Question

Topic: E-Marketing

Convincing Management For Online Redemption Portal

Posted by mothicy on 12/12/2012 at 5:45 AM ET 250 Points
My management is very old-fashioned and conservative in their communication style and go-to-market strategies. We run a loyalty programme for our customers. The points they accumulate with their loyalty card can be used to redeem items from our rewards catalogue via phone.

Currently, there has been high turnover at the customer service helpdesk staff. As such, I would like propose to develop an online web redemption portal to allow online redemption. With this, we may be able to slowly reduce incoming redemption calls. Our customers can just redeem the products online.

My problem is - how do I convince my management? Apart from the cost savings portion, I'm unable to convince them further to invest in this portal.

Seek your urgent help.

Thanks.
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RESPONSES

  • Posted by Moriarty on 12/12/2012 at 6:17 AM Member
    This will not be a positive message, because I try my best to remove such individuals from my sales funnel. It is easier to change yourself than anybody like your management. Sure they would pay me for my work, only I wouldn't see any of it implemented - and that wouldn't do me any good.

    However, if you can catch their attention and tell them a story ... which parallels your idea, you may have a chance. Intellectuals who have fixed ideas are notoriously easy to woo with a good story - if you can sit them down for long enough because they bore easily and want their answers on a plate.

    Mr Goodman works with corporate clients and no doubt has tackled with this sort of problem. I suggest getting in touch with him.

    Moriarty.
  • Posted by Jay Hamilton-Roth on 12/12/2012 at 7:36 AM Accepted
    From management's perspective, what problems exist in customer service? If the portal can be part of an initiative to solve these problems, then your solution could make good sense to them. Otherwise, you're solving a problem that they don't perceive, with questionable benefits.
  • Posted by Peter (henna gaijin) on 12/12/2012 at 12:02 PM Accepted
    Cost savings. I know you say apart from that, but in business, everything really comes down to the numbers. So if the portal can save costs, that would be important. And it does seem that this would be an excellent area to put on the web from a cost savings perspective. And the fact that you can't retain helpdesk staff, that is a sign that those costs likely will; go up (as pay or benefits or other costs go up to retain them).

    The other aspect is usage rates. I suspect as the general population moves more online, the number of people who are willing to go through a phone order process is declining. If you can show that your overall sales are growing by x% but the redemption rate is not keeping up, that shows a gap that perhaps an online portal can achieve.
  • Posted on 12/12/2012 at 12:36 PM Accepted
    How important is the loyalty program to the business? Maybe management is enjoying the slippage between points earned and points redeemed.

    "Why make it easier for people to redeem? It costs us money when they redeem. In fact, why spend money on Customer Service staff? They don't sell anything or generate revenue?"

    For senior managers who probably learned business skills before the internet was popularized, it's easy to see why they would rather direct resources toward marketing, manufacturing, sales, and even R&D. They don't fully appreciate how much online communication has come to permeate (and dominate) the lives of folks under the age of 30 (and many in their 40s or 50s too).

    My suggestion: Pick your battles. If this is the most important issue facing the company today, then it is worth the fight. But if it's not, direct your energies to something that will make more of a difference in the company's bottom line (and in the eyes of your management).
  • Posted by Gary Bloomer on 12/12/2012 at 4:30 PM Accepted
    Show them how much money it's costing them NOT to have an online solution. Break it down per day, week, month, and quarter.
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