Microsperience - Latest Comments

Re: Policy control: red hot telecoms tech that delivers a great telesperience

rke — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 16:57:23 -0000

"telesperience" I couldn't find that one in my teledictionary...

Re: First touch, last touch, every touch

Teresa Cottam — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 12:10:38 -0000

Yes I will be writing to Ofcom to complain, cos if they cannot get it right for me then what hope for the little old lady down the street? I will tell you the horrible details over a pint Peter :-)

Re: First touch, last touch, every touch

Peter Bowen — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 11:31:41 -0000

Teresa, you are the wrong person to have as an unhappy customer but the right person if the CSP takes on board your comments and acts on it. I will watch this space

Re: Dumb and dumber – the typical CSP approach to pricing

Peter Bowen — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 09:14:07 -0000

Teresa, lots of truths in what you say but the fact is not
all CSPs have a good handle on what service delivery costs and what the margins
are on each. In addition, to become more retail-like does require a level of application agility many simply don’t
have. One of the biggest threats to the
industry comes from slashing prices to such an extent that there is simply not
enough margin to invest in the future. Cost
savings and efficiencies can only do so much to off-set the damage done by tit
for tat reductions.

Re: Making the impossible possible (a fishy tale)

Teresa Cottam — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 10:30:12 -0000

Thanks RC for your support - we aim to challenge, inspire, explore and we love hearing the views of our readers. Of course I'm biased but I think BSSOSS is the most exciting part of telecoms!

Re: Making the impossible possible (a fishy tale)

RC — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 04:52:33 -0000

Great piece, Teresa. Telesperience consistently worth reading! Keep up the great work.

Re: CSPs could do far more to help customers avoid billshock

Teresa Cottam — Fri, 25 Nov 2011 06:14:18 -0000

Thanks Convergys for the comments. A big point for me is that customer loyalty is built on trust and we have to trust our providers to get our bills right, and to not "scalp" us. Most customers react to billshock by a) being unhappy, disgruntled, complaining b) limiting their usage. Are we in a short term business to "fleece" our customers or a longer term relationship with them to build value and loyalty - that's the question I'd like CSPs to consider. I agree that "just raising prices" is not what it's about - rather it's about finding "honest" new opportunities to add value by providing things that customers want to pay for. My current ISP charges me for data I use (I'm on "unlimited" now) but gives away the basic plan for free. Yet even though I'm paying & others aren't my traffic isn't prioritised. That means I'm paying but getting slowed down by all those on freebies. How does this make sense for either party? The current approach we have to selling services to custs is too-often lazy and old-fashioned - our industry can do much, much better. Come on CSPs, excite me with your service plans, tariffing, products and customer service...even just a little...

Re: CSPs could do far more to help customers avoid billshock

Convergys — Wed, 23 Nov 2011 09:45:49 -0000

Teresa, you're absolutely right that the bill shock issue is a problem that extends far beyond mobile into other sectors. The problem is just as pressing in broadband, where carriers continue to be squeezed by rising network infrastructure costs on the one hand and and competitive pressures on the other hand. Given the latter, merely raising prices in response is not a wise long term solution. Instead, broadband providers should look to improving the efficiency and performance of their own back office "infrastructure." This post by Convergys (http://bit.ly/rEWSYR) offers insights on smart BSS solutions that address bill shock from the broader perspective of revenue management. Already used successfully by wireless carriers to head off mobile bill shock, such solutions let the operator deliver real-time alerts to keep customers in the know on usage -- a major boost to customer satisfaction and loyalty. And beyond addressing the immediate bill shock issue, such systems often are equipped with business intelligence and predictive analytics that learn customer needs and interests, forming the basis of tailored sales offers with a higher closing ratio.

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Teresa Cottam — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 07:22:17 -0000

We've had requests to reuse this diagram - you're very welcome to reuse it so long as you attribute to Telesperience. Please contact us if you need it in a particular format.

Re: Is the telecoms industry too focused on the negative?

Teresa Cottam — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 07:20:49 -0000

We've had requests to reuse the diagram shown here - you're very welcome to re-use so long as you attribute to Telesperience. If you need it in a particular format then please contact us.

Re: IT – Get Off Of My System

Ashley Bowen — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 04:23:17 -0000

Hi Nathan, thanks for the comment. Of course you're right that in many enterprises, the IT department is where it all comes together. However in many others, IT takes up the mantle just because nobody else will. I agree that the business rules configuration role is often very complex and possibly IT type people have the right analytical skills to carry this through. However, they often lack the business knowledge and acumen. If these people sat within the commercial department they would assimilate business knowledge while at the same time being able to advise business owners as to technological capability during product development and enhancement lifecycles

Re: IT – Get Off Of My System

Nathan C — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 19:20:05 -0000

I'm sure this need a major evolution of the business departments in most businesses. Right or wrong, in many Enterprises today, outside of the system skills, IT is one of the few places where everything comes together. The retail owner that wants to sell a new widget line, needs to mediate with fraud, credit, billing, logistics, online, customer care etc. etc. departments. Each will have their own requirements. And in each case you need to understand that the "config" will not upset the apple cart somewhere else in the complex chain of technology, people,and process that supports most business activities. The world for most operators gets more complex by the year ... I struggle to see how a delegated model can really succeed. So business will need to take up the mantle of investing in E2E capabilities and knowledge, e.g. Business Architects, E2E process owners (so you'll still have a centralized department .. just may not be called IT)

Re: IT – Get Off Of My System

Ashley Bowen — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 10:35:00 -0000

Thanks for the comment Teresa: business users having an understanding of what end-users want is certainly a challenge. But I tell you what, I reckon the business users are closer to the customer than the IT department is - or at least they should be!

I think there is a whole lot of re-thinking to be done before commercial departments take up the mantle and they can't be expected to do so until system vendors have provided platforms that are easy to reconfigure.

Re: IT – Get Off Of My System

Teresa Cottam — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 08:27:06 -0000

And then of course Ashley there's the shadowy figure of the customer. Business users are not only there to represent the organisation's internal needs but also to act as representatives of what they know customers want. This of course depends upon the business user having an accurate understanding of evolving customer need, which as we know is yet another challenge. I agree IT is best doing what it's good at and not being expected to second guess or act as proxies for the business - IT is the engine (and a smart engine at that, providing lots of insight, information, optimisation etc) but it shouldn't be the driver.

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Teresa Cottam — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 07:09:03 -0000

Hi Monica and thanks for your comment. Okay so you have picked me up here on my lazy use of language! Of course you are right that there are more reasons for not having an iPhone than ability to pay for one. I do think it's a marketing myth that Apple produces the "best" phones - as "best" depends entirely on what you as an individual need. I also think there's an enormous market out there for "less smart" phones.

A further point though is to not to fall into the trap of regionalism. While it may be true that on average Western Europe has wealthier consumers who want more high-end or expensive goods, developing countries also have their high-end consumer class now. Likewise Western Europe and the US also have large numbers of poorer people - both in relative and absolute poverty. It irritates me that some classes of phone are built and targetted at "poorer" countries when you know full well there would be a market for them in Europe. Smarter targetting of phones models really is required.

To come back to Neena's point about bundles - the bundle (which allowed handset subsidy) has been both a blessing and a curse. I for one am ready to be unbundled and I'd prefer to buy my phone directly from the mfr rather than from the CSP.

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Teresa Cottam — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 06:46:34 -0000

Thank you for your comment Ashley. The sad thing is that many CSPs are building "unbalanced" customer experience houses - they often focus on just one aspect (eg network quality or pricing) at the expense of others. I agree that while we need to optimise each pillar it is critically important that all four work together to create a strong proposition. We're going to look at this in more detail in upcoming posts. I also agree that this is an area where it's very hard for a CSP to assess how well they're doing. Getting an unbiased, unpolitical, objective perspective on your own performance and how it compares to peers is very hard to do internally - not impossible certainly, but hard. (And surely your time is at a premium if you're a hard-working CSP, whereas this is a task that can be easily and beneficially outsourced.) I think engaging an independent third party to perform an audit and benchmark can be very enlightening, but of course you need to find the right third party that has the experience, approach and insight to give you the feedback you need to improve your performance.

Re: Avoiding automation annihilation

Teresa Cottam — Sun, 13 Nov 2011 06:26:23 -0000

Thanks Peter for your comment. When requirements are defined for new systems the customer's voice often isn't strong enough. So finance and IT may want to reduce the cost of support, but are they providing something that is useful for, appealing to or usable by the customer? I guess my point is that the most technical or the most automated isn't always the best from the customer's point of view. In the age of personalisation we like to feel as though we're an individual and the CSP is dealing with us as an individual. I think it's interesting to consider how this (and customer centricity) sits with full on automation (which is about efficiency). There are some excellent egs of good automation out there, so let's consider what makes them good and avoid the automation annihilation scenario.

On Twitter NSN's Jane Rygaard made an excellent point on this post when she said she was seeing requests for "tunable" automation, which allowed automation to be adjusted to the level desired. Very interesting point.

Re: Avoiding automation annihilation

Peter Bowen — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 08:39:20 -0000

Teresa, some great points and how true about IVRs. I have just sent a rocket to my service provider as its fault line told me there was a fault in an area and if this was not my area to hold on and I would be put through to someone. I hung on and it then said “goodbye” and hung up. Going via the customer service line I had to go through 4 levels of multi-choice questions and wait 10 minutes just to speak to someone. I am leaving at the end of the contract period. However, what this and other experiences show is that not enough effort is being put into customer experience and many automated solutions are either poorly designed or poorly tested. I wonder how many CSPs ask their customers to check things before they are launched? Perhaps now is the time to spend more time on defining requirements and getting things right.
Peter Bowen, Head of Consulting Delivery at Telezoetic

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Ashley Bowen — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 07:59:10 -0000

Great article Teresa. As you say, the total customer experience is an amalgam of lots of different things and your 'pillars of Hercules', all four of them, is a realy good structure.
Every single product purveyed by a CSP has its own 'customer journey', taking it right through the sales-to-cash cycle. A good customer focused design for a new product will look at the complete journey from the customer's point of view.
Having split the customer experience into smaller components, is there room for some sort of metric system, either self-assessed (probably biased) or assessed by an independent honest broker?

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Monica Zlotogorski — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 08:51:37 -0000

Teresa, allow me to challenge just one tiny point. You said "Apple will not transform the customer experience for most of the world's customers, because most people cannot afford one."

I can afford an iPhone, but I simply don't have one or wanted to have one, at least up until now. I just want a different experience. What I'm trying to say here is this, let's break a myth, which is that people with certain apparent characteristics would go for an Apple device. Let's stop making assumptions about consumers. Instead, CSPs should invest in getting to know their customers better. I've been working in communications for over 10 years (hopefully that doesn't make me a complete geek!) and have all the apparent characteristics of a consumer that would want Apple, but I just don't. My suggestion to CSPs is to realize that they simply need to know their customers better, understand their needs and wants better, and realize that what they think as obvious, actually isn't. Furthermore, what I want from a CSP is somethng they are still not even offering, and no, it's not a pink handset.

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Teresa Cottam — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 07:54:02 -0000

Neena thank you so much for your very interesting comment. I think it's true that the bundle has delivered high-end handsets to many in Europe and North America. However, the current recession is certainly making consumers re-assess the whole proposition. I also think that, as with eg PCs, the cycle of renewal is changing. The handset was evolving so quickly at one point that people felt the need to have a new one every year; now I know a lot of people who don't actually want a smartphone, they want a "pretty clever" phone. ie their phones now have capabilities they don't need or want and which they don't want to pay for.

To a large extent these people are like the Indian consumers you talk about. They are to some extent price constrained because of the recession, and while they want a nice form factor they now have to think about whether they really need a 10MGP camera rather than a 4MGP, and what the price consequences are of application X or piece of hardware Y. Thus I think the fact Nokia hasn't forgotten the mid and low end of the market is ultimately a smart move. Apple will not transform the customer experience for most of the world's customers, because most people cannot afford one. That's not a criticism of Apple - their whole proposition is one of exclusivity after all - but what about everyone else that can't afford an iPhone? I therefore see Nokia's smartphones (and those of other mfrs at the low end) as far more democratising - as they give access to all the wonderful opportunities of the internet and communications to the masses.

I also agree very much with your point about bundles - they worked for a while but what you're talking about here is the need for a "smarter" strategy - ie the ability to personalise the offer. And on that point I 100% agree with you.

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Teresa Cottam — Thu, 10 Nov 2011 07:41:02 -0000

Hi Marc - thanks for your comment. When I say I don't believe in customer experience silos, what I mean is that typically customer experience is seen as something owned by CRM and that we approach improving the customer experience by eg improving the call centre or improving self-service etc etc. What I'm advocating is that the CSP needs a much more holistic vision of what makes up the customer experience, and they need to approach it more strategically.

The reason I originally wrote this article is that I was becoming increasingly frustrated by the inability of certain staff within CSPs (and commentators such as journalists and analysts) to see that how the network performance is a critical component of the customer experience. I believe that each of the pillars I present is very important in itself, and that we need to ensure that each supports our overarching objective, which is an "optimal" customer experience. Optimal doesn't mean the best possible, it means that the experience we provide is acceptable to the customer and profitable for the CSP.

I wouldn't say that the network experience is "the most critical" as you put it, but it's pretty fundamental. If you don't get this bit right then no amount of good marketing, good products or offers or customer support is going to make customers want to buy your service. However, it's important to recognise that what represents a good "network experience" varies from customer to customer and customers need choice. In my view it's almost a dynamic negotiation between what you want/need and are prepared to pay for, and what is offered/provided.

In reality it's unlikely that you can optimise everything all at once, but if you start to see the relationship between the different elements you can start to understand your priorities. Where I agree with you whole heartedly is that currently in many countries the focus needs to be on QoS/QoE because due to current conditions (capacity crunch, video, smartphones etc) this is an area that customers are highly conscious of and is differentiating. The sad truth is that no one sees QoS as differentiating when it works well of course, just when it doesn't work!

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Marc Lippe — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 09:08:45 -0000

Teresa, I couldn’t agree more when you say that
customers’ wants and needs should be CSPs’ primary focus. And like you said in
the infographic, it’s important that each pillar be optimized to ensure the
best possible customer experience. But even though you don’t believe in
customer experience silos, do you think one holds more weight than the others
when it comes to influencing the customer experience? I tend to see ‘network
experience’ and CSPs’ ability to assure QoS and measure and analyze each
customer’s QoE as most critical. For example: http://bit.ly/nH0RlQ

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Neena Sharma — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 08:49:56 -0000

Nice article, Teresa. I completely agree that if operators really want to improve the customer experience, they need to focus directly on what customers want and what they perceive as a better experience and service for themselves. Talking about the 'eat-all-you-can' plans, these mostly serve the operator's interest better than the individual consumer's; however, there is another angel to it that I would like to highlight here.

In US and countries in Europe, operators subsidize handsets as part of their post-paid contract plans, which has greatly helped consumers to be able to get latest smartphones that would have been otherwise difficult to buy given their high upfront costs. I tend to think it is this strategy that has propelled the use of smartphones in the developed countries. If we look at the developing markets, for example, India, prohibitive high costs of smartphones make them out-of-reach of an average middle class consumer. One of the main reasons why iPhone hasn't become such a rage or why Nokia has been focusing so much on low-cost smartphones because emerging markets are very significant for them. The point I am trying to make here is that contract and bundled packages have proven to be advatageous for the end consumers in some ways already, and if the operators can go one step further and provide more flexibility to the customers to choose the bundles that fit them most, it will be a win-win situation for everybody.

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Claudia — Mon, 17 Oct 2011 12:27:28 -0000

I fully agree, Mrs Cottam. Service Providers are mostly catering their offerings for a small group of people and assume a lot about most consumers. I certainly would never buy a pink handset and I'm not particularly crazy about having an iPhone either, but they can certainly make the handset keys a lot bigger, otherwise it's hard to type with long nails :)

Microsperience - Latest Comments

Re: Policy control: red hot telecoms tech that delivers a great telesperience

Re: First touch, last touch, every touch

Re: First touch, last touch, every touch

Re: Dumb and dumber – the typical CSP approach to pricing

Re: Making the impossible possible (a fishy tale)

Re: Making the impossible possible (a fishy tale)

Re: CSPs could do far more to help customers avoid billshock

Re: CSPs could do far more to help customers avoid billshock

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Re: Is the telecoms industry too focused on the negative?

Re: IT – Get Off Of *My* System

Re: IT – Get Off Of *My* System

Re: IT – Get Off Of *My* System

Re: IT – Get Off Of *My* System

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Re: Avoiding automation annihilation

Re: Avoiding automation annihilation

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Re: The four main pillars of the telecoms customer experience

Re: IT – Get Off Of My System

Re: IT – Get Off Of My System

Re: IT – Get Off Of My System

Re: IT – Get Off Of My System