A debate on the direction of Customer Empowerment

Introduction

This post is a reflection on a Q&A conducted by Robert Bacal on the direction of Customer Service and where it is going this year. The original article is posted here. In the interests of healthy dialogue and debate on the themes raised in this article I couldn’t resist but countering them with our observations on the themes raised.

Question 1

Q: There’s been so much talk about how social media is changing customer service, and in particular a number of experts have suggested this will be the year of the customer — that customers will become way more powerful and that will result in much better customer service as companies realize the impact of poor service. What do you think?

Robert: First, I’ll say this. There are over 500 million Facebookers and similarly large totals of people on Twitter and LinkedIn. When you factor in what we’ve had for years, blogs, complaint sites and forums, and review sites like on amazon, what you have is way more than a year of  “social media” power. The outcome? Nothing. I see no numbers and no data to indicate that customer service has gotten better. In fact, the numbers suggest service is worse than before, something I’ve said over and over again.

Our View: We see Enterprises rapidly beginning the process of Social-Engagement. It starts naturally with their Marketing Teams engaging by BROADCAST of corporate value’s, offers, coupons, incentives and other ‘news’ on their own ‘instances or presence’ on each of the popular Social Media sites. This has evolved rapidly in this year to the actual physical marriage of Social Strategy as a marketing theme; into one where Social Media Interactions are being brought into Customer Operations and are being deployed on the front line.  Throughout this year we have conducted many workshops and discovery sessions with known brands (some global) who have keenly embraced the concept of Social-Engagement in the Enterprise Contact Centre. Our sales lifecycle on the realisation of these projects is weeks. Now, in markets where the deployment of Customer Care Solutions takes between 12 and 18 months these timeframes are unprecendented.  We now have Social Engagement customers active in projects in Europe and in Africa.  Our response to the comment “no data to indicate that customer service has gotten better” is we should be less quick to apportion the quality of customer service to the media or mode of interaction.  It matters not whether or not a customer decides to engage via SMS, Voice, eMail, Web-Chat or via new channels like Twitter and Facebook. The channel is arbitrary.  We agree however that the market is ‘young’ and it is a new paradigm. It will be a while before we see mature Customer Services Process and Policy and associated ‘measurement’ really proving out the case for Social Engagement.  One thing we are sure of though is social-media is here to stay.  The form of interaction or popularity of each social engine may change; but not the customers own willingness to use these channels to communicate with their peers and providers.

Question 2

Q: Could you clarify that last bit?

Robert: When you add additional customer service channels and you don’t put resources in (at a high cost) to staff them, what happens is that you spread your customer service resource THINNER. Thus in general service gets worse. It’s really simple. Companies aren’t willing to add to costs.

Our View: The answer is actually missing the key point!  If an Enterprise adds a channel of communication for Customer Operations and the traffic goes UP then it is a sure validation that they HAVE NOT BEEN LISTENING on that channel and are missing valuable opportunities to engage with the customer in the first place.  The answer poised is actually suggesting if we turn off all the channels we listen on to our customers we can reduce our costs by pretending that we don’t have much traffic!  This is a disasterous viewpoint!  Our view is that their is a BUBBLE of continual activity about any companies products, services or brand.  Imagine an inflated childs balloon.  This balloon represents all the traffic for the Enterprise Contact Centre with its existing channels.  One could somewhat argue that by allowing customers to engage with new or alternative channels that they will not make the same request twice by another channel.  The anology; Squeeze the balloon at one end (by constricting a channel, say eMail) and the voice traffic WILL GO UP; in other words the total volume of ‘interactions’ remains the same, but the means of communication will change.  The Anana view is that the Enterprise MUST BE LISTENING and engaging using the channels and media that its own customers prefer. Otherwise, the simple result is missed opportunities to INTERACT, to provide service, to excel in the customer experience.  If you are not listening you are doing no better than an Ostrich that puts ‘its head in the sand’ and pretends that the Lion standing behind it can no longer see it; as quite reasonably the Ostrich can no longer see the Lion!  At the end of the day their is a cost to serving customers.  The correct line of argument is that the right balance needs to be found between what SPEND will create which EXPERIENCE for the customer!  Spending frugally on telephony and customer service representatives will save money; but result in long wait-times for the callers.  Plain and simple!  Net result; loss of sales, poor customer experience, eroded loyalty, churn and migration to your competitor. So, back to the balloon analogy.  Your balloon needs to be big enough to offer the appropriate SERVICE LEVELS to all customers; irrespective of mode of communication. Period.

Question 3

Q: What about the claims of customer empowerment?

Robert: It’s bunk. The whole line of reasoning is based on a number of superficial assumptions that don’t hold true. For example, people are assuming that now that customers can express themselves in social media, that this will cause changes. Having an opinion, and sharing it online don’t mean anyone reads it, or is influenced by it. The result is that it appears there’s influence and power but there isn’t.

Our View: This is an incredibly dangerous viewpoint!  Suggesting that customers have no power to cause change is simply INCORRECT. Consider @DaveCarroll and his own story here - According to analysis conducted by the BBC this piece of social ‘commentary’ cost United Airlines $180 Million US Dollars!  (and that was only the effect on stock-price!).  I will ask Dave Carroll himself to respond to this one!  If I was an Enterprise and I heard the view from anyone that “Customer Empowerment” was Bunk then I would be very very concerned!

Question 4 – 6 are less argued so are not addressed in this response with the exception of “to have an impact requires collective effort by a large number of people”. Our view is that @DaveCarroll had a huge impact. He did this on his own; with limited support only from his immediate family. Social Media does not require the MASSED movement for change to happen.  The actions of a single VOICE (of a customer) with the appropriate message, and that little mix of the x-factor in their comment, concern or observation (like Dave’s Song) for that to become adopted by the MASSES; this is the viral nature of CROWD behaviour.  No one can forecast huge POSITIVE or NEGATIVE sentiment about anything or any subject in Social Media. Every time I post a tweet I wonder, like winning the lottery, if this TWEET is going to go viral?  Have I found the right mix of timing, sentiment, wording and CONTENT to trigger a revolution?  Maybe!  For my Enterprise customers I focus on making sure that they understand this RISK and the associated OPPORTUNITY. An opportunity to engage in Customer Operations with any customer in a service type of scenario is media agnostic.  So, my main message; start listening, start engaging, and do not do the Ostrich!