Author Archive
Gov2.0 is a buzzword
Today I was inspired by This post about the aims of Gov2.0 rather than a definition (the subject of this linked article at GovLoop) as it is written in a language that is opaque to citizens. It appears to me that citizens most likely care about:
Availability and value of services they actually receive (and the [...]
Gov2.0 is NOT a Social Media Strategery
What is Government 2.0?
Gov2.0 is Government run for Citizens. Each citizen must be able engage with the daily activity to government to satisfy their personal self-interest. It is about citizens getting what they want when and how they want it, and being able to converse with individual Government employees directly and with each other.
What [...]
UK Government data sharing
I was at CapitolCamp Today in Albany, New York. A great event for many reasons – especially the forward looking nature of the State Senate, @ahoppin, and all of the great people there. Now I said some things about OpenID and data protection that probably need a bit more explanation. Some things are just too [...]
Regenerating this site
New look coming soon… and some new content. Creative destruction. Rebuild from within. The same mission and goals prevail – it is time to put bigger ideas here and to be slightly more abrasive.
Stay subscribed.
Death to all websites.
So you create a simple message, and make sure that all of the information that everybody want is easily found. There is a call to action, and easy contact methods. This is the best website you can make. And it still sucks. It just sucks the least that it could.
As a prospective customer I want [...]
Intersting Enterprise2.0 News
This week I noted these interesting posts, amongst many:
Six ways to make Web2.0 work:
http://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/Business_Technology/Application_Management/Six_ways_to_make_Web_20_work_2294
(thanks to Lee Bryant of Headshift for pointing this one out)
60 different How to guides:
http://mashable.com/2009/02/18/how-to-guide/
TIME top 25 blogs:
http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/completelist/0,29569,1879276,00.html
Interesting musing on social networks:
http://confusedofcalcutta.com/2009/02/16/monday-morning-musing-about-social-networks/
Design for everybody…
This weekend I was lucky enough to join in a session of SF folks with a passing interest in Cognitive Science talking with Keith Lang of skitch, who put forward an interesting premise:
Most software is designed by men. It is precise, evaluates yes and no in binary, and relies on thinking in hierarchy. He had [...]
A simple problem: The Web Platform for Customers
We are creating a solution that enables a company to engage better with it’s customers, and allows customers to serve themselves. Customers get what they want either directly Or by engaging in conversation with each other with company employees.
—
This post was inpired by “1. Start with a simple problem…. ” #1 of #50 essential strategies [...]
ROI for SaaS/Cloud offerings
I was asked yesterday about ROI for SaaS based solutions. Until yesterday it had seemed obvious to me that SaaS had little or no upfront costs, and most solutions have zero or little upfront costs in order to try them out that this was the equivalent of dividing by zero. Personally I made the shift [...]
Choosing SaaS.
The key point in any software choice is the difference in Total Cost of Ownership and risk regardless of how they are developed and delivered.
Any company delivering software or services incurs costs and risks that have to be charged somewhere – whether it is in the form of charging for premium services, charged support or [...]
744: Great Enterprise 2.0 Insights
Today my twitter feed told me about http://web2.socialcomputingmagazine.com/50_essential_strategies_for_creating_a_successful_web_20_pr.htm which is a great 50 point guide to building a Web2.0 offering. It is brilliant, insightful and it was interesting to see how many different ideas contribute to a single offering.
Inspired by this list – We will be describing how we address each one on each of [...]
750 days: New website launched with new design
The new website has been live for a couple of weeks now at http://www.firmstep.com which is a great design done by Scott Mallinson, who we heartily recommend for any design project you have. We have now also recommissioned him to restyle this blog amongst other things. So expect to see this blog get a makeover [...]
751 days left… (500andsomething working days)
This is not a mathematical error – just a switch to calendar days rather than working days for looking forwards.
Back in September 08 we set ourselves the goal of 600 working days to achieve our objectives, putting the deadline date at Feb 11th 2011. This is the date we are still aiming for.
The math just [...]
Free Customer Service report
Customer Experience Matters reports on this report on Customer experience (available free – just by registering) from Forrester research – I found the spread of rankings in different indutries interesting. How is it that some industries have a more significant range than others – I will be trying to work out if that is just [...]
The Enterprise 2.0 Manifesto (making the case for the open organization)
I also gave this it’s own page so that it persists as a top level item…
The Enterprise 2.0 Manifesto (making the case for the open organization)
0.verview
The death of the mass-produced product for the mass-market is widely documented. The need for extraordinary customer service widely understood. We can make the kinds of organization and communication that [...]
Latest great post on co-creation from ConfusedofCalcutta
On ConfusedofCalcutta I recently came across this great article http://confusedofcalcutta.com/2008/11/15/whoa-reining-in-the-faster-horses/ that alone empahises the importance of what JP Rangaswami has to say, but more importantly the importance of what customers have to say.
As always walking-the-talk is the next most obvious thing to do…
If you are not yet familiar with Confused of Calcutta, you can find [...]
Customer Service Blogs
I went out looking to extend the blogroll on customer service and and found…
http://www.serviceuntitled.com/
http://flooringtheconsumer.blogspot.com/
http://customersrock.net/
http://tips-customer-service.blogspot.com/
http://customerservicevoodoo.wordpress.com/
http://www.allbusiness.com/sales/customer-service/10783-1.html
http://clearaction.biz/blog/
http://custserv.gbwatch.com/
http://www.customersarealways.com/
http://www.qaqna.com/
http://www.returncustomer.com/
http://customerevangelists.typepad.com/
http://shephyken.blogspot.com/
http://customerservicereader.typepad.com/
http://sethgodin.typepad.com/
http://consumerist.com/
http://customeru.wordpress.com/
http://lovethemup.com/
http://makeitgreat.typepad.com/
http://podcast.amanet.org/edgewise/category/customer-service/
http://www.thecustomercarenetwork.com/
http://www.customerthink.com/
http://www.mycustomer.com/customer_service_and_experience/
http://www.simplenomics.com/
http://www.yourcustomersmatter.com/
http://www.evilgeniusmarketing.com/ice/
http://www.callcenterscript.com/
http://www.customerservicemanager.com/customer-service-articles.htm
http://www.bazaarblog.com/
http://arc.typepad.com/customercrossroads/
http://experiencematters.wordpress.com/
http://www.freedyourmind.com/
http://nextup.wordpress.com/
http://thecustomerinstitute.blogspot.com/
http://contextrules.typepad.com/transformer/
http://maximumcustomerexperience.com/
http://www.goodexperience.com/
http://betuitive.blogs.com/beconnected/
http://netpromoter.typepad.com/
http://customerworld.typepad.com/swami_weblog/
http://cem.blogware.com/blog
http://www.slideshare.net/search/slideshow?q=customer+satisfaction&submit=post
http://www.600days.com
How many minutes did you spend today thinking about customer service?
I mean dedicated minutes of thinking time.
In response to specific requests from customers?
More generally about how to improve things for customers?
Or in small improvements to products and services, that customers will really notice?
How about when writing a brief or design to describe it from the customer experience, and really think about how the customer feels?
Getting [...]
Bad news is better than no news
A couple of recent airport escapades had me siting around with no information. From my point of view what happened in the first one was:
0545 – check in luggage for 0645 flight
0645 – in line with over half of the travellers ticketed and on the stairs to the gate
0715 – everybody already ticketed gets un-ticketed [...]
Customers are more important than internal customers
I have hear it suggested that:
internal customers are as important as external customers.
customer service lessons about customers can be related to internal customers
good internal customer service means that overall customer service will improve
meeting internal SLAs means that customers will be satisfied
many other variants of internal customers=external customers
And I disagree for the simple reason that it [...]