Service Providers Lack Companywide Definition of Superior Customer Experience

A new global study of service providers in the wireless, wireline cable and satellite markets found that although service providers are transforming their business and operations support systems (BSS/OSS) to address the obstacles they believe are preventing them from delivering a differentiated customer experience, nearly 50 percent do not have a clear definition of what the customer experience should be. In addition, the study identified the top obstacles for delivering a more personalized customer experience: the lack of an integrated view of the customer; business process inconsistency and disconnects across multiple business lines, and internal information silos.

The study, sponsored by Amdocs and conducted by the Yankee Group, an independent technology research and consulting firm, also revealed that while 70 percent of service providers believe that business processes have a direct impact on the customer experience, nearly one third (28 percent) do not have dedicated resources to manage their internal business processes or customer-focused key performance indicators to measure the customer experience.

Other findings include:

-- Digital content management is a top priority for new revenue engines: Management of "on-portal" digital content, or content sold on the service provider's branded-portal, is the top investment area for service providers looking to capitalize on new revenue streams.

-- Service providers are investing to create an integrated view of the customer: Master data management (for example, the ability to consolidate customer, product and network data), unifying BSS/OSS systems and the adoption of service oriented architectures are among the top transformation investment priorities for service providers in the next three to five years.

-- Measurement expected to shift to the customer perspective: Although key performance indicators (KPIs) used for measuring the customer experience are operations-oriented today (for example, the average time it takes to service a customer on the phone), 47 percent of respondents expect their companies to adopt more customer-focused KPIs in the future (such as, the call center agent is aware of a customer's past complaints during an interaction).

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