|
A few days ago I received a phone call
from a business friend. His client was in a crisis. Hackers
had stolen customers' credit card information stored
on the server, and were making purchases with the stolen
information. Their Web site vendor was in a complete
denial until the FBI came in and traced the perpetrators
to Russia. What could they do? How could they keep their
online business operational?
In such a case, protecting the trust your customers
have given you and minimizing risk exposure to the company
are the most critical strategies. We quickly developed
a transition plan, making sure we were in step with the
FBI's evidence gathering process. After we had received
authorization from the FBI, we quickly archived the site
and deleted all the data from the server. We discontinued
the old site, which obviously had severe security leaks,
and made plans for a new site on a new server. Within
hours, we e-mailed all their customers informing them
their credit card information might have been compromised
and advising them to contact their credit card issuers
immediately if they suspected inappropriate activities.
We provided the name and contact information of a key
person in the company whom customers could call to have
their concerns addressed.
No customer is happy when a situation like this occurs.
In this instance, customers were naturally worried but
were very appreciative of the decisive moves the company
made to protect their data, inform them, and close all
security gaps. The company had taken crucial steps to
preserve the trust their customers had in the company.
There are a lot of deceptive and illegal activities
on the Web. There are probably no more crooks on the
Web than off, but e-mail has made it so much easier and
cheaper to lure potential victims by blanket spamming
everyone. Trustworthiness is at or close to the top of
the list for most consumers when deciding whether to
purchase or do business online. This is why it is tough
for a start-up to build its business primarily through
online operations. In the go-go dot-com days, in an effort
to build trust, a then well-funded online business sent
its empty trucks touring New York daily simply to create
an impression that it was more than just an online presence.
In working with clients on developing their Web strategy,
almost invariably we have found the trust of their customers
to be a competitive advantage, and an invaluable asset
to build value for their company. Obviously they need
to offer goods and services that meet the needs of the
marketplace, but to attract and keep customers, they
also need to have earned their customers' trust. With
Web sites becoming more and more interactive, businesses
are looking for more ways to capture leads and customer
data on the Web. Customer data collection is now a major
battleground, and if companies do not pay serious attention,
it can end up as their Waterloo.
Dot-coms on their death beds sold the only valuable
asset they had: customer and prospect lists. The information
you provided to a now defunct online shop may have been
rented and sold multiple times. Major corporations are
equally irking consumers by the way they handle customer
data. Double Click just settled for close to half a million
dollars on a 30-month, multi-state investigation into
the online advertising firm's use of consumers' personal
data. Microsoft agreed to oversight on how it uses the
data it collects through its Passport online consumer
identity program. Consumers have their antennae up every
time they are asked to provide their information online:
Will the Web site sell my information? Will someone else
have access to my information? Can I trust the company.
While people are more careful, they certainly do not
withhold their information. The Web has become such a
fact of life in researching, obtaining services, and
buying that people are willing to trade the risks for
convenience. We have found that Web sites that have developed
a good rapport with and have earned the trust of their
customers can be very successful in obtaining specific
information from customers about their product-related
preferences. They are also successful in convincing visitors
to opt-in to receiving communications.
The questions companies have to address are how to build
on the trust customers have given them to create value
and how to safeguard against abusing that trust. We have
found that having a sound strategy on managing online
customer data, and sticking to the strategy, is critical.
Do you have an online privacy policy? What does it say
about what information is collected and how the information
is acted upon? Will the information only stay within
the company the customer trusts, or will the information
be shared with others? If it is shared, will the customer
have the option to opt-out of such sharing? If the customer
changes his mind about opting in, will his wish be honored
promptly.
More and more companies are broadcasting to everyone
on their customer and contact lists anything from an
e-mail newsletter to a product announcement to a press
release to Thoughts of the Day. Broadcast e-mail is inexpensive
since much of the cost has been shifted from the sender
to the recipients and everyone else who has to pay for
the Internet infrastructure. The e-mail distribution
tools and service providers in today's marketplace have
simplified the tasks of sending messages, managing e-mail
lists, honoring opt-out requests, and deleting invalid
e-mail addresses. Companies can track who has received
messages, and who has shown an interest in clicking on
links to specific pages in the company Web site.
These tools might seem like a marketer's dream come
true, but abusing them can backfire. A company once sent
me a series of such e-mail sales calls. The salesperson
then proceeded to follow up with e-mail and phone messages
announcing his knowledge of what, when, and if I had
shown an interest based on the clicks they had monitored.
In this instance, abusing customer data resulted in lost
interest and lost sales.
We have found that a broadcast e-mail strategy can be
very effective in building value for a company only if
the customer has requested the e-mail, the message contains
information of value to the customer, the message offers
a recommendation the customer can act upon, and the business
does not abuse the communication tool. As more and more
uninvited e-mail messages and spam pour in, people will
increasingly tune out e-mail from anyone not on their
must-read list. Companies that bombard e-mail boxes with
messages may find they have created such a bad impression
in the mind of their target audience that their messages
will be greeted with prompt action on the delete button.
Good business practice makes equal sense on the Web
and off the Web. A company that truly respects its customers
and their time and privacy, and has a well thought-out
policy in place to safeguard customer data, will rightfully
earn the trust of its customers and build value for its
business in the long run.
Copyright Eva Chiu and InfoAdvantage.
E-Business
Articles >
|
