You can have all the technical functionality in the world, but without an agile decision engine and strong analytics, it’s not likely to provide your customers with a good experience nor is it likely to yield high levels of performance for your company. A decision management engine drives the processes a company uses to interact with its customers, its suppliers and its operations staff. Good decision management engines will drive processes that mold mass amounts of customer interactions into business outcomes. The trick is, no process is perfect right off the bat. To make a process hum, it has to be constantly analyzed and tuned, ensuring it’s driving your business objectives and at the same time, providing a great customer experience. Key Elements You've got to have two key elements to be able to constantly analyze and tune your processes: Solid business intelligence that is timely and granular enough to provide insights for optimization opportunities The ability to make decisioning process modifications quickly and easily (aka agility) Legacy systems running business applications usually miss the mark on both these requirements. Static, month-end reports aren’t adequate to drive timely or relevant insights. Furthermore, hard-coding is required to configure, test and deploy new processes, making modifications difficult and ...
We all know that a key element of an exceptional customer experience (CX) is consistency across multiple channels. My experience with your enterprise over the phone should be similar to the web experience, which should be similar to the social media experience, and so on. This is especially significant since many utilities are placing customer engagement near the top of their strategic priorities. Customers aren’t going to engage if the experience is fractured and awkward. So, what happens when I (as a customer) am mid-interaction on the phone, sitting in front of my computer and I decide to log on to the web interface? I’m channel-surfing across your enterprise. Are you ready for that? Does the new channel pick up where the last channel left off? Is the message consistent? Am I going to get lost? Channel Switching & Message Shifting Two of the coolest yet most underrated features we’ve built into Kurteus are channel-switching and message shifting. Customers can move from phone to web, for example, and the conversation picks up exactly where it left off on the previous channel. Also, if a customer changes the status of their account mid-conversation via a self-serve application (eg. makes a payment, schedules a service), the ...
"A rule of thumb is that a lousy process will consume ten times as many hours as the work itself requires." – Bill Gates What is a Business-as-a-Service (BaaS) Model? More and more, enterprises are seeking third-party vendors to host business solutions rather than source the hardware and software themselves. This is widely known as the software-as-a-service (SaaS) model and it’s making enterprises more efficient as it continues to gain widespread adoption. The thing is, a tool is only as useful as the manner in which it’s applied. That’s why the business-as-a-service (BaaS) model is emerging. In the BaaS environment, a vendor not only hosts its solution on behalf of the enterprise, it also takes part in managing the tool to ensure business goals are met. This is quite valuable as vendors generally have experience across a range of customers and industries. So, the customer not only receives a hosted business solution, they also receive a wealth of knowledge and real-world experience about how best to apply the solution to meet business goals. This delivers a new knowledge-base to your business and a third-party perspective on current processes and ways to ...
With advancements in customer care technology, the traditional role of the customer service rep (CSR) is quickly changing from a glorified service portal to a specialized customer advisor. Traditionally, the CSR acted as the hub between the customer and the utility, fulfilling service needs between the hours of 9 and 5. Today, technology is enabling customers to interface directly to the enterprise, fulfilling service needs themselves through self-serve applications over multiple channels. This is beneficial to both the customer and the utility – self-service is more convenient for the customer and costs the enterprise less. In fact, most customers with a grasp on technology would rather fulfill service needs themselves than deal with an agent in a call center – it’s easier and faster. That said, there’ll always be a need for CSRs. They’re still required to fulfill non-standard service requests or to help customers who have trouble using technology to self-manage. Also, most enterprises insist upon having a human touch point for its customers. And, a computer is rarely going to quell an irate customer, unfortunately. Beyond that, there’s a new green field for CSR’s: becoming trusted customer advisors. This especially applies ...
If you build it, they will come. It worked for Kevin Costner in Field of Dreams. Unfortunately, when it comes to delivering self-management functionality to customers, this approach is not as effective. Obviously, building customer self-service functionality is a key component, but it isn’t the end-point in providing exceptional customer experiences. The model used to deliver the services to your customer is as important as the functionality. Many utilities are experiencing low customer uptake on their new, state-of-the-art self-service offerings. Why is that? The two most common explanations are: 1) The customer base is not embracing technology 2) Customers would rather deal with live agents Let’s explore both of those explanations and then a third, more plausible reason for why many customer self-service initiatives don't gain the traction that was anticipated. Customers are eager to embrace technology to fulfill their service needs. But here’s the catch: only if it’s easily accessible and simple to use. Just look at the financial industry as proof – think about how you do the majority of your banking. Likely, it’s done over the internet or on your smartphone. Now think about why you use the internet or smartphone for banking instead of a phone-based agent or live teller. It’s easier. It’s more ...
The definition of good customer care is changing. In the past, good customer care was about ensuring CSRs were available in call center queues, ensuring they were courteous on the call and ensuring they quickly fulfilled the customer's needs. Today, good customer care is about anticipating individual customer needs, giving them the information and tools needed to service themselves on their own time, not between the hours of 9 and 5. Today, good customer care is about self-management. Kurteus has a suite of customer self-management applications that enable utilities to easily engage their customers, delivering best-in-class care at a lower cost than traditional service methods. Furthermore, the self-management applications are integrated with the Talkonomics Process, offered via voice (inbound and outbound) and web channels. They're easily configured and deployed in treatment processes to ensure customer risk is well-managed. The Risk Response Treatment engine assesses customers in real time and offers the most pertinent applications based on likely needs. Here's some of our self-management applications: Budget Billing Enrollment Customers can easily enroll in budget billing programs. Contact Preferences Customers can set their preferred channel and preferred language for future communications. Dispute Engagement Customers can register a dispute without contacting the call center. Register New Phone Number Customers can change current telephone contact ...
Kurteus provides a simple platform for segmenting hard to manage customer types and applying customized treatments to them. This is a high-value feature since many hard to manage accounts aren't adequately addressed by traditional treatment methods and wind up being charged-off. Furthermore, they're expensive to manage as they move through the portfolio, requiring repeated treatments. We call these segmentation strategies 'programs', and once configured, they become part of the Time Zero dashboard to be included in business intelligence analytics. Along with the ability to segment and treat based on any data attribute within your systems of record, Kurteus has some out-of-the-box strategies that address many of the common difficult account types found in utilities. Here are a few of them: Reactivation Kurteus can identify and manage instances where customers have avoided debt by closing their account and opening a new one without paying the outstanding balance. Features: Outcomes: Non Contactable This program is designed to ensure that contact information is up to date, keeping the lines of communication open. Features: Outcomes: Low Income Identifies and communicates with low income customers. Includes customized solutions to fit within specific regulatory environments and/or company policies. Features: Outcomes: Payment Arrangement Designed to handle the entire payment arrangement lifecycle without the need for CSR intervention, Kurteus supports multiple payment ...
