Customer Service /
Virtual Communities

Hyperservice -- Serving Customer Communities in New and Better Ways
Virtual Communities -- Managing and Profiting from Empowered Customers

Internet-based communications media will radically transform the process of customer-vendor dialog over the next decade.

This is happening most rapidly in high-tech and business-to-business markets where customers and vendors are technically adept, and where customer communications and support needs are complex and time-sensitive.
It is also happening wherever customers have strong drives for knowledge and control.

These new approaches promise to enhance customer relationships while reducing support costs.

Enhanced support will improve customer relationships and increase follow-on sales.
Rich customer dialog will become central to the one-to-one marketing strategies of the future.
Support delivery will become more efficient by applying new and old methods in synergy.
Customers will demand rich, high quality online support as a key vendor qualifier.
Customers will gain power to choose businesses that serve them effectively
New business models will focus on managing and serving focused communities of customers

Companies who fail as early exploiters or quick followers will lose to more responsive competitors.

The needs

Customer dialog is an ongoing collaboration best aided by a combination of media channels. New media will not replace old media, nor will all communications be fully digital any time soon.

Web sites should gracefully complement call centers and help desks, as driven by user need and preference. For example, a Web site can include "call me now" buttons that trigger a live conversation -- after the customer has drilled down on the problem and decided he needs a person to help complete the solution process (one who sees where he has been so far, and can guide him through additional online content as they speak). Building this capability requires work on both the Web site and the call center.
Other "groupware" collaborative and messaging tools can also synergize with traditional processes. For example, newsgroup / bulletin board discussions can empower customers to help one another, and in turn feed a process of continuous refinement of documentation, FAQ's, and searchable knowledge bases.
Well-managed, focused, and active virtual communities can support free-standing businesses that generate rapidly increasing returns from vendor transactions and services, direct marketing, advertising, and sponsorships.

Exploiting these evolving opportunities takes a multidisciplinary team that combines vision with pragmatism -- to assess the options, set sound priorities, and gracefully transform a critical, ongoing process. It requires people who appreciate the new media, as well as the realities of business operations and support -- who can build new communications media that work alongside and in concert with existing media -- and who can apply strong project management and consensus building skills.

Our services

We can contribute in roles ranging from full-time leadership or participation in your team, to short, discrete projects. Tasks in which we can contribute or lead include:

Opportunity assessment
Strategy development and approval
Process analysis and reengineering
Systems analysis, architecture, and design
Proposals, white papers, consensus building
Infrastructure issues/resources/constraints (technical, operational, and organizational)
Project planning, coordination, and tracking
Task specification and sourcing
Web site content, design, navigation, and usability
External information services sourcing / controls
Needs and support analysis for:
- Knowledge base development / architecture
- Transaction processing / problem tracking
- Customer messaging and workflow processing
- Bulletin board discussion forums
IT development, operational support, service level management, and security/integrity controls

What we bring

Please contact us to explore how we can contribute to meeting your particular needs.

Contact Information

Richard R. Reisman, President, Teleshuttle Corporation
799 Broadway, New York, NY 10003
(212)-673-0225 fax: (212)-673-0226
e-mail: info@teleshuttle.com

Related items

Death of the Salesman? (Part 1): Does the Middleman have a role on the Web? A panel discussion with executives from IBM, Pinacor, American Express, Commercenet, and Gartner Group, presented by the MIT Enterprise Forum on 4/22/98 - transcript posted at Business Week Enterprise Online. (Organanized and moderated by Richard Reisman.) (Part 2.)
Web Marketers: Call-back to the Future with POTS!, a preview of the emerging coupling of the Web with Plain Old Telephone Service-based call centers.
Customer Service on the Web: Handling the E-mail Deluge
You can't get there from here: Integrating Web Marketing with Business Operations
The Media Foundry Resource Guide: a critical survey with links to selected resources

Richard R. Reisman: Capabilities Summary / Biography / Background Details
E-Business Consulting
Connective Media + Information Technology
Teleshuttle / The Media Foundry home page