We cannot assume that an organization has taken the time design a customer experience strategy that supports their brand.   Therefore we audit all of the existing training protocol.  SEC lives by the old adage: “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail”.  Customer experience is no exception, it is imperative to understand the value proposition of a brand and what designed level of service is needed to support it.

Our Enterprise Feedback Management System (EFMS) is designed to assess every customer touch point in the customer pathway. We include every stakeholder and constituent in the process from Senior Management, Field Managers, Frontline Employees, Customers, Vendors and anyone who impacts the Brand Value Proposition. Our core asset is the ability to deploy trained and certified field research participants as “Undercover CEO’s” ready to measure what you are trying to manage. No matter the business venues, we will provide the resources to observe, listen, evaluate and engage. Findings are collected, analyzed and streamed on demand, allowing stakeholders to integrate results into their decision-making, to recognize and reward exceptional performance, and expertly understand areas for operational and service improvement.

Formerly using a prominent reporting solution, SEC switched to JReport because of a need for enhanced dashboards to demonstrate business analytic data directly with their clients. The former solution proved difficult in finding competent help to create the reports and could not support SEC’s need for customizable dashboards. The total cost of ownership was economically inefficient and produced a negative ROI. “With Jinfonet’s professional training and support, it is easy to create the desired reports and dashboards,” said Arcadio Roselli, CEO of SEC.

Not only does SEC plan to replicate the exact former reporting template for an uninterrupted transition into JReport’s service, we also plan to utilize JReport’s customizable dashboards to improve our system for a more visual data delivery. With JReport, SEC will be able to better convey survey results and directly improve their service offering and value proposition.

SEC especially values JReport being 100% Java and standards based, so that they will be able to utilize this product from mobile platforms like smartphones and the iPad while maintaining platform independence on the reporting server. With this capability, SEC customers will be able to view reports and dashboards on their new mobile platform called “Smart Agent.”

Yahoo News
http://news.yahoo.com/s/prweb/20110401/bs_prweb/prweb5040434

DZone
http://www.dzone.com/links/jreport_replaces_prominent_reporting_solution.html

Consumer Electronics Net
http://handhelds.consumerelectronicsnet.com/articles/viewarticle.jsp?id=1425152

NewsGuide.us
http://newsguide.us/pc/computer-news/databases/8645-jreport-replaces-prominent-reporting-solution.html

Digital Journal
http://www.digitaljournal.com/pr/264944

Benzinga
http://www.benzinga.com/press-releases/11/03/p967674/jreport-replaces-prominent-reporting-solution

TMCNet.com
http://technews.tmcnet.com/news/2011/03/31/5415853.htm

iPad Latest
http://www.ipadlatest.com/news/Press+Releases/20110331/21001849/JReport-Replaces-Prominent-Reporting-Solution.htm

Without exception, every team says that they spend 75% of their time in the business and just 25% on the business. In this disruptive environment, they can’t succeed unless they reverse this metric.

Helping executive teams elevate where and how they play the game of their business involves several steps. With this approach, the discipline of thinking and acting differently is supported by on the business processes, which can often be undertaken in one- or two-day offsites.

1. Create a Visual “Mental Practice Field” of the Marketplace
You need to help people see the “Big Picture” by developing a sketch of marketplace forces that show trends, consumer preferences, brand erosion, economics, competitive threats, shifting channels of distribution, and technology. This helps determine “game changers” that shift the outlook from dire to exciting and leads discussion of the actions to take.

2. Agree on the most critical questions, given dramatic changes in the market place.
I like to conduct interviews to assess the most critical questions for success. I ask leaders to select the vital few questions that must be answered. This establishes areas where new strategies, practices, and behaviors are essential.

3. Identify truth statements of where you are today.
Business transformation and strategy execution occur more naturally with an honest assessment of where you are and a clear picture of where you want to go. I often ask leaders to identify truth statements that might be hard to recognize or discuss, or that may hinder future success. After leaders identify these statements, create a “Wall of Reality” by writing them on paper and posting them up. This becomes a tangible menu of what to solve for as a team.

4. Develop Behavioral Ground Rules
Based on your visual of the marketplace, recognizing the strategic questions, and identifying truth statements, you can begin to facilitate creation of ground rules to establish the behaviors necessary to lead on the business. (People often tell me that strategy creation isn’t the problem in driving change – it’s disbelief that leaders will change their behaviors to bring the strategy to life.) You need to recommend ways to hold everyone accountable to the ground rules so permanent change occurs in the way the business is led.

Service Evaluation Concepts is committed to Return On Intelligence. Let us know what else we can do to help you deliver on your brand commitments at solutions@serviceevaluation.com. Thank you for stopping by Service Evaluation Concepts .

Arcadio Roselli
arosellill@serviceevaluation.com
(516) 576-1188 x3530

It’s a new year and as the page is turned on 2010 many businesses are facing the prospect of a new marketing budget. While some companies will be forced to adapt to the reduced availability of funds, it’s more important than ever–for all businesses–that the money being spent on advertising is the most effective it can be. Optimizing your advertising spend isn’t just about spending less money on advertising: it’s about making better use of the money you do spend. With that in mind, here are 6 ways to optimize your advertising spend.

1. Web Analytics: You can only allocate your advertising budget in an optimal way when you know the effectiveness of your advertising campaigns. To know this, you need to define and measure success. What happens when an ad is successful? The simplest way to start on this path toward advertising optimization is to measure the clicks you receive from online ads. You most likely do this already as you track the incoming sources of traffic to your website. Google Analytics is free and is a good way to start exploring these issues. For better or for worse, though, not all of your customer interactions occur online. Just because web interactions are the easiest things to measure doesn’t mean that they’re the most important interactions to measure. This is why you need the next item on our list.

2. Phone Analytics: This comes back to the question of defining success. Is your ad successful if a customer clicks through to your website and then is never heard from again? What about if a customer calls? This isn’t measured by traditional web analytics services, but it is a key stat to track. Tracking phone calls gives you a more complete picture of the effectiveness of all your ads–both on- and offline–in whatever way a customer contacts you.

3. Test Copy: While many web search optimization programs will focus on finding the best keywords in which to place your ads, it’s equally important to test and adjust the content of those ads. Try a few different variations for each campaign you pursue. Which one is most effective? Adjust your budget to focus on the language that resonates with customers.

4. Test Time: Optimization is about more than just garnering more responses. It’s about garnering better responses. If a tourism agency in Maine knows that no one is coming to visit in January, then it might be best to hold back on advertising beach-front rentals until the warmer months. This simple example illustrates a more nuanced point: don’t pay for advertising that won’t lead to sales. This might mean cutting back advertising during certain months or even during certain times of day.

5. Test Geography: This is closely related to our previous entry, but it’s no less important for you to optimize your advertising by geography. A local landscaper in Maryland won’t put up billboards in New Mexico. Why should you pay for online advertising for your local business that’s seen by people halfway across the country? Make sure to specify the settings on your PPC ads to account for geographic point of origin.

6. Interaction Design: Now that you know what causes customers to click and call, the next step is making sure that the interaction is successful. For clicks, this means that the landing page for your website is clear and legible, with a simple call to action. For phone calls, this means that the call agent is as informed as possible before speaking with the potential customer. A whisper message will let your call agents know the identity of the caller along with the advertising source that led to the call.

Service Evaluation Concepts is committed to Return On Intelligence. Let us know what else we can do to help you deliver on your brand commitments at solutions@serviceevaluation.com. Thank you for stopping by Service Evaluation Concepts .

Arcadio Roselli
arosellill@serviceevaluation.com
(516) 576-1188 x3530

With so many businesses faced with this challenge, I elected to conduct an informal survey of sorts to see how consistent some efforts and goals were in this area. So I asked people I have been meeting over the past several weeks how they would define top shelf customer service.

As you might surmise, the question resulted in responses that were far from consistent. These unsuspecting research participants used descriptors like “customer intimacy” and “customer-centricity.” Marketing types used words like “delight” and “exceed.” Operations, used words like “problem resolution” and “first call reconciliation”, while customers said they just want to have their needs met with the least amount of effort.

If you do a Google search on the definition of Excellent Customer Service in .23 seconds you will get 556,000 responses.

Now imagine an employee, associate or agent being asked to deliver a “world-class customer experience.” Where would you start? What would you do? Delight? Get intimate? Solve their problem? Change their sheets? Exchange their year-old shoes with no questions asked? Without a compelling vision translated into actions that are relevant to that industry and business, employees will make up their own version of “world-class customer service,” and that’s what will drive their actions.

Want to improve your customer satisfaction scores? Start by rallying the team around a common definition of what the ideal customer experience looks like within your business. Your customer satisfaction scores will never improve at a rate faster than your ability to do this.

Remember, all customers really want is for you to be easy to do business with. Low effort = high loyalty.

We have all felt the excitement and creative energy of belonging to a winning team. We drew energy from each other when we put another point on the board. We heard friends and family cheer us onward through the valleys. Our coach believed in us and drew out the very best in us. We were motivated to give our all, for the sake of the Team. We shared clarity of purpose, common goals and we celebrated the positive contributions of every teammate.

Today, many CEO’s are failing to realize the full potential of their Team because they are failing to tap into the energy, the creativity, and the hearts of their employees.

The effective CEO needs to ensure that their organizational strategy is purposeful; clearly communicated in meaningful words and well defined measures. And every employee needs to hear and understand how their work matters, and how their work is vital to the success of the Team.

Employees are not looking for another company slogan to be posted at the drinking fountain. Nor is their creative energy stirred by learning that “we achieved our budgeted goal for the month”. If you are the CEO of an organization that desires to achieve exceptional results and meaningful growth, your employees are listening intently for you to personally communicate with them regarding the issues and concerns that really matter to them.

First, your employees want to know that the organization they belong to has meaning, vision and genuine purpose; something bigger than shipping more product or handling more phone calls. They want to belong to something of significance.

Second, they want to know how and why their personal contributions matter. They want to see that the energy and talent that they bring to work every day is valued and appreciated. And, when they actually believe your message, that their work really does matter, it will unleash a deeper inner desire to do more, and to do it better than ever before.

Even Dilbert deeply desires to be an effective and contributing member of a winning Team.

How can you know if your online brand is safe? SEC’s new Pulse Online Reputation Monitoring service can help. To find out how, please contact a representative for more details.

How loyal are your customers? The cost of acquiring a new customer is five times the cost of retaining an old one. Therefore, it is important that your customer interaction is managed in the best possible way. Understanding and improving the customer experience is a strategic imperative for all customer-driven enterprises. Providing an experience that is in line with the corporate message or brand is the surest way to win customer business loyalty.

* Define what your customers want
* Identify the behaviors that create success
* Create ‘brand promoter’ customers
* Train your staff more effectively

We offer the most powerful Customer Intelligence Solutions programs can help you define what your customers want and help identify the key performance indicators that create loyalty over time. We’re continuously pioneering new solutions based on breakthrough technologies and innovative practices. SEC’s customized reporting system provides the actionable information that augments the analysis of the resources of a business. These are an invaluable source of insight into the reasons behind the ratings/metrics. SEC provides the ability to identify the key drivers of satisfaction.
Voice of the Customer Programs

Do you know what your customers are saying about you? Do you have the capability to react quickly to when your customers speaking directly to you about your business, or are they talking to their friends or even to strangers? Are you listening and responding no matter when or where they give feedback? A comprehensive voice-of-customer (VOC) program is a critical part of protecting your revenue, and requires multi-channel listening in real-time, with the capability to respond to customer feedback instantly.

* Customer feedback surveys (see content below, should open up in new page if possible)
* Customer Intercepts/Exit Interviews (see content below, should open up in new page if possible)
* Smart Agent Mobile text/SMS feedback
* Pulse Social media feedback management (Pulse)
* Call Track Call Center Monitoring and Recording
* SmartAgentTM Mobile Intelligence
* Focus Groups

Customer Engagement Programs

You only get once chance to make a first impression. When it comes to customer service, even one bad experience can not only mean the loss of a sale, it can also mean the loss of the customer permanently, not to mention the negative word of mouth. SEC can help you determine how you measure up during routine transactions, after the sale, when customers have a problem. We can help reveal what your customers think, how they behave, and why. All of this results in happier customers, better trained staff, and a boost to your bottom line.

* Captures the behavior, thoughts and attitudes of your customers
* Surfaces key customer insights
* Continuously improves the customer experience at every touch point

Lost Customer Programs

How many customers has your business lost today—and do you know why they’re leaving? Given the high cost of acquiring new customers, one of your greatest challenges—and opportunities—is to effectively manage your customer loyalty. Our multi-dimensional programs can help you determine why you are losing customers, and what you can do to get them back!

Customer Loyalty Package

Not looking for an ongoing program? Not sure exactly what you need? Let our loyalty experts put together an introductory package of brand alignment services at a price you can afford, with no long-term commitment. Please call 516.576.1188 x.3530 or email us at solutions@serviceevaluation.com This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it for more information.