Apple teaches Telstra about customer experience

The new Apple store opened in Sydney to much fanfare this week. According to reports people came from as far afield as California just to be there when the store opened. And what a gleaming, glass fronted store it is.

On visiting the store I was struck by the proximity to Telstra’s much heralded T Life store, literally just across the road. Telstra launched the T Life store with much ceremony. To quote Telstra’s CEO, Mr Sol Trujillo:

It provides one of the most compelling customer experiences that can be found anywhere in the world and will be a key differentiator in the market.

(Oh the irony! Apple must be having quite a laugh.)

For those of you who haven’t ventured into Telstra’s store, it is a very pleasant single story wooden floored shop. It is customer experience in a fairly minimalist way, but certainly quite a step compared to other Telstra shops.

“Key differentiator in the market”? I think not.

The shop is now dwarfed in all terms by the Apple experience just across the road. What now Telstra?

On the day of my visit to the Apple store, two Telstra staff were outside the shop desperately trying to drum up interest in a free raffle. The contrast between the two stores, and the attitudes of staff and customers towards them was marked.

Matt Jones’ on social software and social networks

I was catching up on some blogs and came across Matt Jones’ presentation on Social Software and Social Networks at Adaptive Path’s MX conference. Matt’s the co-founder and lead designer at Dopplr. Matt has long been banging the drum of social networking - and his presentation gives a great introduction to his thinking. Well worth a clickthrough.

I particularly liked the quote he chose to describe serendipity from Julius Comroe Jr.

Serendipity is looking in a haystack for a needle and discovering a farmer’s daughter.

Makes you want to go out and do more research!

Trends in blog activity

I have been writing this blog for around a year now. Periodically I look at the stats provided by the WordPress Dashboard (call me vain but it is nice to know you’re being read!).

When I look at the unique visitors by day there are two things that stand out clearly:

• Saturday is always the day with the lowest number of visitors.
• Monday is always the day with the most or second most traffic.

What does this mean? As with any data I could read endless things into the pure statistics. What I need is a bit of insight provided by user research to augment the raw data.

I wonder if other bloggers have similar experiences?

Can advertising kill?

Apologies for the sensationalism of the post title (I did used to work for News Limited!), but I spotted this on my way to work this morning:

Which all fine and dandy until you see the context in which the advert is placed:

Is it really responsible and sensible to put a large slogan saying in bold capitals “RED MEANS GO” next to a set of traffic lights?

I am slightly worried that there is a hint of nanny state coming out in my reaction to this, but in a culturally mixed city such as Sydney, such an advert feels like it could lead to accidents

It also got me wondering, is red universally used as a stop sign on traffic lights? Seem like it is according to Wikipedia. But even so, if I were in a new country and saw a bold sign saying “RED MEANS GO” I might assume that I walked/accelerated on red even if it wasn’t what I was expecting (after all everything else in Australia is upside-down so the traffic lights could be kooky too).

Can customer service ever be too good?

A couple of recent exceptional customer experiences have left me wondering whether returns policies can ever be so good that it actually has a negative affect on your perception of a company.

Experience 1: Amazon’s returns policy

We ordered a copy of series 4 of The Wire from Amazon about 4 months ago. What with having a baby and various other DVD’s to catch up on, we finally got around to breaking the cellophane at the weekend only to discover that the box contained two disk 4’s but no disk 1!

My wife emailed Amazon and we got the following response:

Thank you for contacting Amazon.co.uk.

Firstly, please allow me to apologise for the issues you have experienced with this item.

I have placed a new order #xxx-xxxx-xxxx for “The Wire: Complete HBO Season 4″, and it will be dispatched as soon as possible to the same address.

To view the availability time and an estimation of the dispatch date of the replacement order, please visit Your Account on our home page

http://www.amazon.co.uk

There will of course be no additional charge for the replacement order. When sending a replacement for a damaged or defective item, it is our policy to request that you must return the original item to Amazon.co.uk within 30 days. However, as the cost of returning the package is in this case prohibitively expensive, we ask that you keep the original item with our compliments. Perhaps you would like to donate it to a charity in your area if you feel it would be appropriate to do so.

I have added the bold to emphasize the bit that I found most surprising.

Experience 2: Apple’s (or Next Byte Apple’s reseller in Sydney) returns policy

A couple of weeks ago a colleague mentioned that he returned his non-functioning, 12 month old iPod to the authorised Apple reseller (Next Byte) he bought it from, and after an inspection they replaced it with a new iPod.

Would the iPod be cheaper if I wasn’t paying everyone else’s insurance?

My first reaction to the Amazon experience was that it is truly excellent customer service, but my first reaction to the Apple experience was “so that’s why my iPod costs so much!”. Is this just because one of these experiences happened to me and one happened to a colleague? Possibly.

Maybe if my new model iPod stopped working after 12 months I’d be very thankful for this policy, but if the cost of my iPod includes insuring everyone else’s iPod it makes me feel differently about the basic cost of the product. Does this make me a bad person?

I am left with the question “Would the iPod be cheaper if I wasn’t paying for the insurance on everyone else’s device?”

I suppose it comes down to whether Next Byte check whether it is mechanical failure, or a user inspired problem. I am quite happy if it is only for product mechanical failures, but if I’m insuring someone who has just dropped their iPod in the bath for the 3rd time I am slightly aggrieved.

(I am not sure whether my colleagues experience is Next Byte’s standard policy, or whether he sweet-talked them into giving him a new product, certainly they don’t seem to make much of a song and dance about this policy.)

Amazon: a messy alternative to tabs

It feels like a momentous occasion in Internet terms - and long overdue in my opinion. Amazon’s latest redesign has got rid of those tabs!

As acknowledged by Amazon themselves in their explanation of the redesign, the expansion of their product range made it difficult for navigation tabs to support the breadth of their product range.

Despite applauding their move away from tabs, I am less than impressed by the navigation solution they’ve ended up with. The expanding navigation requires mouse dexterity that will leave many users frustrated, and this is further compounded by the fact that the department headings are not themselves links.

It is fine to use expanding navigation, it enables users to get greater context of the contents of an area before clicking, but you should always make the navigation label a link. This enables less dexterous users to progress without having to perform mouse gymnastics.

Amazon say the redesign is a result of much customer consultation, I only hope they get some usability testing done with users with average to poor mouse skills sooner rather than later.

5 ways to improve customer service in call centres

Over the last few years I’ve conducted a number of contextual research studies in call centres. It is an interesting environment in which to conduct contextual research. Generally I’ve double-jacked in to calls, observing how the customer service consultants address the queries, and then asked a few questions of the customer service consultants.

Common call centre problems

Although there have been specific issues in each call centre I’ve conducted research studies, there have been a number of common issues. Namely:

• The customer service application is not used during training. Instead training teaches the consultants to take and rely on hand-written notes. They become familiar and trusting of these as a quick resource for addressing queries. This is an issue for a number obvious reasons; paper doesn’t get updated, their notes may not even be accurately recorded, etc.

• Consultants have no mechanism for suggesting improvements and updates to the system. If customer service consultants know one piece of information to be inaccurate, it undermines their trust in all other information on the system.
• Staff are commonly incentivised to complete calls in the shortest amount of time. Besides a whole heap of other issues that this form of incentivisation may lead to, it also encourages consultants to go with the quickest way of finding an answer to a customer query. Encouraging speed rather than use of the information system increases the risk that customer service consultants will provide inaccurate answers.
• For the reasons listed above, printed reference materials abound within call centre environments. I even once found a printed reference guide titled “Things you won’t find on the intranet”! Rather than ban printed materials and send these underground (as many call centre management do), I wonder if there is a way for management to ensure that printed materials are up-to-date and accurate.
• Management are oblivious to any of the above and find it a real kick in the stomach when I deliver my research findings.

5 ways to improve customer service

From these common findings I’ve extracted 5 ways in which most (if not all) call centres could be improved:

1. Use the customer service information system during training.
2. Encourage suggestions for improvements to the information system, and resolve the suggestions quickly and publicly.
3. Incentivise new staff by use of the information system, not time to complete calls.
4. Use colour co-ordinated official print-outs that are changed as regularly as your environment requires, this enables management to at a glance check to see what versions of print materials staff are using.
5. Management should walk the floor regularly, but not in an intimidating way, and double-jack in to calls for a period of time is a great mechanism for seeing what really goes on.

Tobii eye tracking

I was given a demo of the Tobii T60 eye tracking software by James Breeze last week. Eye tracking software has come a long way since the last time I investigated it. In laymans terms, the T60 is a clever monitor that has uses beams/sensors to monitor where on the page you are looking. There is absolutely no funny head-gear required!

Although a very slick and impressive presentation, I was left with many questions and concerns about using this for usability testing.

It only works when the participant is close to the monitor

The T60 relies on you being within a specific distance of the monitor. Although vastly superior to old-school eye tracking, this felt awkward when I used the product and certainly restricts the use of the product to “lean forward” interaction experiences (despite what they may say about using it for “sit back” experiences such as watching videos, etc).

A colleague mentioned that other eye tracking products, such as faceLAB, are far less restrictive in terms of movement and proximity to the sensors.

I can imagine that this distance limitation could be problematic and require the facilitator to constantly remind the participant to “move closer”.

The heatmap produced by the product is misleading

The heatmap produced by the product was, in my opinion, very misleading. I am not sure if this is a deficiency in eye tracking heatmaps in general, but a colleague spent approximately 2 minutes attempting to complete a task. He gazed nearly all over the webpage until, after around 1:45 minutes, he fixed on the correct area of the screen. He then spent approximately 15 seconds gazing at the correct area of the screen before being confident enough to click.

My laymans interpretation of observing this interaction was that the website failed my colleague, yet the heatmap produced by this interaction showed the correct area of the page as single biggest area of the user’s attention. The suggestion of the heatmap was that the website succeeded.

(This observation is likely to be directed at heatmaps in general rather than the Tobii T60’s heatmaps in particular)

The “think-aloud” protocol interferes with accurate eye tracking data

James mentioned that pure eye tracking should be conducted without interrupting the participant, i.e. without using the “think-aloud” protocol. Apparently use of “think-aloud” protocol has been shown to interfere with the results produced from eye tracking. So to get accurate results from eye tracking you require a sterile test environment.

As someone who has conducted usability testing for many years, I would be highly reluctant to lose the valuable insights that come from using the “think-aloud” protocol. Even though the product enables you to quickly review the video footage so the participant can reflect upon what they did and why, after the event reflection is highly likely to miss out on many valuable insights and lead to the user blaming themselves as they watch video of them failing a task. Also this requires people to watch themselves, something I have found research participants almost universally unhappy about.

If I had to pick just one research technique…

As any good research consultant will tell you, to get accurate insights you should use a variety of research techniques. But the reality is that few clients have the budget or time to allow for multiple research techniques to be used.

This means that during a particular research project I will get to use one or two different techniques if I’m lucky. Given that reality, I am not sure whether the gloss and glamour of the data and videos produced by eye tracking is enough to make me want to lose the valuable insights offered by techniques such as “think-aloud” usability testing. I appreciate that it doesn’t need to be either/or, but the grim reality of many commercial projects is that you don’t get the opportunity to do both.

That together with the cost of the product ($$$), my conclusion is that there is still some way to go before I’ll be recommending eye tracking for anything other than clients with plenty of spare cash.

Leopard: the way upgrades should be

I finally got around to upgrading to Leopard, Apple’s latest operating system.

I disbelieved the sales rep in the Apple store when he told me that anyone could do the upgrade and it would take around 45 minutes, but after going through the installation I truly believe anyone (just about anyone) could do it.

It kind of worked the way it should work, i.e. not the way that any previous upgrade of an operating system has ever worked for me.

Typically upgrading your operating system means handing your computer over to some highly trained, but socially inadequate individual for a couple of days, but with the Leopard upgrade I just inserted the DVD and following 2 (or was it 3) pages of simple instructions and then it went and did its thing for 45 minutes (plus another 1hr).

So hey I was lied to about how long it takes, but the seamless way in which it kept everything I had on my computer yet made it snazzier and zappier really impressed me.

But it is never 100% right!

The only slight criticism I have is that the instruction that you need 9Gb of space for the installation is too late in the process. Something as significant as this should be clearly stated on an entry page before the computer restarts.

Universal buttons: Now my washing machine thinks its a DVD player

My new washing machine has a Play/Pause button just like my DVD player/stereo.

This trend towards universal control icons/buttons (or butcons as Mr Cooper would have it) certainly makes the washing machine more intuitive for me, but what about if your previous washing machine looked like this?

The new interface strikes me as revolution rather than evolution. Yes the language may be similar, but the interaction is completely different.

Where the old interface is all pull/push, knobs and physicality, the new interface is just buttons. The old interface gives a sense of the mechanics behind the interface (which if you’re interested to read more about, see How stuff works - where the image comes from), where the new interface controls could be from an iPod (kind of!).

Usability testing the new machine

I wondered how my iPod-less, slightly luddite, 20th Century mother would cope with the new controls? So I did some guerilla usability testing of it with her. A brief summary of the issues she encountered is as follows:

• She tried to twist the push button display that changes program, i.e. she tried to interact with the new device in exactly the same way as the old device.
• She spent 2 frustrating minutes trying to work out how to get the setting back to the previous program, i.e. synthetic back to cotton, before deciding “something is broken”.
• She didn’t comprehend how these programs affected the temperature controls (not pictured).
• She attempted to pull the change program push button to start the wash.

In summary, the interface failed for her.

Of course people learn and adapt, and personally I feel that convergence of interaction and common controls has much to be said for it, but as interface designers it is wrong to assume that just because something makes perfect sense for us and touches on familiar cultural reference points, that it will be intuitive for all.

The root of the problem

I think the root of the problem is that LG have tried to make the interface look like the old style machines, but the reality is that it works completely differently. This faux similarity  is the issue. The push button change program control on the new machine looks too much like the old tactile knob that people can twist back and forth. The position and style of the new change program push button gives the new machine a familiarity that is self defeating.

Maybe LG are targetting the “iPod generation” with these new machines - I can almost hear the marketing meeting now - “I want you to create an iPod experience to make washing clothes enjoyable!”.

I am still none the wiser as to what “Pump” or “Quick 30″ mean on my new machine, but then again what did all those 15, 12, 9, … numbers mean on the old displays?

Thinking along these lines I stumbled across Bill DeRouchey’s History of the Button site, well worth a read.