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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