Universal Customized Proactive Customer Service Using UC

Most every enterprise needs a proactive customer service strategy. Customers are hard to come by in this economic environment so companies need to keep their existing customer happy. Corporate proactive customer service plans needs to provide targeted information to individuals and at the same time provide information to a large number of customers. Enterprises are beginning to see the benefits of proactive customer service and many think they are breaking new ground by reaching out to customers. However, long before proactive customer service was part of the business lexicon, schools and school systems created communication plans that targeted individual parents and provided information to an entire population.

In a past life, I was a high school math teacher and in that brief time, my peers and the school administration stressed the importance to be in constant contact with the parents and especially the parent of students who were having difficulty in my class. This was long before social networks, before unified communications, instant messaging, and even before email.  My communication tools were the telephone (primary) and the US post office. I learned that different situations required a different tool. For events that affected the entire class, like information on a large project or a unit test, I may have sent a note home to the parents. However, information about a specific student, such as if a student was experiencing trouble in my class, was not performing up to standards, or showed a sudden change in behavior, I would call home or the parent at work (and send a letter if I could not contact the parent). Today, teachers have many more communication channels than the two I used. Teachers now have email and social network from which they can broadcast information or to target specific information to specific audiences.  These new tools also allow parents to select how they wish to receive information. For example, a parent may want to receive broadcast information at home and receive status reports on a student’s progress sent to his or her work email, avoiding the possibility of the student intercepting the communication.

Many school systems offer parents a “passive-proactive” solution through web-based applications that list class assignments (and due dates) and the student grades (through a secure account). The solution also allows parents to opt-in and receive a weekly status report and news bulletins. Passive-proactive customer service uses technology to list some of the burden of proactive service from the teachers and administration. However, the teachers and administration needs to keep the solution current or the solution does not supply useful information and parents are likely to request more active support.

How many of us have fond memories of waking up on a snowy morning and rushing to the TV to see if school was canceled (my wife is a teacher and she races the kids to the TV!)? In those days, local radio and TV stations were t only way of letting the population know what is happening. Today, the need to provide information to parents is no less important but the means in which that information is delivered is much more diverse and schools need to accommodate the many different preferred methods of communication. School systems still use local radio and TV as their primary source of information distribution.  However, because parents have increased commuting time or radios and TVs are not turned on in the morning, parents may miss the news. Many parents (and many students) have mobile devices that accept text/SMS and email messages. In addition, many residents do not have cell phones or mobile devices and rely on their home phones for communicating with schools and other outside entities. Because of the wide technological spectrum of the county residents, school systems employ several communication channels (sometimes utilizing a unified communication system), including radio, email, text and outbound IVR. Parents can specify also the communication channel that best suits their specific needs.

When developing a proactive strategy, businesses should take the lesson offered by school systems. Their strategy needs to comprise of multiple channels and have the capability of individual as well as universal communication. Just like when a teacher gives parents information about their child’s progress, proactive customer service needs to provide customers with targeted and useful information. Simply broadcasting sales information or new stock to all customers is neither targeted nor is it useful. In addition, when events affecting a large part of the customer base occur, such as when school systems cancel school for the day due to inclement weather, companies need to present the information quickly and through more than one channel. Sending a letter about a car’s potential break problem may be close to universal, but it is not fast. Emails are faster but less effective. Broadcasting through a news channel is the most universal but not everyone watches the news. However, utilizing all three channels can provide quick and detailed information, especially of the message directs a customer to a web page that provides more details. Business should also look at passive-proactivity to keep the customers informed on events in which they are interested. Finally, businesses need to allow their customers to indicate how they would like information sent to them.

Governments, especially local governments, are rarely viewed as trendsetters and business tend not to look at what governments are doing when it comes to customer service. However, business can learn a lot about proactive customer services from school systems. As cash strapped as many local governments are, they still find a way to provide parents with important information quickly. Using the combination of old style communication (radio) with newer channels (text messaging), schools provide information to parents when and before they need it. As many teachers have learned, being proactive can create partnerships between themselves and parents, increasing cooperation and increasing the possibility of a win-win situation.