Speech Summaries

Bob Chatham Principal Analyst Forrester Research, Inc.

Design Track: Simplify Cross-Channel Design

Bob Chatham, Principal Analyst, Forrester Research, discussed how companies can simplify cross-channel design. Low-cost channels do not satisfy customers, so companies must improve how customers work across various channels (both high- and low-cost channels). To overcome the complexity of working across channels, companies must simplify. Bob offers three ways to do this, the three Cs: choice, consistency, and continuity.

Companies need to trust their customers' desire to use a particular channel, and give them the choice of what channel they will use. After all, customers know what they need, so trust their judgment. To give customers choice, companies need multichannel access, user-maintained contact profiles, and a reasonable escalation path for customers in case they want to bail out of one channel and use another.

As far as consistency, companies must have their facts straight so customers are not confused when crossing channels. A company is consistent if it has synchronized data, coherent policies, familiar content and tone, and has fulfilled brand promise across all channels.

Lastly, Bob discussed continuity. The attributes of continuity are: multichannel awareness, preserved context, feedback, and smooth handoffs.

The three Cs focus on the user's perspective. As for what companies should do, Bob divides up steps they can take into three categories: must do, can do, and don't do. 1) Must do: plan to right-channel (the democratization of channel choice), assign common customer IDs, test your cross-channel scenarios, and track customers across channels; 2) Can do: adopt "assist" metrics and reuse Web analytics across channels; and 3) Don't do: "Can I help you?" (in-your-face sales), have separate telephony and apps teams, or hide access to service or information.

Questions And Answers

Q: What is the cost of not providing consistency or continuity?

A: There are different types of damage. In the simplest case, the customer is confused about pricing, policy, etc. And when a customer is confused, you go from spending pennies on the Web site with them to spending dollars on the phone with them. It can go so far as to lead to financial damage and brand aversion.

Q: If a company is selling to a premium customer, what can the company do differently to provide consistency and continuity for these special customers?

A: Companies must experiment with these customers and measure the results. Companies can differentiate how they treat premium customers especially well on the Web; for example, by having customized portals.