Joining the dots:  The biggest problem with digital service design and how to solve it.

Published on 10/03/2021

Clever digital services that offer self-help for consumers are too often wasted because organisations aren’t using data to triage customers and logically connect multiple digital experiences.

Technology adoption and service transformation is alive and well. Brands in every sector have accelerated their shift to DIY service via mobile, web and app-based technology – as they should.

The problem for organisations seeking to ace the customer experience is not what’s possible though technology, it is how and when they tell their customers, which requires integration beyond the digital innovation itself.

This is the single biggest miss for businesses as they implement their transformation initiatives. Evidenced by brilliant solutions buried deep in websites – a situation that serves to limit both the customer adoption and ROI justification for technology investments made.

Why does this problem exist? Design thinking and sprint-based MVP’s are a blessing and a curse!

Brands care about their bottom line and their customer, which explains the swarm of activity to implement digitally powered interactions. These self-service or DIY tools often take user inputs to immediately action simple changes or deliver recommendations based on user inputs. Traditionally these are web powered but increasingly shifting to mobile apps or automated chat interactions. Examples are loan calculators, fare-finders or platforms to order takeaway food. Organisations benefit both from the operational efficiency (they do not need to hire folks to talk to customers) and improved customer satisfaction (24-hour service and not forcing customers to wait in queues for service).

To identify services which can be transformed with DIY service solutions, businesses often apply design thinking and concentrate innovation to the most pressing pain points. Automotive and Paints & Coatings are two sectors I have recently studied and each offers numerous examples for digital service improvement – a sampling of these service interactions organised around a simple buying process is shown below.

The examples illustrate that, regardless of the industry, analysing customer behaviours along a buyer’s journey will identify customer pain points and associated digital tools that make it easier for customers to interact and receive answers to commonly occurring problems. Each solution is a win for the customer – yet only relevant at their specific moment of need.

Design thinking is certainly highly effective to identify and ideate the highest priority solutions and thereafter agile / sprint-based executions enable rapid implementation. However, hurried market launches often miss the opportunity to step the customer on a logical path – with little consideration to connecting and sign-posting between digital experiences.

An example of this is in a home loan journey where there are tools for every step – finding the likely price of a property, calculating borrowing capacity, stamp duty, loan repayment amounts and budgeting. The missing stepping-stones between each create uncertainty for the customer and inconvenience in the form of duplication of data entry.

How the solution fits in the broader connected journey ecosystem can become a labyrinth for the customer to navigate. This is a major miss and opportunity where just a smidgen of additional thought is likely to significantly improve uptake, customer satisfaction and attribution to achieving an ROI outcome.

Using customer data to guide customers to the right tool and the right moment!

Digital self-service design needs to consider the full journey and the connectivity between key decision points within a connected experience.

Data and associated personalised marketing are crucial to ensure success of every self-service tool. Results from a recent implementation show more than 80% of participants using one self-help tool were sourced by a data insight and logical customer marketing outreach. In this case, the stand-alone tool would be a fraction of its success without data led communications encouraging the customer in the right direction.

Without question digital tools are valuable to the customer and this creates a significant data opportunity for personalised marketing. The convenience to the customer of using such a tool means they are often willing to offer their personal data as currency. That first-party data is priceless when it comes to downstream marketing and attribution – enabling transformative marketers to place a value of the said tool in the first place.

Importantly, where multiple experiences and convenience tools are offered by a brand, the data used to identify the customer is necessary so end-to-end marketing journeys can “connect the dots” and chaperone the customer between each tool.

Example of transparent data collection during an experience by Expedia.

The recipe for a data driven implementation is quite simple but itself creates a momentous improvement in customer experience. Anticipating the customer by studying data is akin to a salesperson observing and listening within a physical interaction. Sales leaders learn from every customer interaction, understanding where each customer is in a process and acting accordingly. The same needs to apply to digital leadership, where we listen through data and drive 1:1 communication accordingly.

Acknowledging each customer (and their pathway) is unique is also important. That is, the speed and order of events which the customer may undertake is up to the individual – some take longer to get from A to B while others take a less than linear approach. An analysis of a vehicle buying process (and vastly varied pathways) demonstrates this perfectly.

Illustration – pathways to purchase a new vehicle.

Visibility of the goal enables attribution and justifies further investment.

Disconnected experiences that don’t track users across each step (or to the end goal) are short sighted. It not only makes it difficult for the customer but also for the brand – because brand owners end up flying blind in terms of customer outcomes.

Building digital tools that solve customer problems without connecting the dots and identify the pathway each customer travels, is a missed opportunity. It’s a bit like your local council building a new bus route and each stop, while forgetting about the bus to carry the customers!

The lesson for improved service outcomes and ROI.

In the age of 2021, customers are discerning and expectant of genuine service – they detest queuing and repetitive entry of form data. Similarly brands and their commercial owners are demanding – they need to know the value each digital experience will have and has had on measured profitability.

Hence, brands implementing digitally led customer solutions need to think about solving customer micro problems simultaneous with the end-to-end customer process.

A unified data strategy must be central to all transformations. Data enables brands to learn about the customer, anticipate their needs and track them through an experience. The value is evident to the customer when they receive relevant downstream information, or they are guided toward solutions contextual to their broader need.

Data collection works best when conducted with transparency and incentivised by the genuine experience benefits that follow.

With the right data it’s possible to drive personalised journeys that connect every step of an experience. It’s also possible to see exactly how many customers go on to complete the desired end-goal.

Build your knowledge and marketing power

Keen to know more? You’ve gained further understanding on joining the dots between your digital tools and leveraging CRM to maximise the opportunity. For more, follow Track for regular insights and ideas.

Or let’s chat. I’m always up for feedback or hearing your own product experiences and business challenges.