| Stock Ticker |
| ICT | 5.04 |  | 0.41 |
| CDC | 1.24 | | 0.1 |
| RightNow | 8.9 | | 0.5 |
| Amdocs | 20.55 | | 0.92 |
| Chordiant | 2.93 | | 0.13 |
| ATG | 1.95 | | 0.07 |
| NetSuite | 8.42 | | 0.3 |
| Rainmaker | 0.91 | | 0.03 |
| Convergys | 7.06 | | 0.2 |
| Interactive | 7.03 | | 0.17 |
| LivePerson | 1.91 | | 0.04 |
| ClickSoftware | 2 | | 0.01 |
| Astea | 2.55 | | 0 |
| Sykes | 19.65 |  | -0.04 |
| Epicor | 4.76 | | -0.04 |
| Pegasystems | 12.65 | | -0.11 |
| Unica | 5.69 | | -0.06 |
| HP | 36.33 | | -0.48 |
| Teletech | 8.5 | | -0.12 |
| NICE | 23.08 | | -0.34 |
| SPSS | 26.79 | | -0.43 |
| NCR | 14.35 | | -0.24 |
| Oracle | 18.09 | | -0.32 |
| Salesforce | 33.35 | | -0.67 |
| SAP | 35.69 | | -0.93 |
| Vignette | 9.04 | | -0.24 |
| Tekelc | 13.1 | | -0.35 |
| Nortel | 0.28 | | -0.01 |
| SupportSoft | 2.1 | | -0.09 |
| APAC | 1.32 | | -0.06 |
| eLoyalty | 2.45 | | -0.52 |
| Selectica | 0.69 | | -0.19 |
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As of 3:59 p.m. on 1/5/09 |
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EDP helps companies connect with customers – no question about it
By John L. Rueter
Chief Marketing Officer, StreamServe Inc
There is a phrase called “The $64,000 Question.” Derived from the 1950’s TV show of the same name, people will use it when they want to indicate they are asking a critical question.
For instance, a marketing executive might say, “CRM has failed. The theory behind it is great, but in practice -- without an effective way to present the information to the customer -- it just doesn’t work.
“So the $64,000 question is how can we find a way to leverage the customer information in our CRM system?”
While $64,000 is still a nice piece of change, it’s not nearly as impressive a figure as it was in the 1950s. I have a series of questions for you to consider. If these questions prompt you to action, it could help your company enhance revenues and/or cut costs by a substantially more than $64,000. How would you respond to these questions?
· When someone contacts your call center does your company take advantage of that opportunity to cross-sell and up-sell them?
· Take a look at your Web site, account statements, text messages, etc. Are they consistently branded and do they do a good job of transmitting your value proposition to the market?
· Does your company do a good job of taking advantage of your customer touch points to improve customer satisfaction and enhance the value of the customer relationship?
The truth is companies have largely maxed out on reducing their costs through the use of technology. So the onus is now on them to enhance revenues by adding value to their customer relationships.
In fact, many global companies already spend millions of dollars every year to ensure that the image they present to their customers accurately reflects their brand. Prior to undertaking a new marketing initiative, these companies typically employ focus groups and market testing procedures to make sure they are picking the right logo, colors, message, advertisements, and Web site designs.
While these companies are scrupulous in their approach to making sure their marketing and advertising collateral are just right, ironically they fall short in that “last mile” of communication with their customers. Whether it’s a business-to-business purchase order or a consumer insurance invoice, most companies don’t fully appreciate the role of these types of communication vehicles play in building their image. For most companies, this represents an appalling missed opportunity to carry their branding and image through to customer documents.
This lost opportunity to promote a company’s brand can be especially costly when two companies merge. When a customer’s service provider is merged into a larger company, customer irritation because of incorrect or confusing statements and invoices can create an opening that competitors can exploit.
However, one compelling new technology is emerging to help businesses make that last mile of communication between company and customer pay off in terms of branding, marketing, customer loyalty and revenue: Enterprise Document Presentment (EDP).
According to a recent report, 68 per cent of customers leave their current vendor because they feel as if the company doesn’t know who they are. EDP enables companies to communicate in a personalized way that lets the customer know that not only are they are aware of them, but that they know them well enough to provide targeted offers that make sense based on the customer’s historical purchases or service use.
As such, EDP technology is rapidly gaining the attention of marketing executives who are searching for new and better ways to connect with their customer base. In addition to dramatically reducing document costs – which can run as high as 15 percent of company revenues -- EDP also enables companies to reinforce their branding with every customer document across multiple communication channels, including print, fax, email, Web, mobile phone, etc.
Here are examples of how companies in the insurance and telecommunications industries have enhanced customer loyalty, extended their brand, and increased sales through the use of EDP:
Agis gets healthy returns with EDP
Agis is one of the five largest specialized healthcare insurers in the Netherlands with 1.2 million customers, and it recently enhanced its market presence by merging with three regional insurers. Agis was faced with the challenge of improving customer satisfaction and enhancing revenues by consolidating, standardizing, and personalizing customer communications for the entire company.
Agis used EDP to enable the newly merged units to produce and distribute personalized customer communications that maintain the company’s brand and style. EDP provided significant time and cost savings for processing corporate correspondence; improved document quality resulted in fewer call center issues and improved sales, and deeper insight into customer information helped management make better decisions.
“While the cost savings alone justify our investment, the greatest value…..EDP delivers is that it enables us to provide better customer service, which results in enhanced satisfaction and sales growth,” said Bertjan Teunissen, a project leader at Agis.
TDC connects with customers with EDP
TDC is Denmark’s largest telecom service provider with 15 million customers in Europe. Their challenge was to improve customer service by increasing customer self-service options; comply with governmental requirements for invoicing, and reduce costs.
TDC chose EDP to standardize on one system for all of the company’s legacy systems. As a result, TDC was able to offer improved service by enabling customers to receive their invoices in paper or electronic format; personalized correspondence to facilitate cross- and up-sell opportunities; compliance with governmental invoice format requirements, and cut costs.
“We want to be known for offering our customers quality service and innovative and interesting services, and ... EDP helps us do that,” said Eric Balslev, product manager, TDC IT Services.
Personalization was a big issue in the 90’s and it died for a time. But advances in technology – such as the advent of EDP – as well as the growing awareness that enhancing customer value is the lynchpin to growth has given the idea of one-to-one marketing a whole new life.
No question about it.
John L. Rueter oversees corporate marketing, product marketing, customer care, and other related global marketing activities for StreamServe. Mr. Rueter has over 20 years of experience in marketing, sales, and general management in B2B information services. Prior to joining StreamServe, Mr. Rueter served as senior vice president of global marketing for Fast Search & Transfer, one of Europe’s fastest growing technology companies, and the world leader in enterprise search solutions.
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