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2015 trends in email marketing
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The new normal: 2015 analytics predictions
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Contact Management
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The Authority on Data-Driven Engagement & Operations
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Vol. 27 • No. 12 • December 2014
Think Big One-on-one with Google Canada’s Marie Josée Lamothe
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Marie Josée Lamothe, recently appointed Managing Director of Branding at Google Canada.
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Vol. 27 | No. 12 | December 2014 EDITOR Amy Bostock - amy@dmn.ca PRESIDENT Steve Lloyd - steve@dmn.ca DESIGN / PRODUCTION Jennifer O'Neill - jennifer@dmn.ca Advertising Sales Mark Henry - mark@dmn.ca CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Robert Burko Cameron Dow John Leonard
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Liz Osborn Stephen Shaw Nicole Wright
COVER STORY Thinking Big One-on-one with Google Canada’s Marie Josée Lamothe
LLOYDMEDIA INC. HEAD OFFICE / SUBSCRIPTIONS / PRODUCTION: 302-137 Main Street North Markham ON L3P 1Y2 Phone: 905.201.6600 Fax: 905.201.6601 Toll-free: 800.668.1838 home@dmn.ca www.dmn.ca EDITORIAL CONTACT: Direct Marketing is published monthly by Lloydmedia Inc. plus the annual DM Industry Source Book List of Lists . Direct Marketing may be obtained through paid subscription. Rates: Canada 1 year (12 issues $48) 2 years (24 issues $70) U.S. 1 year (12 issues $60) 2 years (24 issues $100) Direct Marketing is an independently-produced publication not affiliated in any way with any association or organized group nor with any publication produced either in Canada or the United States. Unsolicited manuscripts are welcome. However unused manuscripts will not be returned unless accompanied by sufficient postage. Occasionally Direct Marketing provides its subscriber mailing list to other companies whose product or service may be of value to readers. If you do not want to receive information this way simply send your subscriber mailing label with this notice to: Lloydmedia Inc. 302-137 Main Street North Markham ON L3P 1Y2 Canada. POSTMASTER: Please send all address changes and return all undeliverable copies to: Lloydmedia Inc. 302-137 Main Street North Markham ON L3P 1Y2 Canada Canada Post Canadian Publications Mail Sales Product Agreement No. 40050803
Targeting & Acquisition ❯❯8
2015 trends to watch in email marketing
Engagement & Analytics
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Six techniques NFPs use better than for-profit organizations Contact management supplement
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The new normal
Future of the contact centre
2015 data analytics industry predictions
7 key trends driving a massive transformation
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Customer thoughts on future tech and trends
Canada versus offshore: what do companies have to do to compete
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Part 1 in a series on challenges facing the Canadian contact centre industry
A data-based look at the holiday meal
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DM Landscapes
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What are we waiting for? December 2014
Operations & Logistics
Are we ready? The Canadian contact centre landscaping is changing – but is it for the better? DMN.ca ❰
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â?ą DMN.ca
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December 2014
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Big
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Thinking
When it first began 16 years ago Google was just another search engine. But the relevancy of its search results immediately vaulted it ahead of the competition. Now it is set to take another big leap: conversational search.
One-on-One with Marie Josée Lamothe By Stephen Shaw
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ife without Google is almost impossible to imagine.
Whether you need an instant answer to a question, directions to anywhere on the planet, information on just about anything, or even just need to send an e-mail, Google makes it easy and simple. It has transformed the way we find and acquire knowledge. It satisfies our every curiosity. And now with its bold bets on a reimagined future – like “self-driving cars”, or “smart” contact lenses, or using helium balloons to provide universal Internet access – Google continues to “think big”. Yet back in 1998, when it began, Google was just one of many search engine start-ups competing for traffic (at first it was called Backrub). That first year it earned a mere $220 thousand in revenue. Today it generates that amount every 90 seconds. Google has become a $400 billion company, almost entirely due to its stranglehold on the online advertising market. Considering its stratospheric growth it would be easy for Google to limit its vision to web targeting of audiences where it makes 97% of its revenue. But it has much grander ambitions: it wants to be the knowledge curator for the world. To serve up the right answers faster and faster, even if the questions are imprecise or lazily worded. And it wants to improve the relevancy and usefulness of those results based on what it knows about you: your geocoordinates, prior search history, and December 2014
situational context. In short, the aim is to make search more conversational and contextual. Ultimately Google hopes to serve up information without people even having to ask for it. “We’re motivated by a profound belief that access to knowledge will improve humankind”, stated co-founder Larry Page last year. He added, “And while the world may have changed over the years, we’re as motivated by the potential to make a difference in people’s lives today as when we first started.” The nobility of that mission is attractive to people with a zeal for reform. As Larry Page says, ‘Googlers make everything possible”. The standards are high to join the company: it prefers to hire maverick thinkers who love to challenge orthodoxy. That would be an apt description of Marie Josée Lamothe, the recently appointed Managing Director of Branding at Google Canada. She made her mark as CMO of L’Oreal Canada where her success won her recognition by the trade press as one of the top marketers of the year in 2012. During her tenure at L’Oreal she succeeded in dramatically increasing its market share while leading a major shift in channel usage toward interactive marketing and e-commerce. Her new role at Google is to encourage and guide other marketers on that same journey, sharing best practices with clients and agencies in an effort to accelerate their digital transformation.
SHAW You won quite a bit of renown at L’Oreal for your achievements there. So I think it surprised a lot of people to hear you had made the leap to Google. What led to your decision? LAMOTHE I loved every minute of L’Oréal in the 12 years I was there. Let me share a bit of history. In 2008 I had been working in Paris, heading up marketing development for our hair colour brands. For family reasons, I came back to Montreal and started managing the luxury brands. At the time – this was six years ago, remember - we realized that to be number one, even just to be competitive, we needed to “digitize” ourselves. Our CEO wanted to create this new role of CMO and asked if I was interested. I thought it was a fascinating opportunity, starting from a blank piece of paper. I had no existing teams. There was no set direction. I was just given the mandate to “digitize”. But after four really good years in that role, enjoying recordbreaking market share, I wanted to do other things. It was just time. I was lucky that I’d been working a lot with the Google teams at L’Oreal. So Google said, why don’t you consider joining us? So you asked: why did I join Google? Because Google is doing what I liked most at L’Oréal. To continue to be good you have to constantly reinvent yourself, constantly challenge yourself, and constantly innovate. Google is all about thinking about
tomorrow. Those are values that I love. Plus, the culture here is unbelievably great. It was just a natural fit. I felt flattered. And now here I am. SHAW When you’re staring at a blank page, as you were at L’Oreal, how do you even know where to start? LAMOTHE There is only one place to start, with consumer insight: How is the consumer behaving? What is their channel use? What are the gaps between that behaviour and how we market our brands? Going back six years ago, one clear gap was social media, even though it was still fairly new at the time. Another obvious one was e-commerce. So it was about trying to align our go-to-market tactics with how consumers are behaving. The challenge at L’Oréal was that it is made up of 31 beauty brands and every brand has its own DNA which is very unique. SHAW Was your role as CMO to coax the brands into adopting digital practices? LAMOTHE Some brands were very open because they saw the potential. They just had no clue how to go about it. Other brands were much more resistant to change. So you start with the people who are the most willing to embrace change and go from there.
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You can’t take no for an answer. But that’s not about winning an argument. It’s not “my way is better”. So a whole lot of listening, a whole lot of perseverance and also thinking outside the box. I remember when I took on that role six years ago, someone warned me I was going to have the hardest time, it’ll never work. But you start building relationships. You put people in touch with the right influencers. And testing, a whole lot of A/B testing. And recognizing that you’re going to fail too.
SHAW Were you building unique digital experiences for each brand? Or did you have a master brand strategy? Because I’m presuming that customers use multiple L’Oreal brands. LAMOTHE Not everybody consumes information the same way. Not everybody reads the same way. Not everybody shops the same way. So I think every brand needs to understand their consumer and develop their own strategy. Every digital practice is not necessarily relevant to every brand. There is a DNA that is true to each brand. The consumer identifies with the brand based on that DNA match. I was there to facilitate with tools, training, knowhow, with common best practices, and to make those investments affordable. To create a scale of efficiency. I did not manage the marketing for each and every one of those brands. It was really about introducing new thinking, new approaches. SHAW But as CMO, did you have the power to say “thou shalt”? LAMOTHE I did but this was really a business challenge as much as it was a marketing challenge. When you decide to get into e-commerce, you have to work with finance; with logistics; with retailers, right? For example, all of a sudden you need a “pick” line: how do we make that affordable? When you start digitizing you have to look at the whole picture - the domino effects of every move. But once you’ve built infrastructure, and all of the brands are using the same back end, then it becomes very affordable, and I would say very profitable. So that was my main role: to help make it all happen. SHAW But did you get pushback or resistance because people were wedded to traditional methods? LAMOTHE For sure, but again every team had a different level of openness to the idea of change. You have to consider that CPG companies historically built their brands by investing in media, TV, print, sampling and by having a really strong retail presence through shopper marketing programs. It was very important to create that brand awareness. And if that was really ❱ DMN.ca
SHAW Google has this interesting expression: “fail well”. What does that mean exactly? LAMOTHE If you’re going to fail, that’s all good, but understand why you failed, learn from it and then rebuild your strategy to address the reasons. I think that’s what “fail well” means.
well executed, you were pretty much assured of gaining market share. That in essence was the CPG way. But then what happened? All of a sudden the consumer was being influenced by a friend of a friend through social media. Let’s say you have dandruff issues. You’re going to read up on it. You’re going to be influenced by YouTube and bloggers. And then you’re going to be influenced at the store level through POP material. Many touch points along the path to purchase. SHAW A very elliptical path, as they say, but how do you know where to place your heaviest bets when you have finite resources? LAMOTHE I think the best way is through A/B testing: do it the traditional way, sure, but let’s do it in the new, innovative way as well. SHAW Okay, but as we all know, digital skill sets are in short supply. How do you move an organisation down this path? Do you lean heavily on your marketing services partners to help with knowledge transfer? Do you create a centre of excellence? Do you embed a digital lead within each brand? LAMOTHE We didn’t want to be dependent on outside experts. Our strategy was to build an internal centre of excellence. However, we decided the digital
managers should sit with the brands and report centrally to the CMO office until the brands were ready to break out on their own. And building that expertise takes time. Our idea was to develop a common strategy that we could apply to all brands - to have one core platform. I think a mistake, for any CPG company, is to have different brand teams, each doing it their own way. SHAW Even so, how do you ensure uniformity? How do you design a consistent experience when you’re serving so many different brand groups? LAMOTHE You have to make sure the core delivery platform is agile and flexible. “Digitizing” is not simply about communications. It’s about creating a backend that makes it possible, for example, to easily “skin” digital sites. Every brand has the same challenges. It’s about being where the consumer is - and the consumer is moving constantly. So you need an omnichannel plan to make it possible to interact with them across multiple devices, increasingly in real time. SHAW Given your success at L’Oreal, what are the personal attributes that enabled you to accomplish what you did? LAMOTHE
SHAW I agree that A/B testing is totally valid where things are trackable but so much in marketing isn’t really that measurable. How does a CMO today make the business case to the CFO to increase digital spending at the expense of traditional media? LAMOTHE I always say, for every incremental profit you make, reinvest half of it. Who can say no to that, right? And that quickly creates a snowball effect. But I have no rule of whether digital spending should be 10%, 20% or 30%. For some brands the percentage even needs to be greater. Again, it really depends on your audience, your community - who you’re talking to. And that comes back to consumer insight. Who’s searching for you now? What keywords are they using? Where are they? And then understand what interests they have. SHAW In this post-digital world we live in, is the problem with the funding formula itself – the fact that it is often media-based? Digital versus traditional? Print versus TV? LAMOTHE I think the whole concept of traditional versus digital is already behind us. I think there are two ways for a brand to communicate. There are “stills” and there are “videos”. A “still” is a picture that can go from print, to December 2014
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cover Story ad banners, to outdoor. A “video” can go to traditional TV, to YouTube, to in-store digital signage. Most modern agencies today, the ones that get it, don’t talk in terms of TV, print, radio, etcetera. They just talk in terms of how best to communicate, depending on who you’re trying to reach. SHAW Is it just about communications though? Isn’t it also about creating better experiences for people? LAMOTHE When Red Bull creates an event – an experience - and draws attention to it, that’s their way of communicating. Coke communicates through their vending machines. These are just different forms of expression, shaped around an experience. To be successful today, you have to find the most relevant way of communicating with your consumers. SHAW The other way to look at it I suppose is that consumers have erected barricades to traditional forms of media messaging. To get around that brands have to actually figure out how to align what they say with what their audiences want to hear or read. To think less like marketers and more like publishers, as the saying goes. LAMOTHE I would very much agree that it’s all about targeting a “community of interest”. It’s no longer about targeting consumer demographics, whether that’s a mom between 24 and 35 with three kids, or a 55-year old empty nester. It’s about serving people in need of a quick recipe when they come home, or someone with dry skin people passionate about the things you care about. SHAW Yes, I’m always surprised to see people taking the time to interact with Facebook pages for even the most banal household products. Which brings me to the topic of winning audiences through content marketing. That seems to be a huge uphill climb for most brands. LAMOTHE I think it is. We used to just push out information and say look, what a great product, buy me. Now the consumer is saying “Let me be the judge of that”. So now it’s about educating the consumer. It’s about entertaining them. And being relevant. Or useful. But it starts December 2014
with consumer insight: knowing the interests of your community. The subjects that invite interactions and conversations on Facebook. SHAW Some marketing departments are starting to hire ex-journalists to head up their content marketing practices. Do you see the future marketer being a hybrid creative thinker and analyst? Someone that can match audience interests with content? LAMOTHE It is absolutely impossible today, in my opinion, to be a strong marketer without being analytical. SHAW Are you saying that as an ex math major? LAMOTHE You know, when I graduated, I thought I was going to become an actuary! And then four days into the job I thought “Meh”. Yet today much of marketing has become math based. In the past marketing was considered a cost centre where you invested dollars. Now I would argue it has become a profit generator. You can calculate what you’re getting back on your investment, sometimes through a direct link to your market share or your revenue or even your profitability. Everything is based on sound science. And that’s what attracted me to Google. They are extremely technical, and very analytical, but open to reinventing things. Thinking always of the future. Willing to do things differently. SHAW Is your mandate at Google be to a digital evangelist? To help brands achieve digital transformation, as you did at L’Oréal? LAMOTHE It’s how you go about communicating your message to the public. That’s at the core of everything, right? How you start interacting with your “communities of interest” in a relevant way. And Google is in a very unique situation – being right in the middle of all the ways brands communicate digitally. Google enables messaging across all platforms. My role is to meet with my accounts, work alongside their agencies, and help them optimize their communications, working as partners. SHAW Larry Page uses this term, “moon shot
thinking”. What kind of moon shot thinking can Google bring to marketers that will help marketers reinvent themselves? Because that’s what marketers really are faced with doing, isn’t it, reinventing themselves? LAMOTHE Google can help because we’ve developed unbelievable technology and the better we are at training both brands and their agencies in how to take advantage of it, to create more relevant communications, the faster they will embrace omnichannel marketing. SHAW Certainly Google and Facebook and Amazon and Twitter have all had a role to play in digital disruption. Do you see these various platforms going to war with each other over who owns the biggest piece of the digital universe? Or do you see that as an irrelevant question – because each of you has a distinct orbit? LAMOTHE By definition the web is interconnected, right? It’s about working together. The consumer will flip between G+ to LinkedIn to Twitter to Facebook to a website, all within minutes. SHAW But what really fascinates me about Google is its reason for being: to satisfy people’s curiosity. To serve as the ultimate source of knowledge. You’ve changed the way people buy. The way they seek out information. How they solve problems. In the world of the semantic web, where people will be able to ask questions conversationally, will advertising even matter anymore? And how will that affect your business model? LAMOTHE Google’s ambition is to make all the information around the world available in the most relevant way to you, as an individual. The path to purchase starts with search intent. We call it a “search platform” - to me it’s really an “intent” platform. And that’s where the biggest insight is: understanding the “search of intent”. SHAW The onus today is on the consumer to find their way through the labyrinth of pages and links in order to answer a question. But it seems to me that Google is trying to shorten that trip, by helping people get to the right answer more quickly and
directly. LAMOTHE Yes, Google helps identify people who are searching for an answer, but it doesn’t do any of the marketing. It enables but doesn’t replace marketing. I mean there’s no way it could. SHAW Well, unless Google itself starts to serve up recommendations, synthesizing the social conversations of people, expert reviews, bloggers, rolling all of that up into each person’s knowledge graph. At that point marketing becomes very peripheral. LAMOTHE Okay. But, really, all the technology does is show you where people are talking about a specific topic. The content itself is user generated for the most part. The recommendations come from the community of users. So Google is really helping the community circle around a common interest by facilitating that engagement. SHAW You spoke earlier about the role of Google in assisting companies with digital transformation. Considering the need for marketers to reinvent themselves, what kind of help should they expect from their agency partners and service providers? LAMOTHE If I had a magic wand, I would erase the entire economic model we have in terms of the way we buy media and make it much more agile and flexible. Agencies are there to optimise communication. Google is there to enable that communication, regardless of who is providing the content. The model should be much more content focused as opposed to channel focused. We would identify and follow communities based on interest and “search of intent” as opposed to anything else. SHAW I suppose eventually we’ll get there. LAMOTHE I think we’ll get there faster than you think. Stephen Shaw is vice-president of strategic services with The Kenna Group, a full-service customer relationship management company. He can be reached at 905-361-4046 or via email: sshaw@thekennagroup.com.
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Targeting & Acquisition
2015
trends to watch in email marketing
By Robert Burko
F
or Canadian email marketers, 2014 will go down in history as one of the most interesting years ever. The launch of CASL in July rocked the digital landscape and changed the game forever. This, of course, was preceded by an absolute flurry of confirmation requests being sent to Canadians en masse, as organizations scrambled to salvage as many mailing list subscribers as possible. Let’s put aside the obvious irony: an anti-spam law causing a massive influx in the amount of email people received, with little value other than “click here to confirm”. In fact, it did result in organizations trimming the excess fat on their databases. This means that as organizations close out 2014, they have a much leaner and cleaner database comprising an audience that actually wants to be engaged. With a new rulebook and a refined (albeit smaller) database, how will email marketing change in 2015? In this article we’ll take a look at the trends to watch in 2015 as email celebrates its 43rd birthday (...for those playing at home, the first email was sent in 1971).
List segmentation 2.0 Gone are the days of treating everyone on a mailing list like they are the same. Organizations of all sizes are now realizing the amazing power a good mailing list can have when managed correctly. What previously seemed like one long, never-ending list of email addresses all lumped together in one glorious unsegmented and undivided group, is now a wealth of data ripe for the most meticulous of segmentation. Every email address has a story, has buying habits, has interests, and has a certain way it reacts to different types of messages. In 2015 marketers are going to really focus on the persona of the email address (...well, really the person behind the address) to segment ❱ DMN.ca
their data in new ways that allow for much better targeting. Traditional marketing segments on the most obvious of categories such as age, gender, race, income, etc. But email marketers are going to dig way deeper in 2015 and build segments not only based on profile data, but on behavioral data too. Mailing list subscribers who click on links about “blue pants” will be added to behavioral segments for people who like the color blue and are interested in pants. At Elite Email we saw a rise in this type of segmentation across our Canadian clients in the back half of 2014 and the expectation is that this will continue to be a prominent trend throughout 2015.
Emails for me, not emails for everyone As marketers build targeted segments, it will also pave the way for much more personalized emails in 2015. Organizations that currently send one main newsletter to their entire mailing list are going to shift to a model where multiple variations of that email are deployed. For some organizations, the differences may be rather small, while for others the email may be completely different. The underlying idea is that the email content needs to be specifically targeted to the segment that receives it to produce the greatest chance of engagement and conversion. To email recipients this will be a welcome trend because emails that are received will be much more relevant to their unique interests. As an example, your local community center runs programs for everyone, from toddlers to senior citizens. They used to send out a newsletter to everyone covering “All Activities This Week”. Now, they’re going to send a specific email to each age bracket (after all, very few seniors are going to sign-up for a toddler music program… so it’s kind of
a waste of email real estate to promote something like that!) This does mean that email marketers are going to be investing more time throughout 2015 in terms of content creation and building out the emails. However, this is going to lead to a much greater ROI for organizations, because open rates and conversion rates will soar to new heights. This means that in 2015 organizations should be getting their email marketing staff to spend more time optimizing this critical communication channel. Mobile first mentality The amount of organizations that still sent non-mobile friendly emails throughout 2014 is absolutely shocking. The statement “everyone checks email on their smartphone” would not surprise any marketer, and yet so many have not taken steps to provide a better mobile experience. This is a huge missed opportunity and something that will simply not be allowed in 2015. At Elite Email, every year the amount of emails opened on mobile devices has increased, then increased, and then increased some more. That trend is not likely to slow down. Currently every email sent from Elite Email is fully responsive, which means it looks perfect on desktops, mobiles, and everything in between. That will be the new defacto standard for 2015 and beyond. Creating emails for mobile requires a different thought process. On a mobile device, marketers need to get used to their layout stacking to one column and familiarize themselves with how that impacts click-through rate and what displays ‘above the fold’. In addition to having a responsive mobile-friendly email, marketers will have to make sure that all the links in an email link to a responsive mobile-friendly landing page as well.
2015 will be the year when all points of engagement become as optimized for mobile as they are for desktops. Tighter messaging between email & social for one cohesive messaging strategy In 2015, organizations are going to pay more attention to their crosschannel messaging to ensure greater integration with their communication strategy. Posts on social media will now be more in-sync and aligned with the messaging contained in their email. Organizations of all sizes will take a more holistic look at all their digital channels and craft content calendars that keep everything focused on shared common goals. The days of the social media person operating in a silo (separate from the email marketing person) are absolutely behind us. As consumers access each of these digital channels on a daily basis, organizations will need to ensure not only that they have a presence on each network, but that it’s all part of the larger integrated strategy. The blog article, newsletter, tweet, Facebook post, and photos on Instagram and Pinterest must answer the question ‘how does this achieve our overall goal’. When all channels have a shared goal, the digital footprint of an organization will lead to greater conversions. The future is bright for email marketers as that channel continues to drive the greatest ROI and highest level of engagement. The email marketer of 2015 is armed with a wealth of strategies that can drive goals and raise the bar of what is possible with this tried, tested, and true channel. Robert Burko is the President of Elite Email
(@eliteemail)
December 2014
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Engagement & Analytics
The new normal 2015 data analytics industry predictions
❱ DMN.ca
By Cameron Dow
T
he rise of big data has led to a new era of databased decision making. Today, the use of analytics in decision-making has become a common business practice. Whether an organization is using analytics to make better decisions for strategic planning, manufacturing, selling, supply chain management or marketing, analytics touches nearly every aspect of business operations as organizations strive for better performance and increased revenues. The fact is, using analytics to drive better, more informed business outcomes is the new normal and the sooner businesses are able to shift away from traditional hierarchical decision-making to a more data-driven culture, the sooner they’ll realize a greater ROI. In 2015 organizations can’t be left making critical business decisions based on gut instinct; it’s time to place your bets on analytics for the sure win. Here’s my take on the top data analytics industry predictions for 2015:
data and network security has focused on firewalls, intrusion detection and intrusion prevention. Security specialists are beginning to realize that putting up a barrier doesn’t always work. As fast as experts put up a firewall, savvy hackers find a way around it—or through it. It turns out the key to stopping hackers in their tracks is data – lots and lots of data. Public and privatesector organizations all over the world are starting to use something called Cyber Analytics to defend their systems. They are taking internal and external information—from firewall data and behavioural profiles to cyber threat intelligence and fraud alerts—analyzing it in real time and identifying anomalous patterns of activity that in the past would have gone undetected. What used to be a liability is now an asset, as data becomes the key to recognizing threats before they materialize and identifying clandestine activity before it becomes a breach. Now organizations can spot potential hacks and prevent them from occurring. In 2015 more organizations will turn to analytics to heighten their cyber security capabilities.
Cyber analytics It seems every few months a large organization announces that it has been compromised. Traditionally,
Cloud analytics Cloud computing fundamentally changes the way IT services are delivered and consumed, offering December 2014
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Engagement & Analytics a range of benefits like business flexibility, operational efficiency and economies of IT and scale. In today’s economic climate of increased customer expectations, accelerated business pace and fierce competition, organizations need to make better use of their ever-increasing volumes of data for fact-based decision making. More and more enterprises are taking their data use to new levels and applying business analytics to support rigorous, constant business experimentation that drives better decisions – whether it involves testing new products, developing better business models or transforming the customer experience. The challenge to provide better information faster is changing the traditional approach to information technology and many organizations are increasingly turning to cloud solutions to help drive their business needs. Cloud computing’s ability to provide elastic scalability, faster service delivery, greater IT efficiencies and a subscription-based accounting model has broken down many of the physical and financial barriers to aligning IT with evolving business goals. With its promise to deliver better business models and services quickly and cheaply, cloud computing has become a major driver of business innovation across all industries and this trend will continue in 2015. Cloud computing techniques, are enabling organizations to deploy analytics more rapidly throughout their organizations while lowering the total cost of ownership through reduced hardware costs. SAS Cloud Analytics have grown 3 per cent year over year (YOY), last year alone the YOY increase was 20 per cent. The cloud phenomenon is also addressing the analytics talent gap as companies that don’t have sufficient analytical talent in-house are looking for hosted solutions to provide analytical insight. The data skills shortage is real! As enterprises increasingly recognize the value of the vast volumes of data they collect, the demand for people who can unlock that value is rising sharply. The McKinsey Global Institute predicts that by 2018, there will be a shortage of as many as 190,000 data scientists in the US alone. SAS has joined Canada’s Big Data Consortium to lend industry insight to an upcoming study from Ryerson University that will be launched in early 2015. The study will December 2014
try to understand the analytics skills shortage in Canada and what can be done to address it. Prospering from big data is moving beyond simply employing new technologies to organizations clamoring to build teams of experienced analytics users in order to stay competitive in a global data economy. SAS has seen this drive first hand. SAS® Analytics U, a broad higher education initiative that includes free SAS software, university partnerships and engaging user communities that support the next generation of SAS users has been downloaded over 111,000 times since its introduction in May 2014. Applications for two of Canada’s Master’s in Analytics Programs has more than tripled year over year. SAS is currently working with over 40 Universities and Colleges across Canada, supporting over 60 SAS courses from coast to coast. By 2015, over 3,000 students across Canada will have learned how to apply analytics techniques using SAS, 250 of those will graduate with SAS certification and SAS will be used by more than five-hundred MBA students in Canada. Although the skills shortage will continue to be an issue, the situation is slowly improving. As nearly every industry starts to embrace a new era of data collection, management and analysis, forwardthinking schools all over Canada have clearly responded by offering innovative courses to ensure Canadian graduates have the analytics skills that businesses need. 2015 will be a promising year for these analytically savvy graduates as organizations race to hire the best of their class. Real-time analytics In this always-on culture, consumers are more demanding in how companies interact with them. Today’s consumer wants the right message delivered to the right channel, to the device of their choice, at the time of their choosing. As mobile devices continue to proliferate, marketers will need to understand the needs of the mobile user and be ready to deliver real-time, relevant communications with each and every customer communication. While real-time marketing is not a new term, the key for 2015 is to use real-time analytics to feed an extremely complex consumer marketplace. With offers, advertisements and marketing messages being sent from every
possible direction, savvy marketers can no longer bombard consumers’ senses. In an ideal world, consumers receive messages that are tailored, relevant and timely – and offered to them based on their actions and behaviors in the past, or better yet, how we might act or behave in the future. These personalized offers are consistent regardless of the channel that is being used. They enable technology, such as beaconing hardware sensors that are designed to wirelessly communicate and transmit data with mobile devices within a specific proximity, to enable in-store promotions, geolocation targeted messaging and shopper analytics. In other words they deliver the offer at the moment of truth - a moment that matters most to a customer’s purchasing decision. This is the customer experience that has come to be expected and only analytics can drive the type of real-time insights that underpins personalized marketing. In 2015 it will be key for decision-makers to have access to up-to-date, accurate and relevant data, which needs to be
available to them in real-time to allow them to make the right decisions. Conclusion There’s no doubt that data is helping to improve everything from driving better marketing insights to healthcare delivery to urban infrastructure. Success stories are bountiful in this regard. But many organizations are applying analytics as a standalone activity isolated from everyday business operations and decisions, limiting its true value. 2015 is the year to operationalize analytics into all lines of business, enabling front-line, day-to-day business users and decision-makers – sales people, marketers, engineers, business unit managers - to optimize their business outputs and decision making. Cameron Dow is the Vice President of Marketing for SAS’ operations in Canada and Latin America. As head of marketing, Mr. Dow is responsible for growing SAS’ market share in targeted industries through the development and execution of the go-to-market strategy. Mr. Dow is also a key contributor to the overall business strategy for the SAS subsidiaries.
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Contact us today to discuss how Direct Mail can be part of your marketing mix. 416-354-4210 or jleonard@cover-all.ca DMN.ca ❰
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Engagement & Analytics
New McAfee study reveals consumers’ thoughts on future technology and trends Canadians anticipate a more connected world in 2025, but have concerns about security and privacy
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cAfee Canada, part of Intel Security, has released findings from its first Safeguarding the Future of Digital Canada in 2025 study, which examines the thoughts and attitudes of more than 500 Canadian consumers concerning technology trends. The study looks at how technology relates to people’s homes, workplace, cars, mobile devices and online security. Canadian consumers believe that technology will significantly change their lifestyle by 2025. For example, 51 percent of Canadians believe their houses will be able to speak to them, 70 per cent anticipate using solar panels as their main source of energy and 56 per cent predict there will be cars that navigate completely on autopilot. While new innovations will make consumers’ lives more connected than ever, Canadians may feel hesitant in sharing personal information or adapting to these technologies in fear of their privacy being jeopardized. Sixty-six per cent of Canadians expressed concern over the expected state of cyber security in 2025. “Canadians know that as technology advances, more of their everyday devices will be connected to the Internet,” said Brenda Moretto, Canadian consumer manager at McAfee. “While they believe this will simplify some aspects of their lives, they’re also concerned about how their security and privacy will be protected. We are hoping this study will raise awareness of these concerns and ensure privacy is taken into consideration in future innovations.” The report was compiled to provide a view into technology trends and what society can expect over the next decade. Highlights from the study give insight on how Canadians will view cybersecurity, how their homes will be connected and how they’ll work. ❱ DMN.ca
Cybersecurity The study revealed consumers are not confident that their cybersecurity will be protected in the coming years. This is not surprising given the near-daily reports about retail and financial institutions being hacked. Seventy-seven per cent of Canadians are concerned their families could fall victim to hackers, while almost half (46 per cent) believe their families will be affected by cyberbullies in 2025. “People have just started to understand that their personal data is not some ethereal thing,” said Brian Johnson, Intel futurist. “They haven’t quite figured out what’s appropriate for others to know about that data. For instance, we don’t blurt out our credit card information when we walk into a room. Why would we want our data do that online?” Wearables Seventy-seven per cent of consumers think smart watches will be a common device in 11 years. Sixty per cent anticipate connected kitchen appliances will be a household item, while only 39 per cent think a PC desktop will be common in 2025. Tech at the workplace In the next decade, Canadian consumers anticipate seeing significant changes in their offices or places of employment. While one in three (31 per cent) working consumers think they will be working from a home office, 60 per cent envision artificial intelligence and robotics assisting with their job tasks. Fiftynine per cent believe they will be able to access work data through facial or voice recognition. While greater precautions will be taken to ensure sensitive work information remains secure, robotics in the workplace may result in companies being more susceptible to cyber-related crimes.
Connected homes Canadian consumers expect to have technology that makes the home experience easier. More than 60 per cent think their refrigerator will automatically add food to a running grocery list if the product is running low. More than 50 per cent of people plan to have been to a house that speaks or reads to them. The majority of consumers believe home security will be connected to their mobile device in 11 years. Other key findings include: ❯❯ Green Means Go: Thirty-nine per cent of people think Canadians will get around by a hybrid vehicle or a self-driving car (20 per cent) in 2025. ❯❯ Pay by Phone… or Fingerprint: Nearly one quarter (24 per cent) of consumers believe they will be able to pay for items using their fingerprint while 24 per cent anticipate they will use their mobile device. Twenty-three per cent of respondents plan to still pay by credit or debit card. ❯❯ Your App Will Know Best: Sixtyfour per cent of consumers believe a wearable device will send health vitals directly to their physician, saving a visit to the doctor’s office. Nearly one in three (29 per cent) people think there will be an online digital health check with sensors running over their bodies to relay signs of illness. ❯❯ Cover Your Digital Assets: By 2025, 34 per cent of Canadian consumers expect to unlock their mobile device by a thumbprint, while 32 per cent believe eye scans will be used. Almost all respondents (89 per cent) plan to put more effort into protecting their digital assets in the future after taking the survey.
December 2014
Engagement & Analytics
Canadians Love to Celebrate A Data-Based Look at the Holiday Meal By Nicole Wright
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t sneaks up on us like tax time: the holiday season. And here in Canada, the signs are everywhere. Suddenly, snow tires are no longer optional, shopping trips are more frequent and carols blare from every elevator. Fortunately, many of us have friends and relatives who are eager to open their homes and celebrate the festive season with culinary gusto. According to a Fall 2013 PMB study, nearly half of Canadian households enjoy entertaining at home, and 62 percent admit they put in extra effort when entertaining and preparing for a family celebration. Add to that the fact that nearly half of Canadian households claim to love cooking and you’ve got the basic ingredients for a tasty holiday gathering. And what’s not to like about dressing a bit more festively, crowding around the host’s kitchen with old friends and maybe belting out a few bars of “Jingle Bell Rock?”
But if the season is the reason for getting together, it’s the promise of savoury appetizers, a dinner table more colourful than an artist’s canvas and platters of scrumptious cookies, bars and puddings that persist in our memory bank. And the data show that those stars of the holiday dinner—ham and turkey—remain staples of Canadian cuisine: in the past six months, 48 percent of Canadian households bought ham and 35 percent served turkey. But like the garlands around a Christmas tree, the side dishes December 2014
can make the meal even more memorable. Depending on tastes and traditions, the trimmings can range from tried and true mashed potatoes, chestnut stuffing and cranberry sauce—favoured by 27 percent of us—to new spins on old Sources: Environics Analytics 2014, favourites like curried cauliflower based on PRIZMC2 and PMB Fall 2013. au gratin and maple syrup-glazed sitcoms as well as current affairs turnips. And who can pass up just a programs and reality-type shows. sliver of pie, a bite of a brownie or a Average users of the Internet, they corner of a cookie? In the past month, prefer traditional devices—desktop 12 percent of Canadian households and laptop computers rather than have used chocolate baking squares mobile phones—for checking out their and 27 percent have used baking chips favourite newspaper websites, reading in their cookie and bar recipes—likely movie reviews and doing their online sneaking a few from the package first. banking. To reach turkey-lovers, direct From the fixin’s to the feast, marketers should use messages that Canadian traditions run deep and, appeal to their family values and sense depending on where one lives, a of community while offering solutions fattened tom turkey or a savoury ham and products that address their busy may be the focal point of a family schedules. Pre-cooked, heat-and-serve gathering. According to the PRIZM C2 turkeys, anyone? segmentation system from Environics Ham-lovers, on the other hand, are Analytics (EA), those who choose also inclined to be family oriented, turkey typically belong to familythough they tend to have French oriented lifestyle types like Winner’s Canadian roots and are found Circle (well-off, middle-aged exurban in PRIZM segments like Villes families), Fast-Track Families (upperTranquilles (middle-aged francophone middle-class exurban families) and families and couples), La Vie est Belle Pets & PCs (large, upscale suburban (upper-middle-class, suburban Québec families). Back Country Folks (older, families) and Les Traditionnelles lower-middle-class couples and (midscale, Québec town families and families in remote areas) also hold couples). Members of Le Cité Nomade family values in high esteem and are (downscale, young and mature Québec likely to serve a turkey for a holiday singles) are also partial to ham feasts. dinner. This taste for ham may be linked to When not seated at the dinner the French Canadian preference for table, turkey lovers are an outdoorsy using ham or pork to create a number group. EA research shows that they of holiday dishes, such as the Tourtiere enjoy walking, golfing, boating and classic meat pie or the ragout de patte, camping—especially activities they a stew traditionally made from pig’s can do together as a family. They feet. These families typically feel an appear to be a traditional and patriotic affiliation to the lifestyle of the Quebec group, with a strong sense of national countryside—even if they live in the pride, religious affiliation and family city. As such, their activities focus on values. They like to read magazines outdoor activities that bring them with specifically Canadian content closer to nature, like hunting, fishing, like Our Canada, Canadian Gardening, snowmobiling and skiing. Ham fans and Golf Canada and family-based also have an authentic homebody publications like Canadian Living. streak, enjoying activities such as And they like to listen to radio that woodworking, sewing and baking fits their active lifestyle, tuning into from scratch. new country music, golden oldies To connect with these consumers, and classic rock stations; their TV marketers would do well to preferences include lighthearted
// 13 Map Legend: Share of Canadians who’ve purchased turkey and ham in the last six months at above-average rates, 35 percent and 48 percent, respectively Brown: Gobbling it Up (above average for turkey) Pink: Squealing for Pork (above average for ham) Blue: Drumsticks & Hambones (above average for both) White: Gone Vegan (average and below average for both)
consider media messages that are communicated in French. Avid consumers of TV, ham fans enjoy armchair sports like auto racing, boxing, NHL hockey playoffs and extreme sports programs. They also like entertainment programming, including games shows, stand-up comedy programs and soap or serial dramas that reflect their French Canadian lifestyles. When it comes to technology, they’re light-to-average users of the Internet, going online in search of shopping discounts through classifieds and flyer websites like Publi-sac. They hold somewhat conservative values, worry about too much immigration, and feel that ethnic groups should set aside their cultural background and blend into Canadian culture. Memo to marketers: be sure to emphasize value and satisfaction in your promotional messages, because ham fans are always looking to score a good deal in the marketplace and they’re less concerned about the future than with enjoying life today. Regardless of whether you serve ham or turkey, bake your own or buy your holiday cookies, the season is a celebration expressed through, and memorialized by, the experience of sharing a meal. In our modern tuned-in, online, time-pressed world, enjoying a festive meal with friends and family means we get a chance to reconnect with our past, revive traditions and nourish our relationship with those we love. And even if Uncle Bob’s jokes are corny and the turkey is a little dry, the meal is a filling reminder of who we are. Nicole Wright is a Marketing Analyst at Environics Analytics. DMN.ca ❰
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Engagement & Analytics
What are we waiting for? Perfect pairing? Tangible results? By John Leonard
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uring a meeting a few months ago someone quoted a comment from IBM that “Every day, we create 2.5 quintillion bytes of data — so much that 90% of the data in the world today has been created in the last two years alone.” When I Googled IBM’s website the quote was expanded more “This data comes from everywhere: sensors used to gather climate information, posts to social media sites, digital pictures and videos, purchase transaction records, and cell phone GPS signals to name a few. This data is big data.” I’ve always considered myself to be a bit of a creative nerd. No, I don’t consider that to be an oxymoron. I appreciate creativity (especially when I get to apply it to my job) but I do like numbers and spreadsheets (my wife will begrudgingly attest to that). So I found this number both intriguing and frustrating at the same time. We can look at this amassing of data from a few different angles. From a pure scientific perspective I would think this amount of data is allowing scientists to gain a better handle on many things from weather to health and already is enhancing our lives in ways we may not yet understand or appreciate. When it comes to business we are probably doing a far better job due to this data at supply-chain management, inventories, risk assessment, and on and on it goes. Oh, and don’t forget charts (it seems we are chart crazy with all the data we have. OK so we call them info graphs now but they’re still charts). And consumers are getting better information – I am amazed at the amount of data we can access on our phones let alone our PCs. So we’re collecting it and using it in many aspects of our lives. But as marketers we seem to be missing. I understand the value of on-line collection of data and tailoring experiences to individuals. And everything I’ve read indicates that the value on-line is the collecting of data. Advertisers want to know our preferences, watch where we go. I
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recently was looking for a new vehicle and through the process visited a number of automobile dealerships. The next day I was surprised and impressed to find some of those dealerships popping up on kijiji and my Facebook newsfeed. How interesting from a technology perspective (and just a bit creepy too). What I find most interesting is my perspective of these advertisements “in the corners”. Is it just me or are many of us just not paying attention to these ads? One stat I read suggested that the click-through rate on banner/side bar ads is just 0.05% So it can’t be just me, even my teenage kids laugh at me when I ask about the ads – they actually respond with “what ads?” and I have to actually show them on Facebook. Maybe the challenge around monetizing data online has something to do with the task at hand. Ever started to look for the best Parmesan cheese in Toronto only to find yourself staring at uber-modern toilets from Europe 30 minutes later? I think psychologically if we’re searching for something we’re either very focused (my wife) and will only follow that train of thought or you’re like me and follow the ever-interesting rabbit (down the hole to unproductivity). If you’re focused on the task at hand you don’t see anything else in the peripheral, if you’re not focused the tendency is to gravitate towards fun things (probably why games are so big online). Maybe the symbiotic relationship between online and the physical world is input and output. I know of organizations that combine input and output. Take my car buying experience as an example. We were about 2 weeks from the initial “we need to get another car” to the final purchase. And during that period we did some surfing, comparisons, and test drives. While the sales guys all tried to call me and nudge me, not one followed up with anything substantial. One car manufacturer I know of was looking to create a bounce-back communication within 12 hours of visiting the manufacturer’s website
a follow-up letter was mailed with information about the vehicle, dealership and sales rep. Within 2 days a mail package arrives in order to keep up the dialogue. Funny how most automobile manufacturers rely solely on a sales process from the 50s or earlier, yet pack their cars with today’s technology. Another organization pairs telemarketing with mail in order to drive response. Obviously in both of these cases timing is crucial, but it is possible and the pairing works well in both cases. With today’s technology around automation, getting a communication out in the mail quickly should be easy if the infrastructure is in place. And Canada Post has recognized the need to compete with or enhance other media so they are working hard to improve their delivery times and are making an effort to help customers with promotional mail get the best possible postage rate (yes it’s still expensive but if we’re collecting the right data and using it, we should be mailing to our hottest prospects). Take this a step into less reactive and more campaign-marketing. Are there opportunities to learn behaviours about customers (collect data) online and then communicate to them in a more traditional manner via the mail? Could marketers be more daring off-line? Could they be taking the risks that they will sometimes take online? A recent comment I heard from a seasoned marketing vet suggested that they felt there weren’t enough risk takers anymore. We have all this data yet it’s frustrating that more people aren’t willing to risk using it to create more relevant communications. Some do. Just look in your mail box and you may see there a rare few very sophisticated programs. The good ones aren’t so exact that you think they’ve rooted through your drawers, but they will promote things that are relevant or interesting to you (based upon your previous actions and possibly online activity). What if capturing information from a mobile app could be used to tailor a physical package
to you, say, quarterly? Maybe a communication that doesn’t lend itself to the small screen – a map of the best and fastest route through your grocery store. Heck, with a map of where I’m to go paired with a shopping list on my phone, my wife would even trust me to go shopping for our family. Over the years I’ve learned to respect marketers that look for ways to drive connections, results and sales. Many of those have been direct marketers. These folks understand the value of data and especially tangible results. I recently heard the editor of a Canada marketing/strategy magazine on the radio state that “online is measureable. We used to draw assumptions that tied marketing spend to results, but now a marketing manager can walk in their bosses office and state we spent X online and generated Y activity. It’s not that they can relate it directly to revenues, but at least it’s something.” This was intended to support online marketing, but I think it supports my suggestion that online can be great for collecting data, but not necessarily always the best channel for outbound communication if you want real results. While we all want to be cool and creative at the end of the day and once our fascination with online wanes, and we get back to the basics of driving tangible results direct marketing as a discipline (online and off-line) will be back in vogue helping collect and model data from online and using a variety of media to communicate including the traditional tried-and-true channel of mail. So, if you’re searching for a means to monetize the data you’re collecting online, I suggest you consider an old work-horse as part of your media mix – been around for decades, it’s direct mail. John Leonard, is V.P. of Sales at Cover-All, has taught DM production at College, ICA and the CMA. Enjoys the creative aspect he can bring to any project and his nerd side figures you might want to know that a quintillion has 18 zeroes. Reach him at 416-354-4210 or jleonard@cover-all.ca December 2014
INTRODUCING DATA MINING FOR MANAGERS New from Boire Filler Group Co-Founder and Direct Marketing magazine Regular Columnist, Richard Boire.
AVAILABLE ONLINE AT CHAPTERS INDIGO AND AMAZON Praise for DATA MINING FOR MANAGERS “Business Managers and decision makers have been in need of a book on data mining, and-voila! This industry overview is unique in serving the needs of the consummate businessperson, differentiating it from the many introductions for would-be hands-on, technical practitioners. Boire has formed a conceptually rich and insightful compendium that delivers a pragmatic perspective on both the tactical and strategic value of data mining and predictive analytics.”
- Eric Siegel, founder of Predictive Analytics World and author of Predictive Analytics: The Power to Predict Who Will Click, Buy, Lie, or Die
“Boire provides a straightforward and disciplined overview of the practice of data mining. Whether you are dealing with large or small data sets, tomorrow’s business leaders will be the ones that extract the most value from their customer information. Boire leverages his extensive experience as a practitioner to help the reader take a measured approach while providing a unique view of data mining.”
- Bryan Pearson, President and Chief Executive Officer, LoyaltyOne
For More Information on how to apply these principles to your business,
Call Boire Filler Group Today at (905) 837-0005
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Operations & Logistics
The non-profit vs. for-profit marketing approach Part 1: Six techniques non-profits use more effectively than for-profits
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ftentimes, for-profits are seen as more effective at marketing than non-profit organizations simply because they have more marketing dollars to spend. However, even though for-profit companies often have bigger budgets, the nature of non-profit organizations gives them an edge when it comes to which marketing tactics they can employ and how they can communicate with their constituents. This two part series will discuss the 10 techniques non-profits can implement for marketing success. Part one looks at six approaches could be leveraged by non-profits with little effort, but could be difficult for a for-profit company to deploy. Part two (coming in the January issue of DM) covers the four techniques that are the norm at for-profit companies. They are typically neglected by non-profits, but if implemented, could considerably boost non-profit marketing efforts. Introduction From traditional outreach strategies to integrated, multi-touch campaigns, non-profits have liberally borrowed marketing techniques from the forprofit world, particularly as the realm and breadth of communications have evolved. While many of the marketing techniques honed in the for-profit world translate well to non-profits, both maintain distinct advantages in specific areas.
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Where do non-profits have the marketing advantage? Following are six strategies that can actually work better in the realm of non-profit marketing and fundraising than they do in for-profit marketing. Regardless of size and scope, these techniques are applicable to non-profits in varying degrees. Each should still be applied carefully and with an appropriate level of tact and professionalism. Individual nonprofits should test and experiment to find the right balance of these approaches for their organizations. Inappropriate asks: bequest giving While asking people to remember an organization in their will would be outlandish in a for-profit setting, it is perfectly acceptable in a not-for-profit setting. Non-profits not employing formal bequest giving programs are potentially missing out on a tremendous opportunity. Organizations must not only understand their ideal planned giving donor, but also must carefully consider their approach in soliciting a bequest gift. The discussion goes well beyond a traditional ask and must come only after establishing a legitimate relationship and personalized rapport. Rather than a direct ask, organizations should present potential donors with the opportunity to opt in to additional information. At the same time, non-profits should regularly share
success stories featuring donors who have remembered the organization in their wills, being sure to illustrate the impact of their gifts. The point-of-sale appeal Some for-profit companies are the masters of point-of-sale add-ons: “Would you like socks and a belt with those great new pants?” or “How about fries with that burger?” But what if a sales clerk asked, “Would you like to make an additional payment for your justpurchased TV?” or “Care to send a check directly to the company’s shareholders?” Non-profits, however, can (and should) be doing this with a clean conscience. In other words, use thank-you letters as an opportunity to ask for more; this “soft ask” technique is proven to work. Sending and leveraging timely donation acknowledgements is a key success factor in the soft ask process. Requesting additional contributions works, but non-profits can also ask people to get involved by volunteering, engaging in other campaigns, completing surveys and requesting more information on a planned giving program. By incorporating the soft ask as part of the process, non-profits can reduce unsolicited appeals, thereby saving time, effort and postal/printing expenses. This efficiency doesn’t go unnoticed by donors, who appreciate
not being overloaded with unsolicited requests. The message will be more personalized and relevant, since it relates back to a contribution that just happened, and it also gives non-profits a chance to share their latest success story, explain more about their mission or highlight a new program. Subscription payment (or donation) plans Certain for-profit industries and businesses have long enjoyed a “membership” or “subscription” business model: from the wine-of-themonth club to magazine subscriptions to Netflix monthly fees. It is no surprise that continuity programs are ideal as far as some business models are concerned – they provide continuous revenue. Unlike for-profits, non-profits don’t need to deliver a monthly product or continuous service to justify a subscription model. It is more about facilitating a simpler donation process and encouraging ongoing commitment to the mission and the organization. By giving constituents the opportunity to become automatic monthly donors, non-profits can make it easy to subscribe to their organizations. According to Blackbaud’s 2011 State of the Non-profit Industry Survey, recurring donors give 600-800 per Continued on page 23 December 2014
THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE MAGAZINE ISSUE 4 • 2014
Canada versus offshore: what do companies have to do to compete? Also in this issue:
❯❯ Are we ready for a changing landscape?
Gary Tannyan
❯❯ Future of the contact centre: 7 key trends driving massive transformation
Technology
Future of the contact center 7 key trends driving a massive transformation
By Liz Osborn
T
here is no doubt that we’re in the midst of a sea change when it comes to consumer behavior. New technologies have completely transformed consumer expectations and buying behavior, making it more difficult for brands to acquire new customers and earn their loyalty. Many organizations consider their contact center to be their first line of defense in the battle for consumer loyalty. In fact, the Deloitte 2013 survey of contact centers found that 62 percent of organizations view customer experience, provided through contact centers, as a competitive differentiator. Contact centers are now under pressure to adapt to the rapidly changing technology landscape and consumer expectations. There are seven key trends that will impact contact centers as they evolve to meet these shifting expectations. 2 | contact management
1. Cloud contact center technology will make companies more competitive Contact centers using cloud technology will enjoy a significant competitive advantage, such as the ability to add agents and sales reps immediately, and scale back when needed. The cloud also makes it easier to address seasonal spikes; in the past, contact centers had to plan far in advance for capacity requirements for peak times. Then they were faced with having to architect, buy, build, integrate, manage and upgrade a highly complex set of on-premise contact center hardware and
software technologies. Now, contact centers can work with cloud software vendors that bundle up all of the necessary capabilities and offer it as a service for one monthly fee per agent. This allows companies to be highly nimble, and extremely competitive, while still offering an excellent customer experience.
2. Omni-Channel (aka Cross Channel) capabilities will be expected Recent Ovum studies found that 74 percent of consumers use three or more channels when engaging with companies. Yet how many of us have Issue 4 • 2014
Technology had to repeat information over and over to agents or IVR systems because the systems don’t support the ability to “remember” the conversation and transfer the information across customer touch points? In the future, customers will expect companies to have an institutional memory across every communication channel and touch point. This is known as omni-channel or cross channel capability. It requires intelligent technology to provide the context of the interaction, along with the customer profile, preferences and relevant history. And, it requires one system with the ability to track and support email, chat, mobile transactions, self-service, and live agent conversations.
3. Multi channel, intelligent self service will expand Most consumers prefer to do things themselves, if possible – whether it’s buying a product online or finding out the answer to a problem. It’s also a lot less expensive for companies to offer self- service capabilities. With the wide adoption of smart phones, there are more ways to provide self-service through mobile apps and visual IVR systems. The trend in contact center technology is to provide more and more intelligence, along with the interaction context, in order to provide the answer to the customer without involving a live agent. In fact, Gartner predicts that by 2020, 85 percent of consumer’s transactions will occur without human interaction!
4. The number of live calls will decline, while complexity of phone interactions will increase Most consumers are now fairly comfortable buying everything from cars to furniture online. Live web chat is one of the fastest growing channels in the contact center. With the advent of social media, and the growing use of SMS in customer service situations, the number of non-voice channel interactions in contact centers has skyrocketed. This, combined with the growth in intelligent self-service will eventually lead to a decline in the volume of live phone calls to contact centers. Picking up the phone to talk to a live agent will be the last resort, which will lead to a leap in the complexity of the phone calls. Ultimately, agents who staff the phones will need to be highly skilled, able to deal with complex interactions and handle multiple channels.
5. The work-at-home agent trend will continue strong growth When companies move their contact centers to the cloud, one of the benefits is the ability for agents to work from
anywhere. All an agent needs to start taking or placing calls is a headset, an Internet connection and a computer. This is fueling the already strong growth in work-at-home agents. According to the National Association of Call Centers, 53 percent of US contact centers already have some portion of their agents working from home. As the job of an agent becomes more complex, moving to an at-home agent model is one way many companies are finding a more educated, stable workforce – wherever they live.
6. Regulatory compliance will be the new normal Although the specifics vary from country to country, two major regulatory areas are critical for the global contact center industry: credit card data and the regulations surrounding outbound consumer calling. We’ve all heard about the big breaches in retail data security in the news. This is driving rising demand for Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards (PCI DSS) compliance for any merchant who receives credit card information from customers. In the US, the regulations governing consumer dialing are known as Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA), and include the Do Not Call list and rules on who can be auto-dialed. Recent large fines and pending litigation are driving the need for technology tools for contact centers to ensure that they are in compliance with the regulatory standards.
7. Social engagement will be used to drive leads in addition to servicing customers Today, 33 percent of contact centers are servicing customers through social media channels, according to
Highest user adoption
Lowest cost of ownership
the Deloitte Contact Center Survey, 2013. As social networks become more and more a part of daily life, that percentage will continue to rise. Many leading edge, early adopter companies are finding that the same intelligent social engagement software tools that they are using to listen, understand and resolve customer issues can be utilized to find prospects who are at a critical “moment of truth” in researching products and companies. These enterprises are beginning to mine the huge amount of valuable clues that can be found on social sites and use them to drive highly qualified leads. The contact center is just at the beginning of a major transformation, driven by the ever-changing technology landscape and the rising demands of customers. The next generation contact center will look very different from the “boiler rooms” with banks of cubicles, phones and terminals that many of us envision when we hear the term contact center. These are just seven of the key contact center trends that we see shaping the future of contact centers around the world. What trends are you seeing in your business that will affect the contact center? Liz Osborn is the Vice President of Product and Solutions Marketing for Five9. With more than 20 years in the technology industry, Liz is an expert in enterprise software and networking. Liz has deep knowledge of the contact center market including expertise in contact center platforms, voice selfservice, performance management, analytics and reporting, customer service, telemarketing, IP/SIP and the cloud.
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Issue 4 • 2014
iWay Software
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contact management | 3
Cover story
Canada versus offshore: what do companies have to do to compete?
Part one of a series on challenges facing the Canadian contact centre industry
Don Moffatt, Chief Executive Officer
Michael has enjoyed a successful 20 year sales career by leveraging the valuable experience gained in diverse client facing roles of increasing responsibility with leading Telecom, Human Resources, Media, Technology, and BPO Organizations. Michael continues to earn the trust and respect of his clients by working tirelessly to understand both organizational and industry sector challenges and mapping those challenges to unique and sustainable customer management solutions that address real client and consumer business challenges.
By Amy Bostock
D
uring uring a recent visit to the new headquarters of Millennium1 Solutions in Toronto, I had the opportunity to sit down with CEO Don Moffatt and VP of Sales Mike Morrison to talk about what they see as the biggest challenges facing Canada’s contact centre industry. Millennium1 Solutions is a leading Canadian Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) solutions provider with a solid track record of providing end-to-end B2B2C solutions for many of the largest North American brands in the financial services, government, retail, insurance, and manufacturing sectors. In this first instalment of Contact Management’s series we’ll look at the practice of offshoring and what Canadian-based call centres need to do to remain competitive. 4 | contact management
Don is a highly sought-after leader for his knowledge, his reputation for disciplined execution and his aptitude for predicting trends in technology, personnel motivation, processes for improving customer experience, reducing costs and generating revenue. He has more than 25 years experience leading Large Canadian and US Operations at the Senior Executive level in both the Telecom and Financial Services verticals.
In the last 10 years Canadian companies have sent call centre jobs overseas by the thousands. But a combination of increased wages and turnover rates overseas, along with low customer satisfaction ratings from onshore callers have convinced many companies like BCE Inc., American Express Canada Inc. and Sears Canada Inc. to reconsider their offshore plans and bring back some or all of their customer call centre work.
The case for the repatriation of contact centre business “I think there are a number of
variables at play that are positive for a slowdown of business going offshore, and for the repatriation of business that’s already offshore,” says Don Moffatt, CEO of Millennium1 Solutions. “There has been a great deal of focus and attention in the media around privacy breaches. You’ve seen it with a number of well-known brands and so people are really nervous about that. And, whenever you allow access to your data offshore, which you’re doing when you’re servicing a customer offshore, you increase your risk. The second issue in Canada, he Issue 4 • 2014
Gary Tannyan
Michael Morrison, Vice President, Sales
Cover story says, has been press around jobs lost in Canada because they were outsourced. “You may recall, in that scenario, we had Canadian people training offshore people, who ended up replacing the people that trained them. The same thing was observed in the United States. It happened sooner there, where a mass exodus of jobs, and the economic ramifications of that, influenced the U.S. Government to say ‘wait a minute’. So the heightened awareness of this migration of work outside, and not supporting the labour pools that are here in Canada is another factor. “I think the third thing is what’s happening on the FX front, with the dollar now below 90 cents. That’s an encouraging trend.” But the most important issue, says Moffatt, revolves around where the customer is going to get a brand experience best aligned to their corporate brand expectations. “If you believe it’s a moment of truth in delivering on your brand promise to your customer, then great cultural sensitivity is required. Once frontline offshore service providers have been trained, are they really culturally attuned? Are they going to deliver the level of empathy and understanding? Are they going to be able to read between the lines in interpreting what the customer’s real issue or concern is? Are they going to be able to relate to the caller’s situation and understand what they are looking for? At the end of the day, people want to know that the person on the other end of the phone cares. Even before they know how much you know, they want to know how much you care. These sensitivities, and the experiential delivery, are more challenging to guarantee if you’ve sent it offshore.” According to Millennium1 Solutions’ VP of Sales Mike Morrison, the reality is that the business process outsourcing space in the Philippines is still growing 20 per cent a year according to IBPAP (IT and Business Process Association of the Philippines). “While we’re not seeing a massive trend towards bringing call centre operations back onto Canadian soil yet, I think there are lots of examples,” says Morrison. “There are pockets where particular companies have made the decision to pull business back. But, while some business is coming back, other business is going over. As an entity, the Philippines are still seeing some pretty significant growth. I think for the companies that are still trying to source on price, the Philippines will win every time.” Morrison feels that the companies that are finding success here are the ones that are figuring out how to deliver something that the Philippines can’t – resulting in a bit of a difference in terms of the mix of what calls, and which processes go offshore, versus what stays onshore. “Offshoring does have a value proposition for certain clients and certain types of calls, and we have some great partnerships that leverage that model. Low complexity work, where price is a strong driver (if not the only driver), is the kind of work where we’ve found the best success offshore,” he says. “Canada certainly has an advantage as a market in terms of understanding the customer, the brand, the vertical, and the geography. When you get into this value-add space, it’s very difficult for someone, on the other side of the globe, to provide the same insights and expertise that domestic companies can deliver.”
Revisiting customer perceptions With the recent iGate scenario still fresh in everyone’s minds, and the backlash it created around offshoring, Issue 4 • 2014
some companies are recognizing that they have to revisit the customer perceptions around moving work and jobs offshore. “That’s forcing companies to consider repatriating their business,” says Morrison. “I think that sometimes companies need to go through the offshoring exercise and experience the offshore model in order to understand that there is a difference. Often, when they outsource initially, they really believe that call centres are call centres, and as long as you can answer the phone and be polite and take care of my customer, it really doesn’t matter where. So, they go ahead and they deploy seats into a particular market, and then they start getting customer backlash and feedback saying ‘no, I’m not okay with this particular region handling my call’, or ‘I’m having trouble understanding the person on the other end of the phone’, or other factors.” So what do Canadian companies have to do to satisfy client needs and still stay competitive in terms of value for the dollar? If they just want seats, and they’re looking for the best price they can possibly get, there are probably 50 companies that can take care of them. “That’s when Canadian companies have to start talking about where they can add value beyond simply servicing your calls, because they’re not differentiated until they get to that conversation.” At Millennium1 Solutions that conversation includes talking about business insights and analytics, and how can they drive improvements or learning. “With some clients, before we’ve ever taken a single phone call, we’ve done that on the front end,” says Moffatt. “We’ve gone in and sat in a client’s internal operations, conducted time and motion observation - because how do you make a recommendation if you’ve never taken a call for that particular customer? Then we’ll come back to the customer and say ‘vendor B down the street might be a dollar an hour cheaper, but rather than focusing on the cost per unit, let’s focus on the unit’. Let’s figure out if there are ways to reduce the net number of units that you need to manage, a unit being a call or an email or a chat session, or whatever the case may be. Then, let’s also figure out how to maximize those units, in terms of are
there other things we could be doing with these calls to improve customer experience, reduce customer effort, or drive revenue in incremental steps. I find this kind of strategic objective is a value-add and helps us support our customers and drive the best experience from each unit.” “Ultimately, it’s a conversation shift. Our domestic customers are moving away from ‘I have this many calls, they come in at these times of the day, and I need these languages, what would it cost for you to do that for me?’ They are moving toward value-based delivery models. Price will still win in a lot of cases, especially in cases where there is no value differentiation. It’s just having a different dialogue with our clients around what our role is as a service provider.” Michael adds “I think that’s where domestic BPOs have a tremendous advantage over offshore operations, because people in the Philippines don’t read the Toronto Star or The Globe and Mail. “They don’t know the market, they may not even know the client’s industry, brand or cultural nuances. I’ve worked with clients in a lot of different countries around the world, and there are different behaviours. And, I’ve seen people go into different markets, with assumptions that are bad assumptions for that marketplace, based on trying to take the North American operating model to other countries, as they have expanded their business. “For example in Brazil, there was a social media site more popular than Facebook, several years ago. Brazilians used their own social site. So, if you were going into Brazil, and you thought Facebook was your strategy, it was probably a little bit off. It’s that kind of local knowledge that you get from somebody who’s in market. This example is a good one to underscore why having people in the country you’re operating in can help clients rethink their strategies. Just being in the country, knowing the client, the marketplace, and the brands cannot be overstated in terms of importance.” Coming in February, the next instalment of Contact Management’s series on challenges facing the Canadian contact centre industry, we’ll look at the Power of Outsourcing.
contact management | 5
Trends
Are we ready?
The Canadian Contact Centre landscape is changing – but is it for the better? By Eli Federman
T
his is an important question, and one Canadian Contact Centre leaders are asking with increasing frequency. The landscape is definitely changing, but the real questions are to what extent, and are we ready for it? Three key themes tend to dominate this discussion: the increasing use of e-mail, chat and text to talk with consumers; transforming technology through cloud based solutions; and creating a multi-channel approach, inclusive of a social media and mobile user strategy. These are exciting times indeed. Let’s explore these themes in a bit more detail.
The importance of the written word It used to be that when consumers had a question or concern related to a product or service, they would call customer service, which meant a Contact Centre. Writing a letter was an option too, but Contact Centres did one thing really well – they answered the phone and provided immediate support. In today’s digital world, consumers have different preferences and expect new and enhanced options: they want to be able to write an e-mail, have a live chat or send a text. In all cases correspondence is written, and that is a very different skill from talking on the phone. Understanding the difference between strong speaking and writing is the first step towards gaining an edge in a fiercely competitive customer service landscape. Here are three considerations for how to ensure your e-mail, chat and text support is every bit as strong as what is provided over the phone: 1. Design a job profile that befits the skills required to write competently, keeping in mind the variation between corresponding on e-mail, chat or text. While e-mails more closely resembles writing a letter, chat and text requires an ability to be more concise and use shorthand. In all cases the framing of the response requires clarity, diplomacy and most importantly, resolution. 2. Develop a testing process to confirm the candidate’s ability to write. Too often, we take for granted that someone who interviews well (by voice) can also write well. This is not always the case and the results can be quite different! Even those with a college/ university education may not be able to write well in business format. 3. Develop measurements to ensure you deliver the kind of written customer experience you want. Set goals to create accountability and make sure they can be tracked and reported on. Ensure there are both quality and accuracy components. Also, try to tie those goals into the organization’s customer satisfaction program.
The move to cloud based technologies There was a time when a Contact Centre infrastructure 6 | contact management
was hardwired end to end. Various pieces of equipment along with numerous servers, switches and wires made up the technology solution for a Contact Centre. While there was also complimentary software (such as the use of Windows to manage Microsoft Office tools) little else was exclusively web based. Customer data was typically stored in some form of internal database, and even CRM solutions often required hardware to enable them. How things have changed! With the advent of the cloud (simply said: web based technology solutions), organizations can be wire-free and eliminate the need for physical hardware altogether. But while the cloud redefines technical simplicity, there are still those who prefer the classic hardware route. Purists will argue that hardware is less likely to fail, is more stable, and easier to build redundancy for. The cloud also makes you entirely dependent on the stability and range of your broadband connection. Despite this, we are of the opinion that cloud is the way to go. There are far too many advantages when compared with traditional infrastructure including: • Cost – it is substantially cheaper to invest in cloud technology • Ease of set up – it takes far less time to set up a cloud based infrastructure • Scale – in the cloud, expanding is limitless as long as you have the right broadband connection • Simplicity – web based technologies are founded on a point and click premise • Access – with a computer and web connection an employee can work from anywhere It is a pretty easy argument (at least from this corner!) to go the route of the cloud.
Become a multi-channel Contact Centre Social media has probably been the hottest topic over the last five years. Almost every modern organization is at some stage of development of a social media strategy, and lately
this overlaps with how to service consumers on their Smart phones. While this isn’t unique to Canadian Contact Centres, the impact has been substantial and has forced companies to create a more diverse and flexible customer experience. Customers want to be serviced on their terms and that has forced organizations to build a multi or Omni channel approach. But to really stand out, Contact Centres have to properly execute this capability. This requires a substantial investment in people, process and technology; but those who do it well gain a competitive advantage, which increases customer spend and loyalty. What can Contact Centres do to embrace this change and turn it into an advantage? • Define a strategic plan – articulate what a multichannel experience should feel like • Diversify your workforce – consider the different skills required for the various channels • Know your customer – understand how their behaviours fit into this approach • Create measurements – decide what success looks like for employee in each channel • Establish strong internal partnerships – work in lock step with HR, Marketing & Communications Contact Centres in Canada are definitely changing for the better, with increased capabilities, exciting new technologies and multi-channel operations capable of delivering world class customer experiences. The essentials of a great Contact Centre remain the same - hire terrific people, build simple and easy to use processes and leverage great technologies – but it’s how they are evolving that has become so fascinating to watch. Stay tuned because continued change is imminent, you can count on it! Eli Federman is Founder and Lead consultant of Customer Service Simplified. Learn more at www. simplifyingservice.com and to reach Eli call 647-202-7385 or e-mail eli@simplifyingservice.com
Issue 4 • 2014
// 23
Operations & Logistics Continued from page 16
cent more than one-time donors. Part of this phenomenon has to do with the fact that recurring donors are much “stickier” and tend to keep giving for 4-7 years, according to the study. What’s more, building a recurring payment system is less expensive for the non-profit than constant solicitations. Donors feel like a more integral cog in the non-profit machine, and it is easier for everyone involved – a true win-win situation. Asking for recurring donations does not mean non-profits need to invent a pajama-of-the-month scheme. Because non-profits are already promoting a wonderful cause and yearround mission, they have the perfect opportunity to ask donors to sign up and give on a regular cadence. And the more and more frequently people give, the better they feel. Heart-wrenching stories Campaigns that appeal to emotions (vs. rational/logical appeals) are proven to be highly effective. Forprofit organizations can (and do) trigger feelings such as happiness; imagine the “I’d Like to Buy the World a Coke” campaign. But telling a heartwrenching story, or using emotional triggers, could be considered exploitative in the for-profit world. Non-profits, however, can very effectively tell emotional stories that demonstrate their mission and their impact. The 2008 ASPCA anti-cruelty campaign that featured Sarah McLachlan’s “Angel” soundtrack was incredibly poignant, and frankly, difficult to watch. It even generated its own share of controversy. But at the end, it was the most successful campaign the organization had ever done, raising $30 million and nearly 200,000 new donors (source: http:// www.nytimes. com/2008/12/26/ us/26charity.html?_r=3&). It was relatively inexpensive to produce, and bottom line, it helped the ASPCA to help more animals. Appealing to emotions works. Beyond this anecdotal evidence, a study by Loewenstein, Slovic and Small called “Sympathy and Callousness: The Impact of Deliberative Thought on Donations to Identifiable and Statistical Victims” clearly showed that appealing to the emotional right brain was twice as effective as appealing to the logical left brain.
December 2014
Knowing too much For-profits have taken quite a bit of flack lately for their unfettered tracking of consumers in this era of big data, and consumers are worried about just how much data is being collected. While respecting constituents’ privacy is extremely important, non-profits should not be afraid of collecting information on donors and potential donors for use in marketing and fundraising efforts. This is not to suggest that nonprofits stalk prospective donors and pop up retargeted advertisements in every Internet location they visit. However, collecting, aggregating and using all of the data currently on file about existing donors in order to build and strengthen legitimate relationships is crucial, and results in communications with higher conversion rates. The first step is looking at all of the data sources that the organization has about its donors. In a sizable non-profit organization, there are typically several, ranging from online donations, to offline donations, to advocacy databases, to customer care data, to eCommerce information and membership data. There is no wonder it is difficult to tie it all together and get it normalized, deduped and into a CRM – not even considering the process to glean meaningful and actionable insights from the aggregated information. But it is definitely worth trying. In the spirit of taking baby steps, think about the data that could be easily captured online from donors. It is easy to ask people for feedback in the form of free text fields or checkboxes or drop-downs. It is easy to see what other contributions they would be willing to make and to ask them to provide additional information for their own profile/ record. Non-profits can also make it easy for donors to share a website with their friends. All of this data should be captured and fed back to the CRM. The same goes with offline information that comes back on pledge forms and response cards. People can not only be asked to check boxes and provide information, but they often write in, by hand, additional bits of key information, like preferences and address changes. All of this should be captured. In fact, non-profits can get in trouble when donations have not been used the way the donors specified, so they really need to be capturing (and paying attention to) this information.
Overall, unlike with most for-profit relationships, donors want to be involved with a non-profit and its cause. By learning about them and offering personalized opportunities to engage, the entire process becomes easier. As an example, CDS Global client Operation Smile Canada recently demonstrated how seamlessly offline donations, direct mail data and telephone donor services data can be linked back to a donor database; in this case, Blackbaud’s Raiser’s Edge™ CRM. Patricia Vidov, Operation Smile Canada’s director of operations, credits the aggregation and integration of this information with allowing faster gift acknowledgements, improved communication with donors, greater efficiency and lower costs. Bragging In the context of a non-profit, forget the advice, “It is not polite to boast.” It is much harder to do in the for-profit world, where organizations have a very difficult time overtly talking about how great they are. Instead, the for-profit marketing technique du jour is content marketing, which is really all about creating sales-like thought leadership
information. In the magazine space, this shows up as native ads, which are what used to be called advertorials. When taken to the extreme (literally and figuratively), there are companies like Red Bull. While their original focus was selling energy drinks, they have become so effective at capturing and telling stories about people doing extreme things that they have expanded into a media company. Fortunately, non-profits do not necessarily need to invest heavily in content marketing processes, systems and specialists. They already have things to talk about – the good and important work they are doing. From an accountability perspective, donors want to know that their contributions are making a difference. As such, bragging about good work creates a virtuous cycle of selfpromotion. Be proud, and talk about the cause. CDS Global is the leading provider of end-toend business process outsourcing, managing 159 million consumers for more than 1,100 brands across industries, including media, non-profits, utilities and consumer products. Learn more at www.cds-global.com.
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// 24
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