Historians say that there are no enduring strategies,
only enduring interests.
The
enduring interest of business, regardless of size, location
or industry, is to attract and retain customers, grow
customer relationships, and use those relationships to
increase revenues and improve profitability.
A
way to achieve that goal is to strategically use the regular
or monthly account statement or bill to connect with the
customer.
In fact, one respected industry analyst points out that
in the credit card processing, insurance and banking industries,
as much as 80 percent of all contact with customers is
accomplished via the account statement.
The
customer statement is the single most regular and reliable
customer touchpoint.
But
the real key to unlocking the potential of the customer
message - and the relationship it helps create, nurture
and sustain with customers -- lies with how the message
is generated and processed.
Specifically,
the ideal approach treats all of the interdependent activities
related to the process of creating, producing and distributing
the message, handling the response generated by the outgoing
message, and updating the customer data file with pertinent
response details, as a five-step, closed-loop process.
Ideally,
this five-step process also encompasses all data related
to the customer that is obtained from all customer touch
points or interactions, such as direct marketing messages,
outbound telemarketing appeals, inbound inquiries to call
centers, and responses to TV, radio and Internet advertisements.
Capturing and incorporating this data enables subsequent
customer messages to be highly targeted and far more effective.
Scores
of high-volume, print/mail finishing centers are already
well on their way to implementing this advanced approach.
In fact, many have already achieved dramatically faster
processing speeds along with superior mail piece integrity
by linking together all of the resources related to producing
the customer message and managing them as a single, integrated
process.
These
resources typically include the print, mail inserting
and presorting functions and comprise the core of the
modern automated document factory concept.
By
the true leaders in our industry are reaching further
and deeper into their organizations to tap into and link-up
with the additional functions, such as the marketing people
responsible for creating specific messages, and the IT
organization responsible for processing responses and
assuring accuracy of the customer database.
These
visionary managers understand that customer messaging
is a five-step, closed-loop and totally integrated process.
And by aligning key internal resources with the production
and distribution function resources traditionally associated
with the print/mail finishing activity, they are achieving
improvements in both efficiency and effectiveness that
far outweigh what they might accomplish by focusing on
just one of the components in isolation.
Prompt
Processing and Delivery
Certainly,
the concept of the automated document factory -- and the
availability of high speed, high integrity processing
and reporting and control systems -- has yielded faster
cycling speeds, better mail piece integrity, and higher
throughput for print/mail finishing operations.
And
when combined with techniques like print stream engineering,
software for postal hygiene, and presorting via either
mechanical or electronic means, the result is faster processing,
higher productivity, lower costs and faster delivery through
the USPS mail stream.
Assured
Privacy
More
recently, a new emphasis on consumer privacy has emerged.
This new focus comes from several sources and is clearly
a priority for the future.
First,
privacy is a natural outgrowth of our industry's existing
effort to boost mail piece integrity, both as way of assuring
customer satisfaction and to help achieve better performance
by eliminating errors and improving throughput.
If you define integrity as creating and delivering a perfect
mail piece, it just makes good business sense to provide
it. Indeed, many consumers now 'expect' nothing less than
perfection in their dealings with business partners. Plus,
the elimination of errors means a less costly and more
efficient production process, which helps lower costs
and boost efficiency over the long haul.
Second, there are significant legislative and regulatory
initiatives underway, most notably the Gramm-Leach-Bliley
Act, which concerns the privacy of consumer financial
information, and the Health Insurance Portability and
Accountability Act, which impacts how consumer health
and medical information can be handled and communicated.
The
Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act will restrict how financial related
firms can share or otherwise disclose consumer financial
information, and includes requirements to: (1) inform
consumers about how the firm intends to share information;
and (2) provide a mechanism for consumers to 'opt out'
or otherwise prohibit the sharing of personal financial
data.
The
Health Information Portability and Accountability Act,
also known as HIPAA, is a new Federal regulation meant
to assure, among other things, that an individual's private
health care data remains confidential.
Although
HIPAA became law in 1996, it remains a 'work in progress'
since the Bush Administration recently announced a delay
in its full implementation.
Still,
for firms involved in health care insurance, for example,
the impact of HIPAA will be significant and will center
on the need to implement technology and procedures to
assure that confidential health care data contained in
both paper and electronic statements and other documents
cannot be misassembled or misdelivered, or otherwise disclosed
either inadvertently or intentionally.
Lastly,
the rapid growth of additional communications channels,
which is unleashing a virtual flood of marketing messages
aimed at consumers, is likely to spur even greater consumer
interest in privacy. Just two examples: where once there
were three television networks, there are now more than
100 cable and satellite TV channels, each delivering urgent
appeals from sponsors or programmers. Tuning them out
is becoming more of a survival skill than a prerogative.
And while the Internet has become indispensable for businesses
and consumers alike, it has become so largely because
of funds provided by advertisers seeking to leverage its
efficient delivery of marketing messages to both mass
and niche audiences.
In
fact, to cite a third but more extreme example, the 'spam'
that clogs our e-mail in-boxes and angers so many recipients
today is made possible by marketers who are satisfied
with a response rate of only 25 out of every million messages
sent. So the 'privacy' -- or at least the daily routine--
of millions of consumers is being violated everyday by
an avalanche of unwanted messages.
Personal
and Powerful
Which
leads to a unique dilemma for business today. Marketers
are reaching out to consumers in a variety of channels
-- such as outbound telemarketing calls, inbound call
centers and Web-based advertising. But consumers cherish
their privacy and are increasingly resistant to - and
even angered by -- marketing techniques such as dinnertime
telemarketing calls and the intrusion of spammer's random
or unwanted mass e-mails.
Yet,
at the same time, consumers want the relationship with
the organizations that they choose to do business with
-- i.e., their partners -- to be efficient, accurate,
comprehensive and custom-tailored to their needs.
Consumers
today expect that their 'partner' organizations will collect,
update and verify all transaction-related data. They expect
that one division or department will know about the purchases
they made through another. And they especially don't want
the burden of furnishing the same data, i.e., address
information every time a new order is entered.
In
effect, consumers today want to be treated like an important
repeat customer when they make repeat purchases -- and
they expect their business partners to provide the essential
record keeping.
Call
Center Coordination
As
a result, innovative businesses are now transforming their
conventional call centers into multi-channel contact centers
that support telephone, e-mail, the Web, and wireless
technologies. This strategy provides customers with more
service and contact options while reducing the number
of 'live' calls that customer-service representatives
(CSR) handle by phone.
However, customer-service representatives must have instant
access to the complete view of a customer's transaction
history across all channels -- especially the mail channel,
which is still the most popular by far among consumers
-- to perform two critical functions.
The
first involves responding to inquiries from customers
concerning the status of account statements and other
critical messages, such as orders, payments or remittances,
credit card and loan applications, contest entries, contracts,
and shipments of products.
The
capability must be linked to track and trace data sources
to encompass all U.S. public and private carriers, including
the USPS, UPS, RPS, Fed Ex and others. It must also include
both paper-based and electronic messages.
The
second function involves responding to customer inquiries
about the entire 'as-built' content of the account statement,
including all enclosures and statement-related messages
and offers.
This
capability is increasingly important as statements become
more highly customized via 1:1 marketing techniques. And
this capability must also include statements in both paper-based
and electronic format.
Marketing
Automation
The
principal reason that customer account statements are
morphing into high-value, customer-focused, 1:1 messaging
tools is that consumers 'open and read' transaction-related
documents with far greater interest than virtually any
general marketing piece, regardless of channel or format.
As a result, marketing messages or campaigns included
with the statement benefit from greater penetration and
response.
An
effective account statement/marketing automation program
will encompass the following key elements:
Analyst
Reports