 Benefits of M2C process There is a pressing need for utilities to overcome the inherent operational issues due to a legacy culture combined with manual procedures, inefficient processes and outdated technology in order to leave behind the tag of a digitally conservative industry, which can be achieved by reducing operational costs, augmenting customer retention, optimising load management, enhancing meter data management and meeting regulatory demands.
Furthermore, of late, on one hand, utility providers are facing a stiff competition from new entrants as a result of market deregulation worldwide, while on the other, they are struggling to retain their customer base. All said, utilities seem to embrace the digital with smart-grid and processes like meter-to-cash, which is a significant process for utility companies to realise revenue generated from the down-stream value chain as well as connect with end-user directly. If done effectively, M2C also entails a fall on the overall cost-to-serve per customer by proactively communicating with customers by addressing and solving their complaints, and thereby improving the price competitiveness. However, utilities are being challenged with capital intensive investments in upgrading to smart-grid/metering infrastructures and consumer-centric revenue models, for instance, net-metering and time-of-use pricing that could significantly drive revenues down as consumption shifts to off-peak periods. Hence, utilities cannot ignore the efficiency if they adopt the M2C process. For the companies, M2C brings a bouquet of benefits as depicted in the figure. In September 2009, the European Union ratified a “Third Energy Package,” which aims to see every European electricity meter smart by 2022. Deployment of smart meters involve huge infrastructure cost as it brings in many elementary modifications to the M2C operations and managing the operations with cost efficiency may not be an easy task for utility companies by themselves, which is where the external service providers fit in. Managing the cut-over from traditional to smart meters, dealing with new network technologies, the diminished role of field services, and the upgrades required to meter data management systems (MDMS) are just some of the key obstacles that this industry needs to overcome while implementing smart meter systems. This would mean that instead of monthly or quarterly readings, consumers can have real-time access to data accurate up to an hour, which present a new challenge in the form of a vast amount of information and how a utility should leverage the data for meaningful business intelligence purposes. Utility industry have found outsourcing as one of their solutions wherein the service providers let utility companies use their own technology platforms that allows M2C process to be delivered by utility companies without any upfront capital expenditure. Some of the M2C functions that are being included on the smart metering wave range from pre-implementation advisory to post-implementation services such as smart analytics offerings. According to the Everest Group, M2C business BPO has been projected to reach nearly USD 70 billion from 50 billion globally, nevertheless, the current penetration remains insignificant. Moreover, outsourcing firms can help in standardisation of processes that result in overall enhanced performance of utilities. Author: Debaleena Debnath Debaleena is a digital media consultant @ speradigital. To know more about our services, please click here. Follow us Linkedin, Facebook and Twitter.
0 Comments
 Traditional outsourcing lacks Innovation Businesses are getting remodelled rapidly with democratisation of decisions, overwhelming innovation in technology and digitisation, abundance of information, increasing power to customers – making traditional model of outsourcing based on time and effort applied is becoming redundant. However, companies are still managing their work in the same manner like a decade earlier using this obsolete outsourcing model. This means the service providers are unable to provide a cost advantage in the long run.
In an already crowded market, service providers today are facing tough competition owing to price, increasing labour cost in countries like India and Philippines and little or no differentiation in the service has made vendors to look for companies that can provide innovative ways to manage the transactional work and at the same time help them in moving ahead in the value chain. Presently, 49 percent of enterprise buyers anticipate to move to a “wide-scale transformation of business processes enabled by new technology tools/platforms” in just two years according to a KPMG study. This may be a fantasy for some enterprises, but one thing is sure that many of those operations leaders are failing to steer their enterprises away from legacy delivery models will get cast aside quickly in today’s tolerance-diminishing business environment. However, Digital technology has made it indispensable for these companies to create a pay as you go/pay per use model. Right implementation of digital technology will completely automate the work or eliminate the work. In the same study, it was noticed that two-thirds of enterprises are falling behind in “digital” areas due to lack in the internal skills to change processes, automate them, analyse them, or come up with ingenious thinking on how to improve operations. Analytics and process automation technologies have emerged as critical technologies to drive better outcomes for clients. Close to half of buyers now see these two technologies as adding significant value in their outsourcing engagements. Outsourcing providers need to evince their clients that they can provide more than just staff augmentation, meeting cost reduction goals and providing basic operational support. The new latent and unsaid directive requires them to be in a strategic partnership with their clients in an attempt to add valuable and niche skills, technological support & innovations and enhance analytical competence for their clients. Author: Debaleena Debnath Debaleena is a digital media consultant @ speradigital. To know more about our services, please click here. Follow us on Linkedin, Facebook and Twitter.  Tangible benefits achieved as a result of data-driven marketing The business atmosphere has gone through a rapid transformation over the past decade — technology is maturing every day, plethora of information is available from various sources and a new corporate mandate to create actionable insights from data, big and small, that drive value for brands and consumers alike—has changed the fundamentals of marketing and have propelled the marketer into a powerful new role as an agent for change. The discipline of Marketing has increasingly become a data-driven approach. Research has shown that marketing driven by data or insights has boosted higher returns on the investment by using the customer information in a way that gives businesses a competitive edge over their rivals. So, what exactly is data driven marketing? According to Gartner, “Data-driven marketing refers to acquiring, analyzing and applying information about customer and consumer wants, needs, context, behaviour and motivations “. The result is that it will help organisations to make time-bound decisions, which in turn leads to improved products and enhance customer experiences, along with higher operational efficiency and competitive advantage (the chart on the left depicts how businesses achieved tangible results with data-driven marketing in some of the areas). In a research initiative, Global DMA report, 2014, represented by 3,000 thought leaders representing all segments of the advertising, marketing, media and technology industries across 17 global markets, a remarkable 80% of them reported that data is positively important to the deployment of their marketing and advertising efforts. Therefore, it doesn’t come as a surprise that nearly three-quarters (74%) of marketers (out of a total of 331 responses from senior executives in a Turn and Forbes collaboration survey in 2015) expect to increase their data marketing budgets this year. In the study by Forbes, 2015, some important industry-wise insights revealed that:-
 Competitive advantage attained in customer experiences through data-driven marketing- by industry group To sum up, organizations that are “leaders” in data-driven marketing have these practices ingrained into the culture of their organizations, and are able to move swiftly between engagements with effective and highly efficient cross-functional collaboration. Thus, “leaders” also record far higher levels of customer engagement and market growth than their “laggard” counterparts.
Author: Debaleena Debnath Debaleena is a digital media consultant @ speradigital. To know more about our services, please click here. Follow us on Linkedin, Facebook and Twitter.  Importance of customer experience services and marketing team's contribution to digital commerce Longevity, loyalty and profit are the pillars of retail business which can only be strengthened via great customer experiences. Although, retail industry has grown leaps and bounds with increasing digital commerce, nonetheless, digital commerce strategies does not only mean redefining through online and social platforms, but to focus on the value delivered to customers. Today’s customer is much more active, increasingly indecisive as to what and where to buy from as well as much more knowledgeable about their rights. Thus, it becomes necessary to deliver on the customer expectations and elevated customer demands across various touch-points through cohesive and seamless interactions.
In digital retail services, the customers expect not only an easy and smooth buying process but an equally good or even better after-sales service. In other words, cohesive digital commerce connects channels and devices from targeting to retention of a customer by segmenting and targeting digital marketing content and offers so as to reach the right audience at the right time. Wherever the customers decide to shop from, they expect a seamless transition and same standards whether it is on the website or their mobile platform. Consumers are becoming finicky and fickle-minded as never before, which may well serve as an indication to retailers that they should evolve as well by giving their customers a digital experience by attracting, engaging and converting them from prospects to buyers by providing them personalised services and products sometimes both onsite as well as offsite (for instance, through follow-up emails). According to Gartner, as depicted in the figure, the marketing team plays and contributes the most towards digital commerce of a brand/ business. Moreover, the onus to design the customer experience strategy also lies with the marketing team. On an average, marketers spend 20% of their budgets on support for digital commerce. Marketer’s prime spending focus is towards offering of customer experience services, with digital advertising accounting for 12.2% to attract customers, mobile marketing to engage customers at 9.5% and finally, digital commerce spending at 9.6 percent to convert prospects to buyers. Value creation comes through the entire customer experience of the retail brand, not just through the pricing of the product. For example, in USA, as Lionbridge observed, 59% of Americans are willing to try a new brand for a better customer service experience. Thus, it makes sense how customers can help in building a brand, drive online and offline sales and generate leads for the businesses. Author: Debaleena Debnath Debaleena is a digital media consultant @ speradigital. To know more about our services, please click here. Follow us Linkedin, Facebook and Twitter.  Being digital does not mean serving your customers through digital medium. With this strategy you only end up creating another channel and with millions of customers you might end up in a position when one customer is connecting you over various channels. Embracing digital customer services mean a lot more - developing and creating meaningful 1:1 relationship or supporting a brand determined to be a cultural change agent. You will always have some customers at the far end of the spectrum who would still want to be in touch with you through traditional medium. Segmenting your customers and fine tuning the digital customer service strategy is essential. Customer services units also needs to educate customers and incentives them to connect through digital channel which is a win-win for both companies and the customer. The benefits of having a completely digital customer services unit are :
A noteworthy example here would be how Skype manages its entire customer services through online communities and analysis based support center. A 2013 McKinsey report found that 65% of social media users prefer digital options when seeking product and service information and support. No surprise, then, that Hubspot research found that 62% of brands used social media to address questions and comments in 2013, more than twice the 30% doing so in 2012. Social and other forms of digital customer service and support are make-or-break operations for global brands. The digital option can reduce CRM costs, speed response times and improve customer satisfaction and loyalty. That’s the good news. Here’s the less-than-good:
If you still need more convincing there is a plenty of fact on what social customer service is really worth: stats Author: Debaleena Debnath and Suraj Poddar Debaleena is a digital media consultant @ speradigital. Suraj is the founder and CEO of speradigital. To know more about our services, please click here. Follow us Linkedin, Facebook and Twitter. |
Archives
August 2015
Categories
All
|
RSS Feed