Year: 2006

(Continuing notes from today’s Forrester Consumer Forum. More here.)

Solid overview from Harley Manning on how “inhuman” technology-based connections can be, as well as some things that can be done to improve them. The highlights:

What’s Inhuman?
Inhuman examples:

• Questions that are nonsensical in the real world: “What country are you in?” is a commonly-asked inquiry at many websites. Think about this in the real world…how many times have you been asked that when going into the store? “Hi, welcome to Bed, Bath and Beyond…what country are we in?”
• Jargon, jargon, jargon: The Motorola only spec sheet for one of their phones states : “PIM funcationality”…when was the last time anyone ever used that phrase? (Goes back to the example from yesterday at the online shopping site for Bloomingdales, have you ever used the phrase “Casual China” in real conversation? “Honey, the Wilsons are coming over for dinner, can you please put out the Casual China?”)

Expectation setting in design is also key. Harley gave a great example of trying to make a deposit at a BofA automated teller machine. The website said he could make a deposit. The physical signage above the machine said “All Transactions”…yet, “deposit” was not an option on any of the ATM menus, despite the fact that the physical machine had a deposit slot!

How to humanize the interactions?
The suggestion is to adopt “human-centric” design practices:

• Not “tech-centric”
• Not “self-centric”
• Not even “user-centric”…people are PEOPLE first, THEN users

Human centric design has three practices:

A) Enthographic research
Derived from cultural antrhopology. Interview and observe. Distill observations into “segmentation models.” Rep each “persona” as a vivid description.

[ed. – I had a little bit of issue with this point in particular…the granularity that is lost when coming up with what is, in effect, a stereotype seems a little bit contrived. We all have so many facets of our selves that putting any individual into a stereotypical segment seems a bit off to me.]

B) Scenarios
Donald Cho scenario

At each step note what things YOU (the system provider) are responsible for, define what is done at each step, and show how channels work together

C) Expert reviews

• Start with expert-derived list of common user experience problems
• Identify goals for each channel
• Reviewers try to accomplish each goal, while looking for each problems on the list
• Great for: giving a common checklist, find basic navigation flaws, shines a spotlight on presentation problems

Ex: Macromedia.com

• Personas highlighted problems (marketing speak in the developers section)
• Half of site received little or no usage
• Redesigned site after reviews
• Home page abandonment down 11%
• Conversion up 297%
• Units sold per visit went up 67%

Ex: Cellular One

• Installed phone self-service: complaints up, transfers b/w reps up
• Observed 300 callers
• Customer satisfaction up after the redesign
• Automation rates up, 76% of customer payments now handled
• 100% ROI in < 3 mos.

Is it worth it for you?
Harley’s point on building an ROI model. Not rocket science; basic blocking and tackling.

1) List explicit business goals for the channel
E.g For a website: conversion rates, avg order size are common metrics

2) Document current channel performance
For the goals above, list current values of the agreed upon metrics (e.g. current conversion rate is 2.6%)

3) Agree on possible ranges of improvement
E.g. website conversion rate increase of 10%-25%, ATM transaction rate improvement of 1% to 2%

4) Estimate costs
Go internally, or get external expert model (e.g. $500K to improve website)

5) Run what if scenarios
This is where the “magic” happens, however. [ed. — One can say that an activity “will increase conversion rates by 2.6%…but the best-laid-plans, etc….Manning glossed over this point. It’s ultimately all about execution.)

Ex: Eddie Bauer redesign
Spent $124,150 on design and dev, estimated added $5.5MM in profit as a result of the redesign.

(Continuing notes from today’s Forrester Consumer Forum. More here.)

Charlene: “Focus on the relationships, not the technologies.”

Who’s using social computing technologies?

Four levels of participation: “The Participation Pyramid”

• Creators – bloggers, etc.
• Critics – commenting, ratings, reviews
• Collectors – bookmarking, “save to favorites” in youtube
• Couch potatoes – passive

Social media: “It’s not about the media, it’s about getting people to participate.”

Key point: Build community. If community exists, then dissemination is easier, wider (yahudi video #1, not the mentos guys)

Burpee Seeds: “November sales increased by 4x because of RSS”

• Changed twice-yearly experience to a daily experience
• Adding reviews with BazaarVoice increased the clickthrough rate by 43%

Anecdote: BassPro used feedback to redesign poor product. One lure had poor ratings, BassPro noticed, connected with manufacturer, and now redesigned product is selling well.

Getting Started

• Decide how involved you will be with social computing
• Map out what relationship you want to build
• Listen to what is being said to find unmet needs
• Participate in the conversations

How to start

Start with RSS because it’s easy and impactful
• Put press releases in RSS
• Use blogs when you have something to say
  • Anyone can have a recruitment blog
  • Anyone can have an internal blog

• Deploy wikis where knowledge is needed
  • “Less frequently asked questions”

Test original podcasting sparingly
– Start with earnings calls and executive presentations

Best practices in social computing
– Be ready to act on feedback
– Relationships can be messy, be prepared to make mistakes
– Use existing marketing metrics to gauge your success

Key quote: “Markets may be conversations…and trust and relationships create marketplaces.”

(Continuing notes from today’s Forrester Consumer Forum. More here.)

A net-positive presentation from Roger C. Hochschild, President and COO, Discover Financial Services. Hochschild seems to get it. Two particular areas of focus of note, with respect to connecting with their customers: Clarity and Control.

• Clarity: Cut our fine-print in half
• Control: If an account in compromised, Discover will assign a ::dedicated:: representative for the duration of the issue…don’t need to keep explaining yourself to the rep each time your call. [ed. nice.]

Two promises they make to their customers:

• Promise to answer phone calls in 60 seconds or less.
• Promise to answer emails in two hours or less.

A few key quotes:

• “We’re willing to forego short-term revenue, in order to help the customer” — Example was given that they will send email to a customer 3 days before due date if payment not yet received. Although this loses the late fee revenue for that month, it strengthens their relationships.
• “Build long-term value by focusing on solving your customer’s problems.”
• “Building customer loyalty pays for itself.”

One interesting question from the Q&A:

Audience member: Will you pursue blogs and podcasts?
Hochschild: Not sure that people come to our site to hear from our CEO or myself. However, we are experimenting with RSS, and it may replace some of the email communications we’ve been sending out.

Am in Chicago today at the Forrester Consumer Forum.

Notes from the keynote by Henry Harteveldt, on Digitizing the Human Experience

Harteveldt poses three questions to ask about the state of the market:

1) How do today’s digital experiences fall short?

Ex: Bloomingdale’s has a distinguished in-store experience, but that experience is missing online
– Site set up in “industry-speak” (what the heck is “casual china?”)
– No photos
– What is a ” Portmeiron USA Botanic PL 8″ ” (apparently it’s some kind of plate, but you’d never know that unless you were a buyer for Bloomingdales)

Ex: Sheraton Hotels
– Looks great…gives options for “Instant Answers” and “Online Chat”….but clicking gives an error that says “Your inquiry is best handled by Live Assistance, but our offices are currently closed. Please try again at a later time.”

Henry gives a good anecdote about service. The question:
“When contacting a company’s customer service, were you satisfied with the experience?”

52% were satisfied using a retail location
29% were satisfied using a web site
21% were satisfied using live chat

Interesting: there’s a Flickr stream just for crashed customer service kiosks

2) What is a humanized digital experience?

“An interaction in which the human benefits are more visible than the technology”
– emotional
– tacticle
– “we feel part o the community”

Three building blocks of a humanized digital experience
– “Useful”…offers value
– Relevant
– Reliable
– Functional

Good example: VW online car configurator

– “Usable”…provides easy access to value
– Accessible
– Convenient
– Familiar

Good example: Netflix, desktop widgets

– “Desirable”…appeal to emotions
– “Empathetic”
– “Empowering”
– “Engaging”

Emotional…not antiseptic.

Ex: E*Trade … invites to chat, while they are applying for a mortgage “Thank you for visiting E*trade Mortgage. Would you like live assistance with a mortgage loan consultant? ”

Apparently..13% of those who chat go on to complete a mortgage application.

Engaging: Mentos example, shown from Revver (about 20% of the audience had seen the video previously)

“Social media allow people to engage with one another.”

3) What priorities should guide your digital experience creation?

KEYS:
– Give users control … “It’s not about how you want to sell, but how the customer wants to buy”
– Explore new technologies that give consumers more control
– Use an approachable tone of voice
– Don’t overlook the small things (e.g. allow users to dynamically adjust font size on web sites…it’s small, it’s useful, it’s usable)

Overall, a good baseline. However…didn’t hear a thing about actual relationships between individuals. There was almost an undertone of how can technology be used to replace, rather than augment actual experiences. (The one exception was the E*Trade live chat example). Based on the agenda (especially the Social Computing track this afternoon), I have a feeling this was an anomaly. Still, would think that concept would be much more strongly presented in the foundational session of the event.

Kent Newsome: “The indisputable fact is that proximity has always mattered, and it always will. Why? Because every meaningful business deal depends, at least in part, on relationships. Granted, technology has significantly reduced the need to travel, but it has not reduced to need to look someone in the eyes.”

Amanda Congdon, Mario Librandi, Rob Librandi and Emily Golub stopped off on the Peninsula today to chat with Blogher founders Lisa Stone, Jory DesJardins and Elisa Camahort as part of the AmandaAcrossAmerica tour from Connecticut to L.A.

The interview should be up here soon, and some more behind-the-scenes pics here.

John T Unger (friend, blogger, uber-artist and global microbrand) was in the Bay Area this week, and we decided to head over to Mars for a bite and a beer. After shooting the breeze for a while, we both ordered the same thing (french dip, fries) from our outstanding server Kelly and went back to the conversation.

A few minutes later, Kelly returns to the table, two plates in hand, confident-yet-sheepish.

“Hi. I screwed up…I only put in one order. So what I did was I split it, and also put the second order in on a rush. It’ll be up in just a minute.”

Now, think about this. The two “default” things to do would have been to either:

• Hold the first order until the second was up, and pretend nothing went wrong.
  • Upside: Appearance to the customer that all is well in the world
  • Downside: One customer gets a great meal, the other one is cold

• Bring out one order
  • Upside: It gets the first meal to the table
  • Downside: The meal sits there and gets cold, since anyone in polite society would wait until his or her dining companion was also served

What happened here, however, was not either of those things. This was a case where the person who was serving the customer had the latitude to do something that is out of the ordinary in order to solve a problem. And did.

Well done! (And the food’s good, too.)

The folks at Social Media Club (bios) are working their mojo in San Francisco next Monday, 23Oct2006. Here’s what’s going on:

This workshop is a unique hybrid of a traditional conference and an unconference, blending the best of both worlds. During the course of the afternoon on Monday October 23rd you will hear short talks from leading Social Media practitioners and engage in conversations with other Silicon Valley professionals, leaving the workshop with an understanding of how your company can benefit from producing Corporate Media using Social Media tools. Registration costs $150 and can be done online using Mollyguard. After the workshop, stay for an evening cocktail reception hosted by SAP and Social Media Club. If you are unable to attend the workshop, you may purchase a ticket for the reception for only $25, which is included in the cost of event registration.

What follows is an approximate schedule for the day.

1:00 PM
The Corporate Media Opportunity – Chris Heuer will kick off the afternoon with a short talk based on his Blog post that shares its name with this workshop. After a brief round of Q&A, he will explain the format for the rest of the afternoon and provide other logistical details for you to make the most of the experience.

1:30 PM
Social Media Strategy – Robert Scoble will present a short talk on the strategic imperative presented by producing your own corporate media as well as empowering your employees to create Social Media that engages customers, potential customers and other stakeholders. After a brief round of Q&A, Robert will leave the stage and join the participants for the first World Cafe of the day.

1:50 PM
Strategy Cafe – The World Cafe format is based on group conversations around small tables and focused on thought provoking questions that help participants learn from one another’s experience. You will join in three different conversations with three different groups of people, including the session leaders who are also participants. After a 12 minute conversation focused on the first question, a facilitator will ask each table to share the most important points of discussion which will be collected and posted to a special wiki for reference after the event. At this point, everyone except one person will change tables, joining another table with totally different participants and the next question will be revealed. The process repeats itself for a total of three rounds of conversations.

2:50 PM
10 Min Break

3:00 PM
Social Media Engagement Tactics – Lisa Stone will present a short talk on specific tactics that organizations can and should employ for properly engaging with different audiences, with an emphasis on customers and potential customers. Social media can be a vital tool for attracting and keeping lots of new customers, especially when you manage to get free instagram followers to promote your brand to a wider online audience. Consider this a practical guide to properly becoming a participant in, or convener of, conversations in the Blogosphere. After a brief round of Q&A, Lisa will join participants for another World Cafe.

3:20 PM
Tactical Cafe – This session will follow the same format as Strategy Cafe, with the emphasis switching to practical tactics for engagement.

4:20 PM
Social Media Case Study – Giovanni Rodriguez will interview Geoff Kerr of SAP to discuss their experiences and lessons learned from deploying Social Media strategies in the real world.

4:45 PM
15 Min Break

5:00 PM
Social Media BrainJam – One randomly selected (and willing) participant will get a free strategy session from the workshop’s discussion leaders, brainstorming possible strategies and tactics that will help their company to be more successful with their efforts. Other participants will get a unique look into the process and techniques employed in crafting creative plans for engaging with stakeholders. This session will be run as a “Blue Sky” session, that will take into consideration certain constraints, but will mostly look beyond those to provide insights into what sort of things are possible today. After 30 minutes, the floor will be opened for a conversation that will include all participants.

5:45 PM
Closing Points – Each participant will have a chance to share their key learning from the day or pose any questions they have that remain. This will lead us into the cocktail party and provide the basis for further conversations throughout the evening.

6:15 PM
Cocktail Party Presented by SAP and Social Media Club – Beer, wine and light appetizers will be provided for all participants to continue the conversations from the day, to network and to simply relax.

Seeya there.

Shel Holtz recently had some issues with his computer setup. Shel:

“I’m running Windows XP SP-2 and have been happily running the public beta for Office 2007 (which I love). A minor problem has occurred whenever Microsoft releases an update. I have to repair the Office 2007 installation in order to get it working again. After this past week’s update, though, bigger problems occurred. I cannot get into Outlook, so I started a repair but got a message telling me the Office 2007 installation was corrupt and that I should reinstall. So I tried reinstalling, but that only got about 20% through the process before it gave me an error (2711, I believe). I tried uninstalling Office 2007 but got the same corrupt installation error. And reinstalling Office 2003 did no good at all—I cannot launch Outlook 2003 because of a mismatched .dll file.

So I have no Outlook and, effectively, no Office installation.

So…any Microsofties out there with a clue what I should do?”

This triggered the thought: instead of this being a process where a customer puts a note in a bottle and throws it into the blogosphere, what if this were a pre-meditated process? Here’s how it would work:

• When an organization puts out a product, the organization defines and publishes a particular tag that they will listen for in the blogosphere when there are customer questions (for example, “office2007question” would have been a good tag the MS could promote with its Office 2007 product)
• If a customer has a question with a product, he posts the issue (just like Shel has done) with the tag(s) of the associated product(s)
• The vendor organization, which is theoretically listening for posts tagged with its “support tags” takes notice, and addresses the issue on the customer’s turf.

I believe we’ve just (re-)entered the era of the customer support “house call.”

Further reading: A Customer Support Barn-Raising