Recently, I had a private martech experience that prompted me to take into consideration what is likely to be occurring behind the scenes.
I got here home to seek out a flier hanging from my doorknob from Xfinity, my web provider. My contract is ending soon, and the flier invited me to establish an appointment to talk with a sales representative over the phone to seek out a latest package to change to before my promotional pricing ends.
Xfinity likely wanted to stop me from visiting one in all its stores or attempting to call or initiate a chat conversation at a random time. One of those options would require me to attend in line, which rarely results in a positive customer experience — let alone waiting for me to wonder why my monthly bill increased by $30 or so.
While I’m still wondering why Xfinity sent someone to my home, I started speculating about what potentially is occurring here.
Removing friction from the renewal process
I reckon that a bunch at Xfinity liable for renewing customer contracts was challenged to seek out a solution to remove friction from the renewal process. A significant source of friction is a customer going to a store or reaching out via a call or chat to talk with a representative. Since this interaction is probably going unscheduled, the shopper likely will need to take a seat and wait to talk with someone.
In this case, by providing this flier, the shopper could scan the QR code to schedule a call in order that there could be less wait time and frustration for each the shopper and the representative.
A red flag
However, after I scanned the QR code, I used to be taken to a Microsoft Office 365 Forms page with a URL and UX that weren’t Xfinity-branded. It even asked me to trust getting a call from a random “1-800” number on top of that.
Xfinity is large enough to have the resources to construct branded forms, right? However, while its size grants it the power to supply branded forms, it also results in a bureaucracy that complicates creating such a branded experience.
In my case, this immediately threw red flags. Was this an elaborate phishing scam? So, I went right into a store anyway, waited far longer than I must have and patiently worked with a representative on my renewal, knowing full well that the front-line representative was just doing their job and wasn’t liable for the long wait and confusion.
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An uneven effort
This made me wonder why I had such an uneven experience. The try and smooth out an undesirable experience is sophisticated, however the unbranded form will not be.
My guess is that the group charged with smoothing out the renewal process is solely attempting to move on the speed of business, which the technical and operations folks couldn’t match. Perhaps they were told “no,” or that a branded experience would take some time to develop, in order that they decided to proceed with a workable short-term solution, which in lots of cases seems reasonable.
However, in my particular case, it only caused confusion. I’m removed from the one person whose fraud detection is all the time on alert. While the flier seemed legitimate, the unbranded form linked to the flier was suspicious.
Equipped to assist
Martech and MOps practitioners are well-suited to assist stakeholders understand the potential concerns regarding a plan of action. While a branded form is actually desired, many other needs compete for finite resources.
For instance, how comfortable are customers with unbranded experiences? While I admit that having that QR code link to a page linking to an unbranded form that requires an Xfinity customer to log in to their account could be clunky, that might have at the least made me much more comfortable filling it out.
Since I used to be uncomfortable enough about divulging personal information through an unbranded form, I endured the in-store wait that everybody was attempting to avoid. Further, I doubt I might write a few clunky customer experience, but I’m much more more likely to use a suspicious experience as fodder for my MarTech article.
Another way that martech practitioners may also help during such situations is to advocate for acquiring tools which might be far easier to brand or otherwise customize. Perhaps the corporate can procure and maintain a form builder for situations like this that may quickly provide a greater customer-facing experience while a longer-term solution is within the works.
This is an example of what Integration Platform as a Service (IPaaS) vendors are attempting to serve. Such low-code/no-code integration tools are helpful when things have to move on the speed of business, but there are some barriers to accomplishing them quickly.
Further, Workato’s “The Automation Mindset” book and podcast show how business and technical stakeholders can speed things up sustainably. iPaaS tools are value considering for martech stacks, but be sure that to guage such shiny things thoroughly.
This means martech practitioners have to think ahead by involving multiple stakeholders, establishing robust requirements and accommodating each legal and data security concerns. Martech is a team sport, in any case.
That’s why practitioners must remain alert and ready to supply solutions when such scenarios arise. This will help individuals, teams and the broad field prove value.
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Finding viable solutions
To be fair to Xfinity, I appreciate its desire to enhance the shopper experience. Personally, I feel that making an imperfect attempt is much better than ignoring an issue.
When martech and MOps practitioners are proactively on the lookout for such situations, they may also help business and technical stakeholders take the complete picture into consideration when workarounds are required to meet needs on the speed of business.
Dig deeper: 5 easy ways to enhance customer experience
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