Purple Patch Blog

What to do when people are talking about you, not to you …

By Dawn Varley

This week I had two very different customer experiences, one very good and one very bad. What was really interesting was how I talked about them (you know that a good story spreads, but a bad story spreads faster…), and how they then unfolded – all thanks to my new best friend, twitter.

On Monday I was working from home, in part because things just fell that way, and in part because I was expecting a delivery. One that had been due to arrive the previous Friday, but had failed to show. As a fairly recent convert to twitter (c 3months and loving it) I tweeted my annoyance, mentioned the company, and got a tweet reply saying ‘We will be in touch, thanks’. Wow, I thought, that’s fast, and was happy it was being sorted. But I heard nothing after that, and so went ahead and re-arranged delivery online. Slightly annoying, but all good so far, or so I thought.

Monday arrived, and although I had parcels to take to the Post Office for relatives in Australia (it was last posting day for Christmas) I duly sat and waited. And waited. Whilst I waited my mobile rang, and it was a very bouncy chap calling from Christian Aid, following up my text donation to their mosquito net appeal. He launched into his script, and was furiously thanking me for my support, so much so that I had a hard time trying to butt in. Thank you, I said, but I was called a couple of months back after the original text, and I said then I didn’t want any more calls. He apologised, said it would be noted, and rang off. I was a bit annoyed about being disturbed this way, as I think if I’ve told you how I want to be contacted you should record it and stick to it. And I used to work for Christian Aid, so I know the CRM system can and does record ‘Do not phone’ flags. Indeed I used to import them onto the system. So, guess what I did? Yep, I tweeted. It was a polite tweet, but it did name check Christian Aid, whilst pointing out how important it is to record donor preferences. And then I got back to waiting for my delivery (Post Office now closed, sorry Aus rels, your parcels will be late)… Monday evening came and went. No delivery in sight, so another tweet, and a big complaint email, sent to the company.

Tuesday arrived and all was quiet from the delivery company. But I got a lovely reply from Christian Aid, asking for my details so they could investigate the problem with the lack of call suppression. I was very impressed. Not only is that good customer service, it’s good customer service via a channel that they have to pro-actively listen too. After all, I was talking about them, not to them. But they still heard, knew it was important to resolve, and got in touch. A few direct messages later and the mystery was revealed – a duplicate record for me on the system. As a database person I can understand that – it happens. One record was my full supporter details with name and address, and the other just my name and mobile number. I wouldn’t let the system merge me on that basis  - it could be two different people. The nice folks at Christian Aid explained that, apologised, and set to sorting it. Fantastic. I of course duly name checked them and their great supporter care in a tweet, am likewise thanking them now, and may even use this as a case study for a future seminar. Good stories can go far.

The moral of this story I think is that, whatever your business, delivering parcels to customer, or selling your cause to supporters, these days you have to be where the conversations about you are happening. And that’s facebook and twitter as the headline social media arenas. And you can’t just broadcast, you have to listen. And if you hear your name you should reply, in the right circumstances, but ideally you should also record those interactions. If I’m talking about you on twitter then I’m telling people about you – that’s an important piece of information to know. Ideally you should record that on your CRM – but I don’t know many organisations who are. Are you? I wonder if Christian Aid is. I think they just might, they seem to be savvy folks.

As for my delivery, as I arrived home late Tuesday evening I passed a very annoyed delivery man coming out of my block, wheeling away my parcel. I managed to intercept it and all is now sorted. Not sure I’ll be taking my business back there again in a hurry though. Sometimes the corporate world can learn from the not for profit one, and this is a case in point.

 

 

 

The new era: Social CRM explained

Can you answer the following questions?

• What is the online profile of your donorbase?
• What is the ROI of your new media budget?
• What are people tweeting about your organisation right now?
• Have you considered using an iPhone app?
• What % of internet statistics are made up?
• How do you know what to believe?

Apparently, there’s another e-revolution going on!  Are you up to speed?  Ahead of the curve?  On the bandwagon?  It’s easy to feel alarmed by experts with sensational claims and exciting ideas that don’t seem to relate to the reality of your next newsletter or fundraising event.

 

But, despite the hype and fads, we believe that online social media does represent a profound change in the relationship between supporters and non-profit organisations.  This is not because the internet is cheaper or faster or funkier than the old methods; it’s because your supporters can get what they need without you!

 

  

Despite the theory, under the model of CRM in use by most fundraisers today, relationships are, in fact, geared around the cause and not the supporter.  Think about it; who decides what the key issues are, which people might be interested, and when to launch communications?  But with social networking tools like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, the balance of power has shifted to your supporters.

 

In the past, if your supporter wanted to find out about one of your fundraising events, they visited your web site.  If they wanted to complain about you, they wrote you a letter. If they wanted to find like-minded supporters, they phoned and you might direct them to a local volunteer branch. Now, they do all of these things without you even knowing!

 

  

Maybe you have already encountered social media and tried it out for yourself?  You probably have your own Facebook page or Twitter account? And perhaps you have identified ways to exploit it for your organisation?  But do you know how this affects all your other fundraising activities?  How does it relate to your events, your campaigns, your service delivery, and all that information in your CRM system?

 

 

See our full article at http://www.purple-vision.com/news-item.asp?Auto_ID=34

What is the point of the Single Supporter View?

At the IoF IT Group Conference yesterday, I was involved in a discussion on the "single supporter view". As the debate progressed, it became apparent that some people were talking about IT and database intergaration, whist others were re-examining the concept itself.

Especially in light of new ideas in online fundraising based aroud social networks, I wonder if the accepted wisdom of the centralisation of data, also known as the 360-degree view, is still valid?

Are you in favour or not? And what's the point of it anyway?

To prompt discussion, I've created a LinkedIn poll. Please cast your vote at:
http://polls.linkedin.com/p/38072/pkouv

And/or simply post your thoughts here ...

If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck … it must be The Raiser’s Edge!

The Raiser’s Edge version 8 revolution is coming (in 2010 we hear).

Using an all-new ‘Infinity’ platform based on Microsoft’s .net technology, Blackbaud’s flagship product will be transformed into an open and accessible tool that integrates with a growing range of third party solutions, especially online tools.

When (and if) existing users choose to accept the upgrade to version 8 they will automatically adopt the new technology, but to ease this transition it will be built to look and feel (and quack) much like the current beloved product.

But the big change comes for larger players. The same Infinity platform will be used for a new product called Enterprise CRM. This will enable Blackbaud customers to mix and match different solutions to suit the needs of the whole organisation – including back office, local branches, head office, web, service delivery, marketing – all in one joined up architecture.

This is important because it takes a big step towards the holy grail of the 360-degree customer view and total relationship management. In future, you will be able to look at an individual and see not only their recent donations and communications preferences but also their history of services used, online interaction and any other relevant links to your organisation.

Our sources at Blackbaud liken their new technology to lego!  Buy the simple model and it comes out just like the picture on the box; buy the big kit and you can build it the way you want.  Crucially, it all fits together all the time.

“Bring it on” I hear you cry!  But Blackbaud are not planning to launch these new products until they have credible anchor clients up and running successfully.  We have all read that Oxford University is the first high profile early adopter, and we hear that others are likely to be announced in the next few weeks.

It's membership, Jim, but not as we know it ...

At the NCVO's Annual Conference last week, Matthew Taylor led a thought provoking workshop on the future of membership.

Working with membership organisations quite a lot, we see all sorts of clients with various kinds of stakeholders at different stages in their lifecycle (birth, growth, maturity etc) and most are struggling to work out how to relate to (what they call) their 'members' in light of new technology.

One client recently described our work to help introduce web 2.0 as 'giving the organisation back to its members'. Those that don't understand what he meant are beginning to lose out, their old momentum, thought leadership and influence is seeping away to spontaneous new spaces - like online groups, wikis and open media.

In this way, open source disempowers traditional membership organisations but also nurtures new forms of social capital. I agree with the conclusion in the workshop that "membership as we know it" is seriously under threat - but I regard this as refreshing not depressing.

I wonder what happens to organisations after they get to maturity in that lifecycle model? Is there a further stage? Could they disintegrate, regenerate, or regroup? I see parallels with the classic Boston Matrix. It's all rather interesting and I will be following closely the progress of the research project initiated by Karl Wilding and his team at NCVO.