Social Media: Hot Topic for Technology Services World

Our 2010 Spring Technology Services World (TSW) Conference is just around the corner, kicking off on Monday, May 3rd. It seems only yesterday we were in Las Vegas last October; I definitely ran out of time to lose that 50 pounds I wanted to get rid of before the next conference! If you are a regular blog reader, you know that social service (customer communities, emerging social media channels like Twitter, etc.) is a hot topic, and I wanted to highlight some conference sessions around this topic you don’t want to miss.

First up is the TSIA’s director of social media, Shawn Santos, who had the top attended session at our Vegas event. Shawn will present, “Don’t Believe the Hype: Social Media & Technology Services,” on Tuesday at 11am. This session dismantles the hype surrounding social media and explores real-world examples of how technology companies are successfully using social media to service their customers. We’ll delve into ROI, staffing & social media operational models and give you compelling data and examples that will get you started down the path of least resistance in structuring your social media tools, people, and processes.

Another really interesting session is longtime TSIA/SSPA member and all around great guy, Manish Sinha, Vice President Global Customer Care, Yahoo. Manish is going to tackle a topic I hear companies struggling with every week–how to successfully leverage customers to create content without throwing quality out the window. Come to his session, “An Efficient and Effective User-Generated Content Moderation,” on Tuesday at 2pm, and learn how Yahoo! is addressing the ongoing challenges with user generated content (UGC) moderation. Manish will discuss his philosophy on how best to improve moderation consistency, effectiveness, and efficiency, as well as the frightening truth of moderation resources and an enormous business opportunity currently untapped. Sinha will outline the opportunities and respective solutions: automation, community, and customer care.  I’ve seen a draft of his materials–this will be a great session.

The final session I will hype, selfishly, is my own breakout on Tuesday at 4pm, “The 2010 TSIA Technology Heatmap.” In this session I will unveil the results of my 2010 Member Technology Survey, showing technology adoption and spending trends across support services, professional services, and field service. Social media spending is HOT, and my adoption and spending data shows how quickly companies are moving to support these emerging customer channels.

I look forward to seeing all of you in Santa Clara. If you’d like to schedule a 1:1 meeting with me, look for the signup sheet at the registration desk when you pick up your badge–my slots fill up fast. Thanks for reading!

Web chat finds growing adoption for tech support

In a previous post on the appropriateness of email for tech support, several folks added comments suggesting a post on Web chat, so here it is!  I think Web chat is already hugely successful in the consumer world, and I frequently use it to communicate with my wireless carrier and various eCommerce retailers.  But what about tech support?  When I first joined the SSPA 2.5 years ago, chat was hardly a hot topic with our members, and I was told repeatedly that “chat doesn’t work” for tech support. Since then, I’m slowly seeing adoption growing, with a few great success stories.

The biggest eye opener for me was a webcast I did quite a while back, in which Symantec gave their case study on a huge success with chat support. I am also working on a case study with Linksys, which mentions the work they have done to turn their chat channel from moderately successful into a highly adopted and highly rated channel. Dell also has a huge chat operation. So adoption is growing.

But not very fast. When we rewrote the SSPA Benchmark Questionnaire last year, I was successful in getting Web chat added in a few places. One of those was incidents by channel. According to the current benchmark data, 1% of consumer incidents, 0% of SMB incidents, and .1% of enterprise incidents originate via chat. So while some companies are finding chat as a great way to interact with customers, others have yet to jump into the chat pool.

From my perspective, here are the advantages of Web chat:

The Death of Email Support?

I’m endlessly fascinated by support volumes by channel, seeing which support channels customers prefer.  You’ve probably all seen the figures from the consumer survey I did with Lithium last year (white paper available here) on generational differences in attitudes towards support, showing that different age groups have different channel preferences.  But when you ask support managers about which channels they prefer to use when servicing customers, one thing is clear:  everybody hates email.  The numbers show why:

• First contact resolution.  The industry average for phone is 45%; email 27%.
• Resolved within 24 hours.  The industry average for phone is 59%; email 44%.
• Time to resolve.  The industry average for phone is 1 hour 29 minutes; email 4 hours and 3 minutes.

nGenera’s Acquisition of Talisma Shows Importance of Web 2 to Support’s Future

Talisma, a provider of knowledgebase and multi-channel interaction management technology widely adopted by SSPA members, announced today they are being acquired by nGenera (formerly BSG Alliance), a new SaaS software firm that recently launched the “World’s First On-Demand Platform for Business Innovation.” nGenera is not a household name in the customer service industry, but judging by the huge Web 2 buzz at our recent Spring Best Practices Conference, they are a welcome addition to the market.

nGenera’s platform includes some sophisticated web collaboration tools, designed to gather and distill the ‘voice of the customer’ to help companies make innovative changes to products and services. The Chairman of nGenera’s Innovation Network is none other than Don Tapscott, the author of Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything. Now that’s some serious Web 2 street cred!

As we learned last year launching our own non-profit Services Research Innovation Community, companies recognize the need to innovate to stay ahead of quickly evolving customer requirements and expecations.  But change is hard,