't exactly lining up to finance a purchase of Nortel assets,'" a banking source told the newspaper.
TMCnet has been tracking this story. Watch our space for more developments.
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