Only 16% of Participants Ranked Creating Direct Customer Relationships Among Their Top Three Priorities NEW YORK, May 21
NEW YORK, May 21 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Dimension Data, a $3.8 billion
IT solutions and services provider, today announced that organizations in the
$130 billion worldwide contact center industry are not fully leveraging
Customer Relationship Management (CRM) initiatives and instead are focusing on
improving operational efficiencies, reducing costs and improving services. The
findings are part of the 2008 Dimension Data Contact Center Benchmarking
Report, which includes survey responses from 300 contact centers in 36
countries across five continents.
"Minimal progress has been made in adopting a more customer-oriented, CRM-
based approach within the contact center over the last 10 years since the
Benchmarking Report was initiated," said Alex George, Dimension Data
spokesperson for the Benchmarking Report. "When we compared this year's
findings with those from our inaugural report, the picture is not positive."
A key CRM indicator is the establishment of a single view of the customer.
Ten years ago, 39% of participating contact centers already possessed this
capability, with an additional 45% planning to implement a single view within
two years. However, this year's results show a 13% decrease from 10 years ago
-- with only 34% of centers possessing a single customer view.
In addition, 10 years ago, many organizations said they intended to deploy
a more sophisticated set of customer metrics within their contact centers,
including ways to gauge customer lifetime value and profitability. However,
this year's statistics reveal that only a minority of contact centers are able
to measure or actively employ these types of metrics. For example, less than
10% of centers surveyed have the capability to measure lifetime value, and
only 18% of centers use customer profitability as a metric.
Another key CRM indicator is the deployment of 'trigger events' within
inbound customer service contact centers. These events involve, for example,
initiating calls to customers as a result of the nature or outcome of their
previous inbound calls. These trigger events usually address customer
dissatisfaction, retention of a customer or a revenue generation matter.
According to this year's report, only 21% of contact centers actively engage
in this type of customer management activity.
"These findings indicate that the development of a more holistic and
sophisticated approach to customer management is less of a priority today than
it was 10 years ago, and there is a back-to-basics trend with contact centers
focusing more on basic performance efficiencies and cost reduction," George
said. "This is also reflected in the commercial drivers of contact centers.
Only 16% of participating centers ranked 'creating direct customer
relationships' among their top three commercial drivers, compared with over
50% 10 years ago. This underscores that there has been a major shift away from
the tenets of CRM over the last decade."
About Dimension Data
Dimension Data (LSE: DDT.L), a specialist IT services and solutions
provider, helps clients plan, build, support and manage their network and IT
infrastructures. Dimension Data applies its expertise in networking, security,
operating environments, storage and contact center technologies and its unique
skills in consulting, integration and managed services to create customized
client services. For more information: Call 866-DIDATA-US or visit
www.dimensiondata.com/na.
About the Global Contact Center Benchmarking Report
First published in the UK in 1997 by Merchants, Dimension Data's
specialist contact center outsourcing and operations division, this year's
edition is the tenth in a series of the industry-renowned benchmarking
reports. The report has balanced global and industry representation from 300
contact centers located across 36 countries and five continents, and is an
invaluable reference for all contact center professionals. It provides
managers with a set of best practice standards and benchmarks, including
staffing and training, performance metrics, technology usage, budgets and
development plans. The report is researched and published by Dimension Data.
For more information about the report, please go to www.ccbenchmarking.com
Media Contacts:
Lisa Grimes Nancy Pieretti
Dimension Data Davies Murphy Group
(703) 217-2692 (781) 418-2424
lisa.grimes@us.didata.com npieretti@daviesmurphy.com
http://www.dimensiondata.comhttp://www.daviesmurphy.com
SOURCE Dimension Data
