For anyone not familiar with the idea, it is, simply put, “pay-what-you-want” dining. (Radiohead recently applied the concept [not for food, of course], allowing fans to decide what to pay for their new album). At the end of the meal the customer decides how much it was worth, and pays accordingly.

Menus at Zesty’s Deli in Guelph, Ontario list a question mark beside items instead of a dollar figure. Tony Salamone, owner of Zesty’s says, “I have great faith in the people of Guelph.” The participatory pricing approach could clearly go a long way in keeping businesses honest, but the benefits aren’t one-way. For sure, customers win when they are empowered by the policy. At the same time, honest, and good quality businesses will win too - having customers reflect appreciation in the prices they choose to pay.

The owners of Barrie, Ontario restaurant Oscar’s echo Salamone’s message, “We are so confident in our kitchen and the food that we put out. And we are confident in our front of the house staff, our service is some of the best in the city.” Their message emphasizes the fact that business owners who apply participatory pricing aren’t operating charities – they believe that they will be more successful when they turn the price-setting power over to the consumer.

The first pay-what-you-want restaurant was the international, UK-based chain, Little Bay. According to reports, Little Bay is actually enjoying increased revenue since giving customers the power to decide what meals are worth.

More power to the consumer and an imperative to operate honestly for businesses, with increased revenue for those offering the best food and experience - participatory pricing is win-win.

I’d be interested to learn of experiences others have had with participatory pricing and in which industries you think it’ll have the greatest impact.

I really like this graphic because it highlights why customer interaction strategies are changing from a transactional approach to one where we focus on the broader customer experience.  I think it’s particularly relevant when we think about what is needed to satisfy each level of the pyramid. 

• Level 1: Companies can meet expectations with current customer service model.  Simply optimizing transactions, having the answers to customer queries, and providing a decent level of service is where the bar is set right now.  Amazingly, many organizations are still struggling to meet these simple customer needs.
• Level 2: To fulfill desires, companies have to figure out exactly what those desires are.  Usually they are articulated, but buried in call data and interactions with company employees.  Analytic tools and predictive modeling software now exist to help companies make sense of customer data, measure emotional responses, quantify customer wants, and respond accordingly.  It can be complex, but it’s not rocket science.  You’re front line employees probably have a good idea of what the customer is asking for; just ask them.
• Level 3: To meet unrecognized needs you have to learn more about the customer and develop a certain intuition about what would make them happy.  The only way to do this is to interact with them – build on what you learned from Level 2, engage them in conversations, and take the time to get to know them at an individual level.  Unrecognized needs are often not articulated, so you have to read between the lines to figure out what is missing from the customer experience.

I recently interviewed Lane Becker, President and co-founder of Get Satisfaction.  Becker’s model of “people powered customer service” is part of the new way some of the world’s top companies are rethinking their customer engagement strategies.  Becker likes to say, “customer service is the new marketing,” and uses the analogy of a hotel concierge to articulate the type of forward-leaning approach companies need to take to meet unrecognized needs:

“We really see this as a significant inflection point in the way companies treat customers. More importantly, how customers look at companies.  The concierge analogy is really about creating a team of people whose job it is to lean forward into the world.  So, if you think about the concierge model; what authority does the concierge have in a hotel? Concierges have absolutely no authority whatsoever. Yet, a hotel concierge, for example, not only provides the information customers want and need to know, but also engages in conversation with the customer. By putting conversations at the center of the relationship, the concierge reduces their sphere of control—that is, they do not limit the customer to a set of options for which there are defined solutions—but they increase their sphere of influence.  A good concierge doesn’t operate within silos; rather they cater to customer needs across all operational silos that exist both within and outside the hotel.

It’s their job to get out and engage with their customers in every way that they can; to anticipate the problems that customers have and try and solve them.  You are not just waiting for a customer to ask you about ‘Why did this break and how can I get a new one.’ Now you’re out there and you’re talking to your customers and you’re saying, “Have you tried this?” “Have you tried that?” “Have you ever tried using our products with this other product because that works pretty well?” It’s really a different mindset, one that is much more about leaning forward—I keep using this phrase—leaning forward into your customer base, engaging with them, anticipating what it is they need, finding out what it is that they want, and giving it to them before they even ask. And that’s a very different way about thinking about customer service.”

If you think about the current economic downturn, the Hierarchy of Customer Service becomes even more important.  As companies scale back expenses, the temptation is to operate at the first level of the pyramid where operational efficiencies are easily measurable and cost control is the modus operandi.  This type of “hunkering down” is often easy to justify because the value accrued from extra contact with customers isn’t visible in the contact center – it more often falls to sales, marketing, PR, and product development units.  The misalignment between where value is created and where it’s measured in the enterprise has been a problem for a while, but now customer choice and a more frugal market will punish companies that operate at the bottom of the hierarchy.   As wallets tighten and customers are increasingly discriminating about who they spend their money with, they are likely to seek out companies that are adding value and operating at the top of the pyramid.

If you want to think about where companies can tap in, just think about the hundreds or thousands of data points you create each and every day. As an example, Alan and I were talking about my last Rogers bill and I just realized that I’m leaving a data trail that any savvy marketer could sniff out from a (virtual) mile away. Privacy concerns aside, if the good folks over at Rogers ever decided to mine my data from the last 30 days or so, it would be pretty easy to decipher what I’ve been up to lately. Consider the following:

• My cell phone was off for almost two days straight, with the exception of a series of call made at random hours of the day to two phone numbers.
• Phone records might reveal those numbers belonged to my parents (easily discernable by last name) and my wife’s parents (maybe not as obvious).
• Triangulation of my cell phone signal during those brief calls would indicate that I was at a hospital.
• Following those two days of cellular silence, there was a flurry of in-bound calls from all over the globe – although few calls were answered.
• About a week later there was a corresponding flurry of outbound calls.
• Additional triangulation of my phone signal might reveal that I was at home the entire time after leaving the hospital (and overall, more home-bound throughout the rest of the month).
• Two weeks later there was a dramatic increase in calls and text messages between me and my wife during work hours.

Any guesses?

If Rogers was still confused, they might want to check my cable and Internet usage. At a macro level, TV watching increased dramatically over the past month, especially during the day. Interest in On-Demand content was way up. Daytime Internet use was also up. At a more granular level, specific browsing history (assuming they are able to decipher this information – again, privacy, legal, and ethical issues aside) would reveal certain Web content preferences such as lactation advice, baby-related content, and Facebook. And the final giveaway: a newfound interest in John and Kate Plus 8.

So why does this matter? Consider the opportunities for Rogers to target new parents: They know we’re spending more time at home and are facing new “challenges” with respect to how we consume media (we rented Max Payne last weekend and it took us four days to get through it). What could they do improve our customer experience? A longer viewing time for On-Demand movies might be nice (currently you get 24 hours to view a pay-per-view rental). How about a new parent “freebie” to congratulate us on the arrival of our baby? Maybe a discount (or up-sell) related to On-Demand programming? Since my wife and I are communicating more frequently, how about a couples package for our cell phones or free daytime text messaging? Rogers Media owns magazines too – maybe they could pitch us on Today’s Parent with a one-month-free trial?

Thinking beyond my wife and I; a new family member offers entirely new opportunities. If they consider the customer lifecycle, they may want to ping me in a year or two to make me aware of children’s programming and specialty channels aimed at kids. They could also offer me tips on parental controls for both cable and Internet. Thinking longer-term, they could ping me again in 10 years to see if we need a home phone (or cell phone) for our son (currently we both only use our cells). It all gets back to taking time to get to know the customer and offering compelling experiences.

Their approach has been a critical part of Southwest’s success (and WestJet’s as well). One organization who has certainly attempted to duplicate the Southwest/WestJet approach is public transit organization GO Transit. GO Transit operates train transportation through a number of commuter routes in a 100 kilometer radius of downtown Toronto.

I have recently taken note of their new approach to engaging with their customers. On the GO Train, communication with passengers occurs over a PA system. It used to consist solely of monotonous reminders of upcoming station stops (eg “Hamilton this station stop…Hamilton”) and safety reminders (eg “Please stand clear of the yellow line…”). Then, suddenly and strangely, GO Transit ‘Customer Service Ambassadors’ (that’s the new title of the GO Transit employees who speak over the PA) came to life. It was clear that they had been given permission to stray from the old, scripted recitals and to try cracking jokes about travel delays or the weather. The trouble is that in Canada, living in -20 degree Celsius whether is something we’re proud to say we do, but not something that we find funny.

As a frequent GO Transit traveller, I really wish that this was an approach that fit. But it doesn’t. There are two key reasons why GO Transit’s use of “engaging” Customer Service Ambassadors (analgous to flight attendants) is ineffective and, honestly, unpleasant for the customer:

1. When Southwest and WestJet attendants engage with customers, customers have the opportunity to engage with them. In the case of GO Transit, Customer Service Ambassadors are visible to only the passengers seated near them (I’d imagine less than 5% on the average route). Because of this, their attempt at engaging with customers varies little from the one-way PA broadcasting of old. Unlike on planes, GO Transit customers cannot see or talk to Customer Service Ambassadors.

2. Most people do not want to be on the GO Train. Most experience the same route twice per weekday. Southwest and WestJet  benefit from the feelings of novelty held by their customers. For many of their customers, a flight is exciting and to be remembered. Because the same cannot be said of GO Transit passengers, Customer Service Ambassadors have little to speak jovially about. The result: vain attempts at making light of circumstances that passengers really don’t find amusing.

GO Transit would do well to reevaluate its customer service approach. It isn’t Southwest, nor is it WestJet. Yes, engaging customers should always be a key consideration for most any firm. However, as GO Transit has shown me, attempting to engage the customer cannot be done for the mere sake of it. Before tinkering with the customer experience, firms need to ask whether their service truly lends itself to an opportunity for enhanced engagement.

After watching the clip there are two quotes that stick out as having provided some great insight into HP’s future direction:

“Brands are not defined today by campaigns but by the consumer ecosystems we nurture to support them”

“When you look at your customer service, the digital strategy can play an incredible role and in fact what I think and what we have seen is that it can actually be much more effective….We know of communities that have existed on their own as a social community around HP are actually solving customer service issues for HP customers better than at times some of our own service department people. So you can have more accuracy within this community, bring efficiency into the process of the operation and actually be more effective….I do believe it is a digital strategy that should exist across the operations of a company and not just in marketing and communications.”

It is evident that HP not only promotes consumer feedback and the creation of social networks around its product lines but it actually listens to what consumers are saying, which in turn creates a win-win situation for the both consumers and the company. As outlined by Mendenhall, it creates an entire process that becomes more efficient and effective –by using the information gleaned from these social communities to help correct consumer problems the first time they occur. This results happy HP users and a customer service department that isn’t laden with call-backs and complaints about the same problem. The positive customer experience that follows translates into positive word-of-mouth and ultimately creates a stronger brand. As HP has learned, it doesn’t necessarily matter what HP’s marketing campaign says about their brand, it matters what a trusted and influential source (friends, neighbours, digital communities) has to say about the brand. It is the old marketing rule dressed up in digital clothing; listen to your customers, apply the information they provide, create a satisfied consumer base. This may seem simple or straightforward but more often than not companies fail to see the value provided. Some companies aren’t aware that social networks about their brand even exist let alone use the information to improve their service and even worse some companies create social networks around their brand as if to say “we’re doing something digital” and then ignore any consumer-generated ideas. Companies like this invariably believe that they better understand their brand than does the customer. In other instances, customer suggestions make it inside the company boardroom but they either get lost in translation or because they don’t fit with the current strategy they are cast aside.

Hats off to HP for making the effort to actually listen to their customers, perhaps other companies can take a (digital) page from HP’s playbook, or else risk alienating clients and eroding brand value. In an era when existing and potential clients can connect with one another in ways never seen before, ignoring these influential, digital communities is a risky business practice for firms seeking to remain at the forefront of their industry.

It’s cute, but moreover, it shows that YouTube (and Google) understands that a number of video comments would have been better-off not posted (a point similar to my previous post, about the extent to which online systems should be designed to protect us from ourselves). Not just that, it shows a lot of personality, something that seems like something of an odd comment when talking about a website or large company. These personalities serve to “de-technologify” technology, making it easier to simply interact with it.

Some examples; things that made me smirk (or frown) as I tried out new software and websites:

• Google’s Chrome Browser — when something goes wrong in Chrome, you’re not presented with some snippet of code in HEX along with an error code. Instead, you get “Aw snap, something went wrong.” It catches you off guard the first time, and it’s not drab or boring like a typical application error.
• 404 pages — Things will go wrong and people will try to access pages that don’t exist, there are lots of ways that a webmaster can choose to let a visitor know that something isn’t right.
• Windows Vista’s Cancel or Continue — a good example of a complete lack of personality, especially on a prompt that shows up far more than is necessary, it ends up simply becoming a nuisance, making the software aggravating rather than useful.
• OSX’s bootup login prompt — when a mac boots up and requests a password, if you enter the wrong password, the window shakes. It’s simple and communicates that you typoed, all without the need for a popup asking you to try again.
• Winamp — I don’t think that many people use Winamp anymore, which is too bad, because it’s always been great software. Way back when I first loaded up Winamp, the software autoplays a clip “Winamp, it really whips the llama’s…” — backside. Nothing especially functional, but it still serves to set the software apart, and stayed in my memory to this day.

As we do more and more things with and through software, that software itself becomes the face of the company that designed it. For personable companies and applications, having a certain degree of transitivity between the personalities of the applications, and the personalities of the companies, becomes a very good thing.

Looping this back to the XKCD-YouTube example, I appreciate that Google/YouTube is able to recognize that there’s a lot of rubbish-comments on their site, and that they’re able to make light of the situation in a very public-facing way. This doens’t mean that my YouTube usage is going to go up (the only way that could happen is if more hours were added to the day), but it does serve to make the company a little more human, and a little more likeable — not a bad accomplishment if I’m trying to decide where I want to go to watch online video content.

My list above is far from exhaustive, are there any companies or applications that strike you as really having some personality of their own? Does it improve your experience, or detract from it? Or, are you just waiting for the day when most of our overt interactions with technology are intermediated through Turing-capable virtual people, complete with their own, robust personalities?

Welcome back to another edition of the Wikinomics Roundup: Week in Review! Over the next few minutes I will try and capture in brief, some of the thoughts, discoveries, and discussions that graced the blog throughout the past week.

In case you missed it, you can catch last week’s roundup HERE.

On July 15, 2008… Denis Hancock discussed the value of blog comments:

“The value of comments is a function of topic area and scale.”

Be sure to read on (and comment!) @
Comments: Valuable contributions of ramblings of the inebriated homeless

On July 17, 2008… Brendan Peat sets the stage for a discussion on security:

“In the last 20 some odd years corporate security has made some headway. Companies are now at the point where they are reasonably efficient at keeping ‘hackers’ out and letting employees in. The problem is that to get to this point the enterprise has had to put up walls in the name of safety and security, but at the cost of functionality and logic.”

Read about how empowering and trusting employees fits into the equation @
How Web 2.0, Facebook, and the Net Generation will change corporate security

“[The University of Wisconsin is] using the wiki to help us with all the work it takes to get from concept to real product. We use the wiki for spreadsheets on market development, documents with examples of other airless tires, images of competing products, project progress reports, FMEA (Failure Mode and Effects Analysis) sheets, and QFD (Quality Function Deployment) documents,” said Frank [Rath]. “All the different variations are stored on the wiki. If we didn’t have the wiki, we’d be emailing those files back and forth all the time.”

Read more about the use of the Wiki in the project development @
War of the Wikis: University of Wisconsin uses wiki collaboration to help troops in Iraq escape attack

“The release [of graphics and data for more than 84,000 3D city buildings] is meant to allow citizens, whether development experts or simply concerned city dwellers, a greater role in conversations and plans about the city’s future. Want to propose a new development? These 3D images should go a long way in allowing all parties a better, and simpler, platform upon which to build.”

See the pictures and the logic behind releasing this information @
3D Cities and Government 2.0

• Wiki scripts
• Feedback mechanisms
• Unified account information and metrics
• Rewards and compensation structures
• Smart call routing that analyzes reps’ actual skills and matches problems with solutions
• Customers helping customers
• Supplement call center activities with other Web 2.0 initiatives

Read this NOW if you run a call center.  Read this now if you’re a regular Joe. Discuss @
Wikinomics in call centers

Keep checking back each week, as Wikinomics bloggers keeps their eyes on the web, and their fingers on the keyboard.  And as always…if something stood out and interested you, please comment!

You may also have noticed that the format for the WR has changed from last week.  This is because i’m experimenting with formatting to try and find the optimum length : insight ratio, and would love to hear your thoughts.

Last week he was fired by concession company Aramark for not checking the ID of a 22-year-old “mystery shopper.” (The legal drinking age is 19, but apparently he is supposed to check the ID of anyone who looks under 30.)

In response, unhappy fans have joined forces on Facebook to demand that he be rehired. The Official Bring Back Wayne Facebook Group has grown from 2500 members on Wednesday, to 9000 on Friday, to almost 15 000 today. The momentum is just picking up. And now, if you search for Aramark on Facebook, Bring Back Wayne is the number one result.

Aramark has not yet hired him back. But they would be foolish not to. This is turning into a public relations disaster that will come back to haunt them when it comes time to renew their contracts, not just for the Rogers Centre, but for universities across the country. They have nothing to gain from firing a popular employee for not checking the ID of someone who was well above legal drinking age, and for not following a rule that I’m sure many feel is a little over the top. (If you were at a baseball game and the beer guy kept slowing down service and interrupting the game by insisting that people who were clearly of age, but looked 29, pass their IDs up and down the isle, wouldn’t you be a bit annoyed?)

But Aramark, like so many companies, is not used to listening to customer complaints about internal policy. Even if they make an internal decision that upsets a large group of customers, only a few have the time and naivety to phone and complain. And I can just imagine what management thinks of them: “whiners who complain about everything and who have no respect for a company policy that took months to decide on, plan for, and implement. Change the policy? That just don’t understand it. They weren’t at the meetings.”

Ah, but they do understand. They’ve worked in those companies and enforced those policies themselves. And if they complain about everything, its probably because they have everything to complain about.

It used to be easy to maintain the myth that the complainers were an irrelevant and uninformed fringe group. Not anymore. Now, with barely any amount of time or effort, social networks are allowing them to form into a cohesive and public opposition to your company.

Smart companies see this as an opportunity to engage with customers and build the company around what customers want, not what a committee meeting decides is a good idea. Those that choose to propagate the myth that complainers are irrelevant are sure to find their own relevance steadily diminished.

Wiki scripts: Imagine using wiki scripts edited by call center representatives. For common customer problems, wiki support pages could be both internal and external where customers and reps might find workarounds to problems that are valuable to other users (Tony Baggio from SocialText alluded to this opportunity is his comment on my previous post). There are already many communities online where people contribute for free; call centers have an advantage because they control incentives (beyond free) to foster activity. The evolution of call centers from rigid scripts to a network support model would increase call resolution times and increase the capacity of call center employees to take on more challenging issues and tasks.

Feedback mechanisms: The current focus of call centers is problem resolution and mitigation, not customer insight. Call center employees are the company’s front line to customers. Equally valuable would be wiki feedback mechanisms that send information in the other direction to marketing and product development functions. Remember, call centers only see a small percentage of problems, many are discussed in forums and on blogs that are outside the company’s control. Customers also use products in ways that you might never have imagined. How can we leverage these interactions? Is there a role for call reps to engage other communities? Can a Dell IdeaStorm-type initiative help centralize these erroneous points of feedback? The bottom line is this: market research spends an awful lot of money trying to figure out what product needs are and where to take a product; the customer support mechanism should be guiding exactly those things.

Unified account information and metrics: There is an opportunity to use dashboards, widgets, and visualizations to improve problem identification and prioritization by representatives. I’m thinking there are probably a lot of lessons to be learned here from the gaming world where dashboards are extremely complex and pull real-time data from interactive environments. From an IT perspective, this would require some serious integration with back office systems (CRM/ERP).

Reward and compensation structures: Companies need to transform how they think about call centers from a cost center mentality to a value-creation mentality, where each call is seen as an opportunity to learn from customers. For this to happen, incentives will have to change. As an example, most call centers tend to focus on solving individual customer problems; however, a much better objective is to use collaboration to identify root causes and eliminate problems for everyone (tied to feedback mechanisms). This would mean designing a system that rewards people for helping to improve and refine products by removing problems instead of dealing with them as quickly as possible and getting people off the phone. Overall design of these types of complex reward structures could also benefit from lessons learned in the gaming world where rewards, point mechanisms, and incentives are extremely well-defined.

Smart call routing that analyzes reps actual skills and matches problems with solutions: Create a reputation model for call reps that is based on what type of problems they have solved, the level of customer satisfaction, repeat calls, and so on. Smart systems could then provide just-in-time knowledge as problems are identified, either to customers, or to reps as they answer calls – no search required. In terms of wiki scripts and feedback tools, representatives could rate each other, and each others’ scripts and contributions to the knowledge base to help hone the routing system so that issues reach the appropriate person or solution.

Customers helping customers: The first step is to use Web 1.0 tools like a FAQ or knowledge bases to enable customer self-help – this is a fairly standard operating procedure for the vast majority of contact centers. However, beyond this there is an opportunity to allow customers to help each other through forums, wiki product manuals (e.g. see Moto Q wiki), customer-led support (Second Life does it), or online problem solving venues (e.g. see GetSatisfaction.com).

Supplement call center activities with other Web 2.0 initiatives: Why stop at wikis and forums? Live chat is a common addition to the contact center arsenal to improve upon automated online responses (this also allows reps to deal with multiple “calls” at once). What about using videos for online tutorials (vs. documentation) to allow users/reps to post common problems and solutions? How about tutorials using virtual world technology?

“Chapman’s experience is one example of the ways customer service is changing in an age when a single disgruntled consumer with a broadband connection can ignite a crisis,” from Carolyn Y. Johnson, the author of the article.

The article shows the power of ordinary people fighting against large corporations. For fun, in Google, I searched “Comcast complaints” and found over 1,870 listings and without quotations around the phrase Google brings up over a million listings.

“Comcast’s customer service was rated “poor” by 30% of respondents” and it had a strong hit after this video, which showed a Comcast technician sleeping on a customer’s couch.  It was viewed over 1.2 million times with over 700 comments. Also, a website named ComcastmustDie.com was created for users to tell their stories of their experience and grievances with Comcast.

It seems like Comcast finally got the message. With the emergence of Web 2.0 ordinary people can have their voice heard and create a terror of a public relations problem for companies. “Listening and acting upon what [customers] are hearing and being very proactive is different than waiting for a customer to pick up the phone and call us. We can nip it in the bud,” said Karen Hartzell, division vice president of customer care for Comcast’s NorthCentral division.

In the new business environment, companies need to implement a team of individuals to help combat the conversations about their company. By combat, I am not referring to a retaliation, but providing a solution to the problem. Working with customers to generate a satisfying customer experience is essential to thriving in business today. Customer service is just one of the departments shifted by Wikinomics.

I’m interesting to hearing your thoughts on customer service. Is their a company that you will absolutely never use because of their horrible customer service, or is their a certain company that has a level of customer service that brings you back? It may or may not have to deal with Comcast, but please share.

So far, the blog topics have varied – finding summer jobs, reward cards, starting a business, cell phones and mortgages. The posts are free of marketing pitches and offer some useful advice. It seems like a good start.

The key will be for the bloggers to engage other young people in the conversation. However, with most N-Geners wary of large corporations and their marketing pitches, the blog’s authenticity will be vital. The two key tests for the program will be the handling of any negative feedback about RBC and whether the bank actually acts on any recommendations that may result from the conversation. It would also be nice to know what motivates the six bloggers to maintain their involvement in the program.

We will be watching the conversation over the coming months to see how the bloggers fair. If done in an honest and transparent way, the program has the potential of helping RBC attract a new generation of customers. However, with too much oversight or interference, the blogs could all too easily go the way of many other failed N-Gen engagement strategies.

The Economist ran an excellent article last week, “Hollywood and the Internet: Coming Soon” that highlights the issue and talks about the opportunity for major studios to take advantage of the Internet revolution. Using online delivery mechanisms and direct-to-customer models like video kiosks the efficiencies ultimately lie in cutting out the video store middleman.

In the short run, retailers like Blockbuster will be squeezed by video rental kiosks that deliver “self-destructing” movies via flash drives. These kiosks can hold thousands of movie titles that are never out-of-stock and can upload them to portable keys in mere seconds – think ATMs for video rental.

Image source: MODSystems.com

MOD Systems captures the essence of the opportunity in their sales literature:

From retail store to digital destination. Today as a retailer, you face challenges that include:

• Increased competition from online stores.
• Inventory issues. It’s not possible to stock 30-70,000 titles of long tail inventory. In fact, it can sometimes be difficult to stock the right number of hot new titles.
• Differentiating your brand, for your customers and store associates.
• Investing in a scalable and flexible digital management architecture that grows with you.

In the longer run, even the idea of a kiosk seems redundant as more and more televisions become connected to the Web. The model of on-demand movies streamed/downloaded in HD directly to Internet-enabled TV set and portable devices seems inevitable. As noted in the Economist article, “the DVD boom has come to an end.” It was a fun ride while it lasted, but it seems as though after a quick eight or so years, the DVD is on its way out as the dominant media for video. I don’t put much faith in BlueRay either, which I suspect will have an even shorter run as the whole notion of physical media becomes increasingly outdated.

Winnipeg-based Sidetrack Technologies has developed the tools to produce illuminated tunnel advertisements using 360 degree LED strips that combine to create what appears to the rider’s naked eye as video (think flipbook for the 21st century).  In the age of Wikinomics, when advertising dominates the public landscape and the captive audience of the TV commercial is no longer available due to downloading, Tivo etc, Sidetrack may have unearthed a goldmine by finding a way to reach one of the last truly captive audiences and the minds of  millions of commuters in the world’s largest metropolises.  And to think – I figured I had seen it all the last time advertising made it in to the other truly captive space in public life – the washroom.

This new medium will allow Sidetrack to remotely change advertisements on any transit system in the world, based on various metrics including time of day, location and direction into or out of the city’s core.  Wonder why you’re craving that Egg McMuffin this morning?  Maybe it was the golden arches that followed you throughout the tunnel on your way to work…Worried about your next vacation?  Just keep your eye on the plane that’s following you for the latest and greatest travel deals on your way home.

While I applaud the innovative nature of this new medium, within a couple of weeks of seeing it daily, I am pretty sure I would opt for boredom as the better alternative to bombardment, particularly in the morning.

Sidetrack technology is currently in place in the Los Angeles Metro and London’s Underground and it will soon make it’s debut in New York City’s MTA.

Aside:

Subsequent to starting this post, I was on my way home on Toronto’s TTC and I waited no less than 15 minutes in a line at 11pm to purchase a monthly transit pass on my credit card.  The TTC has installed facilities where weekly or monthly passes can be purchased using a debit card at 8 of it’s 70 stations and credit at 4 such stations.  I find this frustrating given that Canada is one of the world’s heaviest users of debit payment systems and yet Toronto’s transit system offers convenient payment options in just over 10% of it’s stations.  There are better systems out there – see London’s Oyster card -  that focus not only on rider convenience, but also system efficiency and saving customers money.  Hopefully, before joining the age of Wikinomics advertising, Toronto’s TTC will catch up to the 1990s in its payment systems.

Call center employees are probably the most underused resources in the enterprise. Most are college-educated individuals, but the collective brain power of this group is never used to its full potential. Not even close. Call center employees are rarely given the tools or autonomy needed to improve decision-making and customer service at the front-lines (basic CRM systems are not enough). Consider some of the possibilities: Wiki scripts, access to all cross-selling and up-selling channels, outlets to capture customer feedback, incentives that stress talk time and relationship-building over dials and traditional call resolution metrics, mentoring and collaborative call resolution, access to information that allows call center employees to build custom dashboards and reports, and mechanisms to impact product design based on customer feedback. Call centers really are the low-hanging fruit of Wikinomics.

Naumi’s Rant:

To highlight some of the possible opportunities, I’ll refer to my recent interaction with ‘Media Company X’, a provider of TV programming, Internet, and phone services. A couple of months ago I called them to try and add four sports channels to my cable package so I could get all of the NBA basketball games, including West-coast games. It seemed relatively simple, they’d unlock a few channels for me; I’d pay them a few bucks more per month. Oh, how silly I was. The Media Company X call center employee informed me that I could not simply add four channels; I had to get the entire sports bundle for $30 per month – but “it’s worth it,” the call center employee told me because I get all the NFL, MLB, NHL, and NASCAR channels in addition to the NBA games. I hate bundles. Plus I don’t watch football, baseball, hockey, or car racing on a never-ending elliptical track. I just wanted to be able to watch Steve Nash and the Suns. So much for mass customization; I declined the bundle.

Last week I got a call from an enthusiastic Media Company X call center employee selling me on a home phone plan. You’ll save hundreds of dollars she tells me, and all it will cost you is $15 a month! Backwards logic aside, I really have no need for a home phone. That’s so 1999. My wife and I both have cell phones, and can’t imagine how I would get value out of having another phone number limited to reaching me at a single location. However, I did want to spend money with Media Company X, as I told the girl. I’d even spend close to $15 a month. All I wanted was some basketball channels for my cable package (and maybe some other specialty channels; National Geographic channel perhaps, monkey’s are funny, right?). Turns out I was talking to the wrong person. Even though she was a Media Company X employee, she wasn’t calling from the TV division and wasn’t able to solve my problem.

So what did we learn from all this? First, customer choice is important. It’s vital that call center employees have the ability to sell the full gamut of offerings that are available to the customer, and unbundling services will further allow call center employees to give customers what they want. Second, scripts are bad. The service agent that called to sell me a home phone was clearly more interested in reading through the script than trying to learn what I wanted or how I use the services. Third, there needs to be some mechanism for capturing relationship data. Over the course of two conversations with Media Company X, I willingly spent 5-10 minutes of my time telling the company how they could better serve me, the customer. My guess is that little-to-none of that was captured in any meaningful way to help improve future offerings.