Customer service and technology

Wireless notebook computers keep everyone in touch.

Hand-helds help track employees, inventory and assets.

Customer service drives business, and technology is increasingly a component of how that service is delivered. Technology is not a replacement for human interaction — the folly of that customer service model was learned over the last decade, but the right technology can enhance customer service.

Web sites
Today, Internet sites are basic customer service tools. Having an informational web site, as opposed to a web site with electronic commerce capabilities, is akin to having a listing in the white pages or Yellow Pages, only better.

With a well-designed — yet basic — web site, a distributor can enhance a customer's first impression of the company and its services much better than is possible in a local telephone book.

The same web site also adds creditability to a distributor by saying the organization is part of the 21st century. This is not to say that distributors without websites are not credible or viable. These distributors, or any other marketer for that matter, may simply be late-or nonadopters of technology, perhaps because they chose to avoid the hype and its subsequent disappointment or because the technology does not fit their market or enhance the service they provide to customers.

"We tend to overestimate the effect of technology in the short term and underestimate the change in the long run," says Roy Amara, a founding member of the Institute for the Future (www.iftf.org). He's talking about how we perceive innovation. For the web, the "short-term" is long past — it is no longer an emerging technology. Rather, the web is becoming a transcendent technology — it has universal acceptance and application.

Just as importantly, the hype is over — at least for the most basic application of the internet, the informational website.

E-commerce
By one definition, any presence on the Internet is e-commerce. By another, e-commerce is the selling of goods via web pages. Whatever the definition, e-commerce is a prominent buzzword, and many distributors are approaching this form of customer service with caution. There are, however, early adopters, albeit in limited form.

For example, nexAir LLC (www.nexair.com) is a 100-plus truck, 22-branch distributor that provides established customers with online access to their invoices and balances, proofs of deliveries and material safety data sheets (MSDS). Customers also have the option to order online. However, the online ordering option is not well used, says Chris Smith, assistant controller.

He explains that the number of customers who use the on-line ordering option is small, and how they use the option is different. For example, some customers are not comfortable with online ordering while others, such as some large companies, issue purchaser orders directly on-line. For the latter group, online ordering requires re-keying an already keyed document. With the old process, all they have to do is fax or e-mail the already-keyed order to nexAir. This process — e-mailing a completed document — seems simple for now, but it may become cumbersome itself as a larger number of distributors and their vendors adopt XML (extensible markup language) and as customers turn to online self-service. XML is a markup language designed specifically for Web documents. XML "tags" allow computer systems to speak and transfer data by means of a common language. Use of XML facilitates e-commerce.

Self-service
Right now, no one expects gases and welding distributors to become like Amazon.com, a leading example of successful on-line self-service. That does not mean the idea of on-line self-service should be dismissed and forgotten as over-the-top customer service or hype. Much of what is successful online today, including Amazon, eBay and Google, was dismissed by many people only a few years ago. Besides, welding-related e-commerce sites, such as www.weldersmall.com and www.weldersdepot.com, already exist.

At this time, the majority of distributors are not convinced that implementing a full-blown, self-service, e-commerce web site with online ordering, frequently asked questions (FAQs), white papers and other features is the way to go.

Self-service can reduce customer service costs by decreasing the number of employees needed to maintain customer service. A 2005 survey by AMR Research (www.amrresearch.com) found that a large company can invest $400,000 in self-service technology and save nearly $900,000 as a result. Most distributors, and most companies for that matter, cannot afford such large investments, but they may be able to afford incremental investments in customer service technology that makes sense for their business and customer base. Distributors should consider asking two questions as part of their ongoing evaluation of any technology: Is it necessary? Will it drive down costs?

Proceed with caution
Customer self-service has been growing in a variety of consumer areas, led by gas stations and supermarkets. Electronic retailers such as Dell Computers and Microsoft have complete, self-help features, including online and telephone procedures for customizing, configuring and ordering the products anyone wants to buy from them. However, customers still can become frustrated with those systems, and hang up telephones or abandon on-line shopping carts.

"There is no doubt at some point customer self-service did not produce the desire results of better customer care at less cost," says Estaban Kolsky, consumer service research director of Gartner Inc. (www.gartner.com), an information technology advisory firm. "There is no question that at some point self-service developed something of a bad reputation," he adds. However, the image of self-service, online or otherwise, is changing, partly because of consumer demographics and partly because of a dramatic improvement in self-service technologies, such as voice-response systems and intelligent instant messaging computer programs.

Hand-helds
Cell phones are now ubiquitous and used in a myriad of ways. Just about every business person on the planet recognized quickly the advantages and simplicity of implementing cell phones into their existing infrastructures and business environments and as an aid tocustomer service.

Early adopters of other hand-held devices have found similar advantages in implementing bar-code readers, personal digital assistants (PDAs or smartphones), notebooks and other hand-helds in the field, warehouse and office. These advantages include tracking assets, such as gas cylinders, and field employees, and capturing information and customer signatures in real time at the point of business activity. Other companies view some of the hand-helds, such as mobile computers, as financially unfeasible or, simply, inappropriate for their business model, environment or size.

Innovation diffusion theory Everett Rogers, in his book Diffusion of Innovations, says that "getting a new idea adopted, even when it has obvious advantages, is very difficult. Many innovations require a lengthy period, often of many years from the time they become available to the time they are widely adopted. " Rogers claims that the characteristics of an innovation that act to speed or slow its diffusion through a social system are: Relative advantage. A new technology that has a measurable advantage over an incumbent technology tends to diffuse faster than others. Compatibility. A new technology that is compatible with existing infrastructures, business practices and social environments is easier to disburse than incompatible technologies. Simplicity. Simpler innovations are adopted faster. An innovation that can be explained in one sentence and understood is likely to be adopted easily. Trialability. Technologies that can be trialed without a huge investment in training or infrastructure tend to be adopted faster than those difficult to try. Observability. Technology that is tangible, such as hand-helds, tend to diffuse faster than ones that can't be seen. However, observability may conflict with simplicity and compatibility.

Emotionally connected All the technology in the world cannot stop the downward slide of a company disconnected from its customers. Charles Schwab grew his namesake company into the largest discount brokerage in the world partly through the use of online investing. His business strategy — maintaining branches and a web presence — even had a buzzword — "clicks and mortar." In 2004, Schwab retired, but the board of directors soon asked him to return to the helm because of the state of the markets and their loss of confidence in his successor. He returned and "found a lot of negative things," says Schwab. Those negatives included the loss of emotional connection with customers brought on, in part, by impersonal marketing and failure to maintain face-to-face contact with customers. He succeeded by taking the company back to its customers and regaining its momentum with new customers who came from marketing and advertising and customer referrals.