Apples, oranges and bananas

A couple of weeks ago on Twitter there was a flurry of promotion for a new account, City of Sanctuary Manchester. I'd heard a little about the movement in other cities so clicked through to the webpage and saw they were looking for support. I've done various bits of volunteer work in the past and it's sometimes tricky to feel that you'll be able to make a difference in a new group but I got in touch with their only paid member of staff, the enthusiastic Lynda.

Strike the match and the unknown

"The trust to communicate cannot await the other person's promise to reciprocate or the conversation will never begin"

Iris Marion Young

I'm a great believer in measuring, clicks, engagement, verbal feedback and conversions. This is probably what drew me to digital marketing in the first place. Last week I came up with an idea for a little campaign that didn't really allow for any of this. 

Social media: mundane to inspirational

Digital engagement for Bolton at Home can mean anything from online repairs enquiries to our staff chatting with customers through Facebook. We offer our staff training on using social media and are encouraged to use it to communicate where it fits with their job role. For more formal corporate services we have an IT and customer access strategy which is at introducing how we embed digital services across the business.

Challenges faced are similar when introducing new ways to engage to both staff and customers. Customers will generally only get involved when they need something – to campaign against bedroom tax, to contact someone when they have no phone credit or to make a complaint.

Learning and inspiration from others at the IOFNW conference

Slightly belated post on the Institute of Fundraising’s NorthWest conference...

Running a charity in evenings and one day a week doesn’t leave much time for stepping back and reflecting on what you do and having being offered a bursary by conference sponsor TPP it was fantastic to be able to have time and space to be able to spend time with other fundraisers and consider what we need to be doing as an organization.

A day in the life of a CDO

Written for the Bolton at Home blog: www.boltonathomeblog.org

Above a row of shops on Kentmere Road the offices for the East Neighbourhood Team are freshly painted and carpeted. ‘It’s much better than our last offices’ Lisa tells me as everyone makes their lunch in the kitchen and I explain how I’d been to their old building by mistake; ‘They’ve knocked some walls down and it’s made it brighter.’ The walls are peppered with Latin sayings, original artworks and an ‘In case of fire’ checklist with a photo of flames and a tick boxes with the staff names against them.

Human Rights, healthcare and debate

On one of those days where you’re wondering why you’re spending your day off at a Human Rights seminar, the availability of reasonable priced parking outside the door of the venue was the first hint that this would be a good day.

Realising human rights are about my work

At the initial refreshments, where that “first day of school” feeling can so easily creep back in, I was instantly made to feel at ease with the people who joined me at my table. It was refreshing to meet people from a range of backgrounds who were all really passionate about their jobs. Having initially signed up for the seminar with my work with refugees in mind I soon realised that the content was also really relevant to my ‘day job’ at a housing association.

David vs Goliath

This week has been an education in good customer service and has demonstrated how often it's the smaller businesses who do it best.

Today I have spent over an hour and a half on the phone to Orange, EE, or whatever they call themselves now trying to upgrade my phone. I am given two ways to do this; online or over the phone. As is now usual the deal is better online and I understand that this is because it is cheaper for them. However when this does not work, and I quote; "How do you know it hasn't worked?" "I haven't received a confirmation email or text ...or a new phone," it might have been cheaper for them to fix it over the phone on Monday rather than leave me, still phoneless, awaiting my fifth phone call of the week having tried three times myself online. I could get started on how their website logged me out three times whilst I was trying to navigate it* but I won't.

In between speaking to the polite but hopelessly unhelpful people in various Orange customer service teams I have also been waiting for some banners to be delivered. The firm, onestoppromotions.co.uk have produced them for me in superquick time and been very nice about my failure to meet their 'safe' copy deadlines. This morning I called to check the banners had been dispatched and they were able to confirm, without me knowing my order number, that they had. Then they gave me my tracking number and the number of the courier, www.apc-overnight.com and said I could contact them directly for more information.

APC overnight's number was answered without me being placed in a queue and each time I called the person I spoke to could retrieve my request with the tracking number, know exactly what I was requesting and where the driver was and each tried to get hold of the driver to get an update for me. Everyone I spoke to was friendly and each offered me a new 'Plan B' option when I explained that I really needed the parcel by Monday morning.

And its not just today. A couple of weeks ago I got the most amazing customer service from an airport transfer company, www.british-airport-transfers.co.uk, on behalf of one of the charity's clients. Again whoever you spoke to was able to promptly bring up my details, was helpful, proactive and reassuring and took even the most specialist requests (Tamil speaking driver) in their stride. And I only have the highest of praise for the poor taxi driver who put up with constant calls asking 'Are they there yet?'

In contrast BA customer service were unable to even tell me what the 'Special Assistance' they offer might include when I was booking it for one of our more vulnerable clients.

I understand that with flights and contracts more security is required and the staff I'm talking to are probably less empowered to make decisions or use their initiative but does that need to be the case?

We're looking at a new contact centre and CRM system at Bolton at Home and we need to make sure that this improves the services we can offer to customers rather than overcomplicate the situation. As a customer I don't understand why the person I speak to on the phone isn't able to see my online self service activity and if I'm honest I don't care. If I contact an organisation through whatever channel I think it's their job to be able to join up the dots and I hope that we're going to be able to offer this for our customers.



*Also picked up some lessons in how not to design a website. If your staff can't find the page, your customer can't find the page and the search function can't find the page perhaps you need to look at your navigation. Thankyou to whoever invented internet history.