Socitm 2010 workshop: customer access & channel shift
Martin GreenwoodSocitm Insight
Some fundamentals• web is cheapest/best channel for many enquiries
• web is already the dominant customer channel
• channel shift has not been a priority until now
• many councils do not know volumes associated with main customer channels and how they are changing
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Where’s our data from? - 1
Better connected:
Socitm’s annual survey of all council websites
Every site reviewed by expert team from a customer perspective – tests usefulness and usability
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Where’s our data from? - 2Website take-up service
Used by 33% of all councils
Pop-up survey offered to one in five web users
What were they looking for did they find it, how good was the experience?
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Where’s our data from? - 3Channel value benchmarking
Small groups of councils
Compare cost, scope and value from all channels
Benchmarking to identify improvement
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Web is already the dominant channel
Listen to what customers do: not what they say they do
Source: GovMetric(May 2010)
Scale and growth of web enquiries
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Visits* Jan 10 Feb 10 Jul 10
Visits to WTS sites 17,941,295 11,045,691 13,124,962
Estimate for all UK 45.5m 30.9m 34.5m
Change for all UK Up 37.3% Up 5.3% Up 11.7%
Source: WTS. (Definition of visit conforms with CoI guidelines)
Web is the cheapest channel
• Face-to-face £7.40 per visit
• Phone £2.90 per call
• Web £0.32 per visitor
(Source:Socitm Insight, Aug 2010)
• Face-to-face £7.81• Telephone £4.00• Web £0.17
(Source NWeGG. 2006)
Also, another study (Apr 09)
• Face-to-face £5.51• Telephone £2.53• Web £0.17
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Web is not joined up with other channels - 1
According to Better connected 2010 just 49% of councils refer out of hours callers to the website
Better connected first reported on this telephone test in 2006 – when 20% referred callers to website
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Web is not joined up with other channels - 2
Result of recent survey for forthcoming customer access and online channel report
Q Are face-to-face, phone and web channels managed in the same or different departments/directorates?
A Same 55%Different 45%
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Q Did you find what you were looking for today ?
• 21.14% say ‘No, not at all’• 21.26% say ‘ Yes, in part’
Source: Website take-up service (April 2010)
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Websites not good enough for shift: evidence from Website take-up service
Cost of web visit failures
• Calculation is based on likelihood that customers will revert to more costly phone or f2f channel
• We ask customers for preferred channel after web• We multiply failures by alternative channel cost
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Web failures are costly
For the full year Cost of failure(£2.90 per failed visit)
Shire county £1.27mShire district £0.26m London borough £1.13mMet district £1.18mUnitary (E) £0.90mUnitary (W) £0.52mUnitary (S) £0.62m
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Understanding channel volumes and cost: the starting point for channel shift
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