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February 12, 2012: What Large Enterprises (>$2b) Value Most?

After slicing, dicing, and performing multivariate analysis on our data from "Leveraging Content to Increase Customer Engagement" study, our analysis revealed the three top capabilities valued most by large organizations:

• Content search, categorization & organization; 48.6%
• Analysis & reporting on content usage; 43.2%
• Ability to publish to a variety of devices & formats; 40.5%

For in depth advisory or specific analysis on this topic by company size, industry or geography, please contact JoeA@HypatiaResearch.com or call 781-862-5106.

January 12, 2012: Buying Good Reviews From Industry Analysts?

April Dunford, principle of Rocket Launch Marketing (disclaimer: also a keynote speaker at a Forrester Research Product Marketing Summit 2010) recently posted this question from a B2B startup founder who "asked if it was possible to buy placement in a Gartner Magic Quadrant. The question shows a fundamental misunderstanding that the big industry analyst firms like Gartner Group and Forrester are "Pay for Play". That simply doesn't make any sense."

Hypatia's POV: Although we do agree that purchasing a contract or research subscription will likely get a vendor more attention and time with Gartner, Forrester and IDC analysts; there are still a few independent boutique and mid-sized analyst firms who do not engage in pay for play  as well.

Vendors and service providers of all sizes get Hypatia Research's attention when a vendor's offerings align with our research agenda--which is primarily customer-driven.  Briefings, product demonstrations and customer references are all done as part of our due diligence at no cost to vendors.

A boutique [10-15 person] industry analyst and primary market research firm since 2001, Hypatia focuses on four major research areas: Customer Management, Business Intelligence-operational, predictive and social/contextual analytics, Information Management and GRC, and Consultancies.  More at http://store.hypatiaresearch.com

Best,

We would like to personally invite you to participate in Hypatia's exploration of how organizations effectively leverage content to engage customers with the goal of impacting acquisition, retention and revenue levels!

Take our survey (less than 10 minutes to complete) and receive a complimentary executive summary with research highlights as a "thank you" for your input.

We will need a valid email address in order to deliver the results, but rest assured we will never share your contact information without your permission. We appreciate your time and participation in this solution study: Survey link.  

Now that information and articles on social media have proliferated in online tweets, chat, and media articles...the result is everyone is interested and understands the "why" of doing social...but the how, what, when, where and tangible ROI still eludes most organizations.

Following Hypatia's recent primary research study focused on best practices and return on investment-- "Benchmarking Social Community Investment & ROI", --management consulting firms have seen an opportunity to provide best practice strategy & consulting services for social media initiatives as well. In alphabetical order:

1) Accenture entered with a 2011 handbook entitled "Everything You Need to Know to get Social Media Working for Your Business".  [in 298 pages available on Amazon.com]. Surprisingly, the authors maintain "Case studies should only be used to generate ideas, not as evidence that any particular strategy or tactic will work for anyone other than the organization in the case study." Judge for yourselves what this type of thought leadership is worth.

2) Capgemini, one of the first management consulting firms to offer services on SaaS solutions, just announced a strategic partnership with Attensity to launch a new comprehensive Social Media Management service, to help businesses take advantage of online social interactions. [Hypatia placed Attensity in its Vendor GalaxyTM for Voice of the Customer capabilities in March 2011]. This partnership is poised to be a game-changer.

3) Deloitte's former CMO and principle Jonathan Copulsky's, latest book "Brand Resilience" identified seven crucial steps to brand risk management.  A thought-provoking read, Copulsky cites end-user case studies and borrows from warfare scenarios in regards to social strategy initiatives. For example, the book cites practices from counterinsurgency doctrine [such as defensive, guerilla, flanking and offensive warfare] to illustrate how brand stewards can aggressively defend themselves from intentional or unintentional brand saboteurs.

4) As of 8/18, HP is in talks to buy Autonomy Corp. for about $10 billion and plans to spin off its personal-computer business. Autonomy specializes in software that analyzes documents and data for so-called "unstructured information" and looks for links that can be tied together in order to understand relationships between documents. This could be a significant boost for HP's information management, and unstructured content analysis [social media] capabilities portfolio when fully integrated and operational. 

Hypatia's POV: Enabling technologies facilitate leverage of social media, but strategy, business processes, performance metrics and the ability to create and leverage actionable insight are necessary to attain tangible ROI.

PS: Next month's primary research study "Best Practices & GRC Vendor Drill-Down: Guide for Practitioners"

Best,

 75% of Practitioners Cite eGRC and IT GRC as Important

August 3, 2011 -- BOSTON, MA -- Industry analyst firm Hypatia Research, LLC announces availability of a primary research study entitled "Enterprise Convergence of GRC: Benchmarks & Galaxy Vendor Evaluations "detailing current developments, major organizational challenges, business case justification and a detailed assessment of this fragmented vendor landscape. Featuring the unique Hypatia GalaxyTM in which 28 enabling technology providers that support GRC initiatives and business processes are evaluated by 10 interdependent dimensions, the report offers readers actionable insight via 40 pages, 3 case study evaluations and 15 charts, tables and figures.  

Hypatia categorizes GRC software technology as either an integrated suite of tools, point solutions, platform or a cloud based architecture designed to facilitate enterprise convergence of both IT and enterprise GRC capabilities. This viewpoint is predicated on the ability of vendors to deliver solutions based not only on solving specific issues, but solutions that flexibly address at a holistic and integrated level all of the interlocking and interwoven governance, risk, and compliance issues that companies face no matter where or in what industries they do business.

According to Howard Baldwin, senior analyst and co-author of this study, "Some vendors offer GRC for the enterprise, known as eGRC, focusing on strategic and operational risk management. Others offer what's known as IT-GRC, focusing on monitoring access and communications for compliance. The fact that both branches of GRC use technology to automate highly complex processes is confusing to most organizations."

Leslie Ament , vice president, senior analyst and co-author shared, "Organizations invest in GRC more often as an insurance policy against unforeseen financial, legal, regulatory and operational threats rather than for a tangible return on investment. Our assessment is that this is about to change as companies move from investing in GRC merely to comply with annual audits, industry or regulatory standards to proactive decisioning grounded in strategic GRC. The products that will best serve those efforts will incorporate facets of both traditional IT-GRC and eGRC, encompassing everything from the security of data access to insight for risk management."

Over 440 respondents with direct accountabiilty for selection or use of GRC software and services contributed to this primary research study. Respondent segmentation is 70% large enterprise >$1B, 23.6% mid-market and 7.3% SMB. This research study is available for purchase online. Vendors covered in this research may contact JoeA@hypatiaresearch to inquire about licensing.

Making Enterprise Systems Pay Dividends

Hypatia welcomes Cindy Jutras, Contributing  Senior Research Fellow to provide ERP focused research a la "Mint Jutras" to Hypatia's subscribers!

Cindy Jutras is a widely recognized expert in analyzing the impact of enterprise applications on business performance. Utilizing over 35 years of corporate experience and specific expertise in manufacturing, supply chain and business performance management. She has spent the past 5 years benchmarking the performance of software solutions in the context of the business benefits of technology.  

Check out her latest research "Don't Confuse How You Deploy ERP With How You Pay For It" on our online store.

We are pleased to pre-announce our upcoming primary research study entitled "The Coming Convergence of Enterprise GRC: Benchmarks, Best Practices & Vendor Selection Guide". This study will publish in early July 2011.

Executive Summary

The market for governance risk and compliance (GRC) software is a maelstrom, the kind of maelstrom that engenders confusion among both customers and vendors. Some vendors offer GRC for the enterprise, known as eGRC, focusing on operational risk management. Others offer what's known as IT-GRC, focusing on monitoring access and communications for compliance. The fact that both branches of GRC use technology to automate highly complex processes is confusing. The fact that many vendors offer capabilities that overlap into both areas is confusing. The fact that many vendors offer limited pieces of the GRC puzzle is confusing.

In addition, the topic itself covers so many areas, many of which overlap, hampering companies' efforts. Governance covers not only how data is accessed, protected, and secured, but also involves adherence to everything from partnership contracts and service-level agreements. Risk covers investment in new products, geographic expansion, and exposure to lawsuits and reputation damage. Compliance covers not only industry-specific governmental regulations, such as those for the finance or pharmaceutical industries, but also other government regulations such as maintaining privacy of customer data; add to this compliance to industry regulations found in manufacturing and consumer packaged goods.

Feel free to contact Joe Azzolino for North American based companies or Octavio Diaz for companies with global headquarters based outside North America. Alternatively, visit us at our online store.

• Personal Desktop Analytics--designed for line of business executives that seek to perform robust analysis without relying on IT. Functionality includes:
• What if scenario planning
• Data Exploration & Visualization
• Import, merge & data enrichment from multiple enterprise/personal data sources onto the desktop  
• Ability to share within work-groups or across the enterprise so that all are viewing the same analysis
  
• Support for 20+ languages

• Integrated Risk Management--one would expect an IT-centric offering to GRC from IBM OpenPages. However, I was impressed with the balanced approach presented during a one on one briefing at the summit. Many GRC solutions provide either a siloed, bottoms-up view, or an aggregated high level top-down view. This solution offers both along with role-based and regulatory templates that can be utilized as accelerators for industry requirements and/or in preparation for external audits.
• More on this next month when Hypatia publishes "Enterprise Convergence of GRC: Benchmarks, Best Practices & Vendor Selection Guide"    
• Vendor & End-Users briefing are almost completed--pls contact research@HypatiaResearch.com if your organization wishes to be included.   

• Social Media Analytics--according IBM, is an extension of enterprise customer analytics--a highly pragmatic philosophy in our view and one that we have championed over the last few years. Analytics-savvy organizations understand the power of leveraging multichannel customer analytics to extract customer insight as well as to perform market mix modeling in support of budget optimization. IBM "gets it" that "integrated customer intelligence" is necessary for organizations working in today's multichannel, customer-centric environment.  
• More on this later when Hypatia publishes "Social Analytics & Intelligence: Best Practices & Vendor Selection Guide"--our follow-on to "Benchmarking Social Community Investments & ROI: Best Practices & Vendor Evaluation Guide". 
  
• Vendor & End-Users briefing are ongoing--pls contact research@HypatiaResearch.com to schedule an appointment.

• Decision Management (released 2010) "combines predictive analytics, business rules and optimization to automate the very high volume of small decisions made every day within an organization." This semi-automated solution provides line of business executives with enough guidance to create pragmatic support for typical business decisions with enough control over which priorities or outcomes should be optimized. (See Hypatia's "Decision Science & Customer Analytics" ) In short, decision management is a set of preconfigured best practices that include business rules, predictive models and an optimization engine.  Examples of pre-configured solutions include:
• Customer churn prevention 
• Credit-card or claims fraud  

Hypatia's POV: Line of business end-users require a customer intelligence platform that enables them to "capture, manage, analyze and apply customer insight effectively."

Hypatia Research Publishes "Benchmarking Social Community Investments: Best Practices for ROI"

19% of Companies Expect Social Initiatives to Increase Sales

May 04, 2011 -- BOSTON, MA-- Industry analyst firm Hypatia Research, LLC announces availability of a primary research study entitled Benchmarking Social Community Investments: Best Practices for ROI detailing current developments, major organizational challenges, business case justification and a detailed assessment of this nascent landscape. Featuring the unique Hypatia GalaxyTM in which 20 enabling technology providers that support social initiatives and business processes are evaluated by 10 interdependent dimensions, the report offers readers actionable insight via 42 pages, 4 case study evaluations and 12 charts, tables and figures.  

Hypatia categorizes social community technology as an integrated suite of software tools or online platform architecture designed to facilitate communication with customers, prospects, partners, or the general public at the same time. Unlike person-to-person emails, social channels are generally defined as one-to-many or many-to-many channels. According to Sue Hildreth, senior analyst and co-author of this study, "What differentiates social media platforms isn't usually one major feature or characteristic. It's the collection of features and technologies that enable organizations to create rich and flexible social environments for their customers, partners or public brand."

Leslie Ament , vice president of research and co-author shared, "Organizations invest in social media initiatives for both long term (customer intelligence gathering and analysis) and short term (marketing and sales campaigns) goals. Others have no clear idea as to why a member community was launched on either a website or on a Facebook site--except that everyone else is doing it." Ament added, "Companies realizing tangible ROI from social initiatives demonstrate several best practice behaviors:

• There is a strategic business purpose for engaging in social media beyond--everyone is doing it!
• Successful social media engagement requires an effective strategy, and consistent business processes, execution plans and actionable measurement metrics
• The social media environment poses challenges that are similar to public and private clouds--thus, socially-adept organizations know that if they fund public communities--their competitors may benefit from the investment as well."
  

Over 300 organizations that utilize social community software and services contributed to this primary research study. Industries represented included telecommunications, retail/CPG, manufacturing, financial services, manufacturing, hi-tech and non-profit. Company size representation was 33% small businesses, 33% mid-market and 34% large enterprises. This research study is available at http://store.hypatiaresearch.com/.

For more information, contact Joe Azzolino our Director of Account Services & Business Development at  978-828-7062 or JoeA@HypatiaResearch.com

With the Passover and Easter holidays almost here, we wondered "What Would Moses and Pharaoh Have Done" communication-wise if they had social media tools? (Checkout the very clever video authored by Aish.com)

Enterprise Social Media Investments: ROI Benchmarks & Best Practices,

Hypatia Research LLC is finalizing a groundbreaking primary research study on Social Media investment. While social media is generally acknowledged as being the latest buzz or flavor of the year in terms of customer engagement, interaction and brand reach, organizations struggle to justify investment in regards to tangible returns.

Our research, comprised of over 300 end-user survey responses and more than 30 interviews will detail the top measurement metrics and key performance indicators (KPI's) used by companies that effectively leverage social media.

HypatiaG2M^TM is a comprehensive customer & market intelligence service designed to facilitate an organization's use of our research findings, benchmarks, market size & forecast, and best practices across industries and geographies.  Subscribing to our growing library of customer intelligence research is an incredibly cost effective way of getting the pragmatic, use-case best practices, industry benchmarks, and performance metrics required to take your organization to the next level.

• Access to all in-depth primary research;
• Access to all briefs, webinars, presentations;
• A complimentary advisory session with a Hypatia expert;
• Corporate-wide license, with 24x7 web access for an unlimited number of users. With tiered-pricing, our research is affordable for companies of all sizes:
• Not-for-profit
• Small Enterprises (SMBs)
• Mid-Market
• Large Enterprises

Accenture, a global management consulting, technology services and outsourcing company seems to be following in the footsteps of IBM by turning to software solutions and services as a  means of growing its considerable portfolio of offerings.  In February of 2010, the firm announced a strategic alliance with  SAS  designed to expand their strategic relationship by jointly developing, implementing and managing next-generation analytics solutions. Moreover, the companies declared intentions to jointly invest in the development of solutions focused on industry-specific predictive analytics applications, starting with the financial services, healthcare and public service sectors; as well as cross-industry solutions in the customer and enterprise management domains. Leveraging SAS software solutions, Accenture plans to deliver advanced analytical capabilities as a managed service.

On November 10, 2010, Accenture acquired Beijing Genesis Interactive Technology Co., Ltd. (Mogenesis), a Beijing-based company that provides mobile software outsourcing services and solution licensing for companies in China. On January 10, 2011, Accenture completed acquisition of customer relationship management company and mobility software firm CAS Computer of Germany.  Although details of the financial aspect of the deal were not available it is expected that 234 CAS employees--located in multiple locations, Germany, the United Kingdom, United States and Australia--will be joining Accenture as a result of this acquisition.

Why is this of interest to Hypatia?

It is expected that CAS will be folded under Accenture's ever-evolving software business division but will continue to operate as a separate business unit.  Since SAS offers comprehensive CRM functionality through its Customer Intelligence Suite, Hypatia asserts that Accenture targeted CAS for its intellectual property resources and global SMB and Mid-Market customer base.  On November 2, 2010, acquired Knowledge Rules Inc. a Philadelphia-based consulting company that focuses exclusively on implementing and integrating business solutions using Pegasystems' Business Process Management (BPM) software.  Pegasystems, is a developer of on-premise and SaaS/Cloud-based business process management and CRM software solutions. Accenture evidently plans to expand its expertise, capabilities and service offerings in the customer management arena.

This growth strategy--via a rapid down-market entre--differs greatly from Accenture's traditional large enterprise customer base. It also diverges from the strategies engaged in by other consulting firms with strong IT chops. For example,  Cognizant, Deloitte, E&Y, KPMG, PWC and others typically wrap business consulting services around software solutions such as Governance, Risk, Compliance & Security, or wrap performance management consulting services around Business Intelligence/Data Warehousing software. While Accenture will continue to bundle business consulting with software solutions--similar to the aforementioned competitors--investment in its dedicated software business (CAS will become a part of Accenture Software) through acquisitions such as CAS, will set Accenture apart.   

According to Accenture, the firm intends to add retail specific functionality that is currently lacking--such as digital merchandising, distributor management and analytics, to CAS CRM software and plans to focus on expanding in Latin America, China and India specifically.  Currently, CAS offers industry solutions (excluding retail) for the following business sectors:

•      CAS IT Services, CRM for software producers and IT service providers.
•      CAS Consulting, CRM for consulting companies, banking, financial services
  
•      CAS Research, CRM for research, education and scientific institutions
•      CAS netWorks, CRM for member administration for organizations & associations
•      CAS Drive, CRM for car dealerships
•      CAS carBid, Auction platform for cars

Against the backdrop of IBM recently scooping up numerous software vendors with marketing strength such as Coremetrics, Unica, and SPSS and Oracle acquiring ATG, Accenture's recent acquisitions and hiring spree sourcing interactive and digital marketing professionals signals a comprehensive, defensive strategy calculated to maintain and potentially expand its market share in comprehensive customer management services.  Is the market ready for Accenture to offer customer intelligence, customer management and analytics as a managed service? Accenture's investment strategies in software, consulting services and analytics seem to predict a highly lucrative market. @Hypatia_18

Just as Irish Finance Minister Brian Lenihan on Tuesday, announced the harshest budget in the 90-year history of the state on December 8, 2010--"Our economy is still in a weakened condition and our self confidence as a nation has been shaken," Lenihan said. Deloitte announced acquisition of Irish consultancy Curach Consulting on December 14, 2010.

Curach Consulting, with annual revenues estimated at $9M USD provides business advisory, delivery and diagnostic services to a range of clients in sectors such as financial services, technology and public sectors. Focus areas include: IT strategy and architecture, business intelligence and performance management, as well as project management and customer channel management. This acquisition brings Deloitte Ireland's consulting & advisory practice to nearly 400 consultants.

Why is Hypatia interested?  With overlapping business advisory and IT transformation expertise--specifically in customer & channel management consulting services--this acquisition strategically positions Deloitte as the new go-to management consulting firm in Ireland.  While a seemingly contrarian move, given that many consulting firms of late focus on IT and business advisory as a loss-leader and IT outsourcing or IT managed services as a cash cow, Deloitte is competing on its strengths in multiple business advisory practices coupled with solid IT advisory and delivery services.

A contrarian industry analyst firm such as Hypatia, always appreciates company. @Hypatia_18

VOC: Most Valuable Information Sources

Figure 1 copyright 2010 Hypatia Research, LLC emphasizes the nascent impact that social media currently has on VOC initiatives.  Many organizations are in "listen" or "understand" or even "categorize" mode, but at best, utilize the following 5 VOC information sources in a siloed approach.

For example, customer satisfaction and loyalty surveys are largely quantitative in nature, and are analyzed and reported on via numbers or percentages. Contextual information such as survey verbatim, online content and emails between organizations and their customers are seldom analyzed or even shared with the same job functions/roles that perform quantitative customer satisfaction and loyalty survey analysis.  Moreover, mapping unique customer identities from quantitative data with unstructured information is either performed manually or is nearly impossible at present.

To view the entire research article visit: B-Eye-Network @http://www.b-eye-network.com/view/14784

For more information on vendor selection criteria, research products (Our 2010 research study Operationalizing Voice of the Customer: Maturity Models, Benchmarks & Best Practices) or scheduling an analyst briefing, contact: ZGR@HypatiaResearch.com or Research@HypatiaResearch.com.

In performing advisory work with clients, Hypatia often focuses on developing business processes and techniques for understanding how to take action on operational reports and customer analytics.  Most organizations we advise are drowning in data & operational reports and yet remain in what we term "analysis paralysis". These companies are unable to systematically create and take action on the intelligence provided by their own analysis. 

So, for anyone in a similar situation, ask yourselves:

• Why are we producing reports and which role or business team actually reads them?
• Is there an internal team tasked with creating insight from enterprise or department level reports?
• Which role(s) are responsible for turning insight into pragmatic action?
• Will this insight be acted upon in a timely manner--i.e. in time to take corrective or proactive action?
• How do we ensure that our action items are aligned with our company's corporate strategy and objectives?
• Are employees KPI's and incentives aligned with corporate objectives?
• How should we prioritize our resources--both internal and external?
• Who is ultimately accountable for taking action on analytics?

On Nov 4, 2010 in a Forrester Research publication entitled: "Customer Intelligence Trends To Watch In 2011: CI Professionals Are Fighting Wars On Multiple Fronts In Order To Evolve" (authored by Dave Frankland, Fatemeh Khatibloo, Joe Stanhope, Zach Hofer-Shall with Suresh Vittal, Emily Murphy, & Michael J. Grant)m  Forrester used (without prior permission) Hypatia's copyrighted 2001 definition of Customer Intelligence:

From the Blogmeister:

Henry Stewart Professional Development Event: Marketing Analytics

Typically when Hypatia provides followers with business case study evaluations, they exemplify best practices, customer success strategies or extremely positive examples of business return on investment. However, my graduate professor of research methodologies was fond of admonishing his students with "A negative outcome is as much a key finding or take-away as a positive outcome."  So, MovieTickets.com, consider this a teachable moment!

Company:

Founded in 2000, MovieTickets.com, considers itself the worldwide leader in advance movie ticketing, where you can buy movie tickets and search movie showtimes for your favorite movie theaters. According to the company's description, visitors/customers can also rate and review movies, view movie trailers, read critics reviews, keep up on the latest movie and entertainment news, view photos and much more. Approximately 57% of the company's employees have more than 10 years of business experience.The company's composition by role/function comprises:

• ~40% R&D
• ~40% Administrative
• ~12% Sales & Marketing
• ~8% Executive Leadership
  

Interestingly, not even 1% of MovieTickets.com employees have role/functions described as customer service, customer support, chief customer officer, customer experience manager etc...and that may be at the root cause for this case study evaluation?

Challenge:

Technical issues with the website created frustration for customers wishing to purchase tickets on 10/10/10--a fortuitous day for marriage--but not it seems for MovieTickets.com.  The online order entry system was unable to recognize passwords, allow new accounts to be created, or to accept purchases for selected seats offered as available through its online seating chart.  Frustrated customers repeatedly contacted customer support numerous times and were provided with lame canned responses that did nothing to address the root cause of the technical failure.  More importantly, customer service did not provide appropriate alternative options for resolving the issue of customers wanting to purchase tickets.  Three examples of poor customer support on the part of MovieTickets.com are provided below:

Inquiry:

Sent: Sunday, October 10, 2010
To: Movietickets Customer Service
Subject: Website Customer Service Form Submission

Comments: Password problem.  Tried all passwords, but system would not take. Nor would system allow me to create new account.  You lost sales due to technical problems!!!!!

Sent: Sunday, October 10, 2010
Subject: FW: Website Customer Service Form Submission

Movietickets.com and Moviewatcher.com are two separate websites and as such require two separate logins

Open a new browser.  Go to www.movietickets.com to access your account.  Sign in to your account via the My account  or edit Account link located within the top navigation area, enter your email address and your password is password.  Once you have access to your account, please change your password.

E-mail: amqm-chm@hotmail.com

Updated Password: xxxxxxxxx

Once logged in, underneath the Account Information column; click on change and you can edit your information by simply changing what is currently in the "email address" field or the "password field" and "verify password" field. Click on the "Update Account" button and your new information will be saved.

To complete a purchase or use MovieTickets.com search functionality, javascript must be enabled in your browser. JavaScript is used in several instances, such as when a search is performed, when a search is performed, when you open a trailer window, error checking, or to display certain banner advertisements. Cookies are used to manage the MovieTickets.com login

Amber Wolff

Movietickets.com Customer Service Representative

mailto:customerservice@movietickets.com

http://www.movietickets.com

Please include all messages with future correspondence.

Sent: Sunday, October 10, 2010
To: Movietickets Customer Service
Subject: RE: Website Customer Service Form Submission

Now another problem...I was planning to purchase 8 tickets! See screenshot of seating chart!

We are experiencing technical difficulties with The Showcase, we will send this issue over to our helpdesk for resolution.  Please try your transaction again later or select the best available option, we are sorry for any inconveniences this may have 

Amber Wolff

Movietickets.com Customer Service Representative

mailto:customerservice@movietickets.com

http://www.movietickets.com

Please include all messages with future correspondence.

To: Movietickets Customer Service
Subject: RE: Website Customer Service Form Submission
Importance: High

This is extremely POOR customer service.  I tried 6X more last nite and today, and am now told this opera - Capriccio by Strauss is SOLD OUT for the lux seating.   Why should I continue to waste my time when MovieTickets.com doesn't care about customer loyalty???  Your customer churn costs will eat up your profit margins and then you will wish you had responded to  3 separate customer service emails. I will blog about this.

Email or call customer service to resolve any issues. Refer to your order by the tracking number.Tracking # 1337347854-72177323  /   customerservice@movietickets.com   /  1-888-440-8457

The Metropolitan Opera: Capriccio

Theater:

Showcase Cinema de Lux Legacy Place

• Tickets:

2 Lux Level 21+

Total:

$71.00 USD

Printable Ticket:

You have chosen to print your tickets at home

Tracking #:1337347854-72177323

Order Date:10/11/2010 1:13:26 PM

Order Status:PURCHASE FAILED

Response: 24 hours later

Our records indicate that performance was locked and no longer available for online ticket sales. We only sell a certain number of tickets online the theater sell the remaining balance.  Sorry for any inconvenience this may have caused you.

Tracking Number:  1337347854-72177323

Order Time (Eastern):  10/11/2010 1:13:26 PM

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Order was not processed successfully:

Performance locked - no longer available for sale - card not charged, tickets not reserved.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Theater:  Showcase Cinema de Lux Legacy Place

Movie:  Metropolitan Opera: Capriccio, The

Show Date:  4/23/2011

Show Time:  13:00

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ticket Type Qty Price

Lux Level 21+ 2 $34.50

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Ikama P

Movietickets.com Customer Service

mailto:customerservice@movietickets.com

http://www.movietickets.com

Please include all messages with future correspondence

Result:

Instead of retaining their segment of high value customers--those that regularly purchase LUX seats at $35 per seat upwards of 8 times per year rather than the standard $20 seats for the same movie presentation, MovieTickets.com chose not to offer appropriate support that would have earned these profitable customers' loyalty. 

Additionally, instead of offering to reserve two tickets until the online order functionality was fixed or offering to take the customer's order and credit card information over the phone, MovieTickets.com chose to not address the root cause of 3 separate emails about customer service and support issues from a single customer.

Moreover, once the show is question was sold out, MovieTickets.com could have offered dissatisfied customers [those who tried to purchase online but were unable to do so for technical reasons on the part of MTC] a discount or preferred seating on their second choice for LUX seats at a future movie presentation. But evidently, MovieTickets.com doesn't seem to care about customer loyalty or satisfaction...and soon, MTC may not need to care about customers at all...because they may not have enough to remain in business.

P.S. We found a fantastic version of this opera with a stellar cast on NetFlix.  So not only will MovieTickets.com lose our $72 for tickets...we can sip our own bottle of wine with a home-cooked dinner at less than 1/4 the cost of the LUX restaurant food/drinks offered...and even invite a few friends over as well.

We initially thought mature organizations would have more sophisticated processes, measurement or analysis criteria, and a proactive course of action for various scenarios encountered. In short, our hypothesis was that in mature organizations and/or large enterprises (>$1b), VOC initiatives would be "operationalized" across the enterprise.

Operationalizing Voice of the Customer:
Maturity Models, Best Practices & Benchmarks for Turning VOC into Customer Insight

However, in creating our maturity model, benchmarks and best practices, we found a wide range of procedures, organizational structures and techniques in use among the 400+ companies interviewed and surveyed. Nonetheless, we identified four main maturity categories that fit a majority of organizations.

• Level One: Nascent VOC Processes
• Level Two: Limited VOC Processes
• Level Three: Operational VOC Processes
• Level Four: Visionary VOC Processes

Focus: How do high performing organizations "read the tea leaves" and operationalize valuable contextual customer insight?  Our research will benchmark performance across key marketing functions: brand & corporate reputation management, product marketing, customer service, media relations, and customer retention, acquisition and profitability.

Clients & Colleagues:

For the third year in a row, Hypatia Research, LLC is honored to have been selected to evaluate leading IT consultancies, service providers and software vendors in the Customer Management, Business Intelligence/Analytics, Marketing Automation, and Sales Force Automation categories. Thank you all for sharing your time with Hypatia Research this year!  We hope to continue our interactive dialogues!

Winners will be formally announced in CRM Magazine's August 6^th issue, but here are the highlights:

• Consultancies - Winner: Deloitte
  Leaders: Accenture, Capgemini, IBM Global Business Services, Infosys
  Ones to Watch: Innoveer

• Enterprise Suite CRM - Winner: Salesforce.com
  Leaders: Microsoft, Oracle, RightNow Technologies, SAP
  One to Watch: NetSuite
  .
• Midmarket Suite CRM - Winner: Salesforce.com
  Leaders: Microsoft, NetSuite, Oracle, RightNow Technologies
  One to Watch: Sage
  .
• Small-Business Suite CRM - Winner: Salesforce.com
  Leaders: Maximizer Software, NetSuite, Oracle, SugarCRM
  One to Watch: Consona
  .
• Sales Force Automation - Winner: Salesforce.com
  Leaders: Microsoft, NetSuite, Oracle, RightNow Technologies
  One to Watch: Sage
  .
• Incentive Management - Winner: Xactly
  Leaders: Callidus Software, Merced Systems, Synygy, Varicent Software
  One to Watch: Softscape
  .
• Marketing Solutions - Winner: Unica
  Leaders: Alterian, Aprimo, Eloqua, SAS Institute
  One to Watch: Oracle

• Business Intelligence - Winner: IBM
  Leaders: Oracle, SAP BusinessObjects, SAS Institute, Tibco
  One to Watch: Microsoft
  .
• Data Quality - Winner: Informatica
  Leaders: DataFlux (SAS Institute), IBM, SAP, Trillium Software (Harte-Hanks)
  One to Watch: Talend

Pls contact us [JeffB@HypatiaResearch.com] for permission in regards to quote reviews and other media /promotional outreach.

Operationalizing Voice of the Customer: Best Practices & Benchmarks for Turning Enterprise Feedback Management into Customer Insight

Organizations' stakeholders often communicate via blogs, call centers, consumer generated media, surveys and service call verbatims. In fact, many innovations in customer service, product enhancements or merchandising tips have come through these 'ad hoc' or social media communications directly with customers.

Companies value this 'anecdotal feedback' gained through advisory boards, focus groups or contextual communications, but rarely do they create a systematic process for analyzing and acting on this valuable intelligence. 

Learn how high performing companies "read the tea leaves" and operationalize valuable customer insight. This research features benchmarks, best practices and Hypatia's GalaxyTM guide for selecting the right tools, services and enabling technologies.

     This 2010 awards program recognizes providers of Information Management & Business Analytics solutions, tools and management consulting services. Vendors may submit up to 3 customer entry forms for consideration. Alternatively, clients may also nominate vendors and professional service providers for Information Management & Business Analytics projects completed during 2009-2010.

Nomination forms will be accepted through July 30, 2010.

Entries will be judged according to both soft and hard performance metrics.

     Award winning entries will be published in Hypatia's upcoming "Success Strategies" study. Historically, less than 10% of all entries are selected for these awards.

Customer and vendor briefings are now being scheduled. Contact us to request a customer / vendor nomination form, share best practices, and to update us on product launches, success stories and lessons learned.

Marketing Analytics: Gain the Knowledge to Control Performance

     This Henry Stewart produced conference, uniquely designed for the business executive rather than IT professionals, will cover marketing analytics from Precision Marketing to Customer Intelligence during a one-day "Boot-Camp". Speakers and panelists will present 30 minute interactive sessions on topics such as:

• Customer Segmentation: Who Achieved What, When and How?
• Web Analytics: Beyond the Hype!
• Realizing Tangible Benefits from Marketing & Advanced Analytics: Customer Success Stories
• Cross-Sell, Up-sell, and Influence: The Virtues of Affinity Analysis
• Show & Tell with Predictive Modeling: Clients Speak!
• Exploiting Customer Data with Advanced Marketing Analytics
• How to Enhance Analytics using External Data: Presentation and Q&A
• Advanced Marketing Analytics + Customer Intelligence = ROI: Lessons Learned in the Trenches: Panel Discussion

      Our new Vice President of business development brings over 15 years of expertise at technology companies such as Oracle, Business Objects, Sybase, Ingres and Aberdeen Group/Harte-Hanks. Previous sales management roles have ranged from Senior Account Director, Regional Sales Director and Director of Marketing to Director, Global Business Development.

Jeff holds a BS degree in Biology from SUNY Brockport, NY. A former New Yorker, (and closet Yankees fan), Jeff enjoys following Boston's best teams and preparing family feasts in his spare time. Jeff can be reached at: JeffB@HypatiaResearch.com.

Agora, whose title refers to the public square and marketplace where ideas were debated in the ancient Greek world, is directed by the Spanish-Chilean filmmaker Alejandro Amenabar, who wrote the screenplay with Mateo Gil. He originally envisioned a movie about the history of astronomy from Aristotle to Einstein but changed direction when his research brought him to Hypatia and the period just before the start of the Dark Ages.

From the Blog Meister:

May 12, 2010: Tekrati Cites Hypatia Research, LLC as Business Intelligence
& Analytics Influencer to Watch!

Whenever you look for the purchase decision influencers in business intelligence (BI) and business analytics, you end up looking at the trade press. And there's some noteworthy news on that front this week: media giant TechTarget announced that they've acquired the BeyeNETWORK properties and network of experts. TechTarget plans to leverage BeyeNETWORK experts to build out their footprint in BI via the new SearchBusinessAnalytics.com destination site.

Regardless how this M&A looks once the dust settles, it will have a definite impact on the influence wielded by the BeyeNETWORK experts.

Many of these experts are solo or small-group professionals with deep subject matter expertise. The group includes analysts, consultants, lecturers and authors. They tend to have closely held relationships with their clients and industry contacts. They influence purchases, implementation, and best practices around enterprise business intelligence, data warehousing and analytics software. They engage with the market, and formulate and promote their own opinions. They can also play important roles in the influencer ecosystem as intermediaries -- bringing the viewpoints of more powerful influencers, such as vendors, directly to their own contacts.

If you're in the BI market, monitor BeyeNETWORK and TechTarget over the next 3 to 6 months to see which experts get more play, which get less, which get lost, and any new experts attracted by the larger combined media site. Keep your focus on the individual influencers, not the BeyeNETWORK brand itself.

For example, some of the BeyeNETWORK experts I recommend putting on your watch list: Merv Adrian, Lou Agosta, Leslie Ament, Steve Dine, Neil Raden, Craig Shiff, James Taylor, and Colin White.

Improve customer data analytics: Tips for using metrics, technologies

Implementing customer data analytics requires attention to methodologies, metrics and technologies.

Before trying to secure additional budget or resources, audit all customer-related performance metrics along with the methodologies or formulas used for each. For example, does your organization capture:

•   Campaign metrics based on uplift?
•   Trade promotion results based on single products or multiple product attachment rates?
•   Percentage change in customer complaints?
•   Percentage change in customer migration rates?
•   Customer risk profile?
•   Net promoter score?
•   Customer recency, frequency and monetary (RFM) value metrics?
•   Customer profitability per customer on a quarterly, bi-annual or annual basis?
•   Customer lifetime value (CLV) metrics?

The holy grail of customer analytics is closely tied to a virtuous circle of closed-loop performance metrics -- which is next to impossible to accomplish in a multi-channel consumer environment. However, it is highly possible to improve an organization's customer analytics processes with a goal of enhancing the customers' experience and corporate profitability. To do this, organizations must define and standardize performance metrics at the corporate level.

Corporate-level agreement on how metrics are defined and calculated is as necessary as enterprise standardization of data dimensions across data marts. Failure to do this renders any report analysis and insight derived wildly inaccurate. Do you want your senior executives making critical decisions based on highly inaccurate information?

Some examples from our research at Hypatia Research LLC include:

• An office supply retailer utilized specific marketing metrics to calculate "uplift" from a trade promotion run on printer ink and internally announced the promotion as a rousing success. However, at the profitability level, the company actually lost revenues on the promotion as market-basket analysis revealed that the promotion did not influence shoppers to buy other products with higher profit margins. In short, they paid for expensive media advertising, store signage, direct marketing and reduced the price of printer ink below cost and realized a negative return on both trade promotion investment and product sales.
  
• Another company utilized activity-based costing (ABC) as the preferred methodology for calculating product category profitability. However, Hypatia found that one team included the actual cost of both production and raw materials in their calculation while other departments added in an average cost of sales per product SKU.

[1] C.2009 Hypatia Research, LLC. "Decision Science & Customer Analytics: Competitive Advantage or Necessary to Compete?"

Exploiting the value of customer data with analytics

Attaining true "customer intelligence" is both art and science --requiring attention to technology, including customer data analytics, processes and organizational mindset.

Prior to the recent global melt-down of 2008-2009, many executives believed that marketing, branding, customer interactions and social media investments were mostly about creating buzz around an organization's product or service offering -- an intangible investment that didn't require justification. The new post-recession paradigm calls for senior executives and marketers alike to create alignment between key performance indicators (KPIs), marketing performance metrics, corporate goals and shareholder earnings in order to prove value and remain relevant to multiple stakeholders. Hypatia Research LLC studies confirm that more than 50% of marketing departments, sales and business development professionals, and customer service and support teams continue to be tasked and measured in a non-integrated, often ad hoc, fashion. In short, companies actually committed to measuring marketing performance continue to rely on a patchwork of linear and non-integrated metrics. more...

•   Improve customer data analytics: Tips for using metrics, technologies
•   Expert advice for developing a customer data analytics program
•   Customer data analytics best practices from top performers

From the team at Hypatia:
May 2010 be a year of peace, good health & economic stability to all.

Team Hypatia Research, LLC

In the not-too-distant future, organisations looking to fill the post of chief marketing officer (CMO) may not peruse the marketing department for the perfect candidate. According to a study by Forrester Research, the next generation of CMOs will in fact hail from the customer intelligence discipline.

The report, "The Intelligent Approach to Customer Intelligence", suggests that changes in consumer behaviour, and a subsequent struggle to understand customers, will force businesses to put greater stock in customer intelligence.

Author of the report, Dave Frankland, describes this as "injecting science into the art of marketing". He points to comments by Andreas Weigend, Amazon's former chief scientist, that individuals will generate more data this year than in the combined history of mankind. An incredible statement to make --but one that bears contemplation.

Hypatia Research, LLC was pleased to be asked to adjudicate the 2009 Vision Awards  sponsored by the BeyeNETWORK. This year's winners include:

2009 Vision Award for Business Impact Winners

•   Analytics: Kognitio for TRA, Inc.
•   Business Intelligence: Hitachi Consulting for Schumacher Group
•   Business Intelligence: Teradata Corporation for Freescale Semiconductor
•   Data Access, Integration & Executability:Initiate Systems, Ochsner Health System 
•   Operational BI: MicroStrategy for Nygard International
•   Performance Management: Actuate for St. Thomas Elgin General Hospital
•   Software-as-a-Service BI: Adaptive Planning for Pep Boys

"Congratulations to all the recipients of this award," states Ron Powell, cofounder of the BeyeNETWORK. "In this time of limited budgets and stretched IT resources, it is reassuring to know that successful companies are taking the necessary steps to improve the way their organizations derive business value from the wealth of data available to them." 

Special kudos to Teradata and Actuate who won this award in their respective categories for the second consecutive year.

PRESS RELEASE: "What Healthcare CIOs Need to Know About the American Recovery & Reinvestment Act & Electronic Health Records: EHR Technology & Government Funding" [BusinessWire Link:]

BOSTON, MA --September 16, 2009 --Hypatia Research, LLC today released a report entitled "What Healthcare CIOs Need to Know About ARRA & EHR: Healthcare Technology Solutions & Service Providers" outlining  current developments, major adoption challenges, business case justification and an assessment of more than 30 EHR vendors that meet government standards for certification and funding programs.

This comprehensive 50+ page report [http://www.hypatiaresearch.com/images/HypatiaResearch_ARRA-EHR_CoverTOC.pdf] complete with client case studies, and figures takes account of:

Benefits of Electronic Records: Efficiency and Access

Beyond the obvious value of centralized access to patient data, electronic records systems provide health providers with multiple benefits:

1. Accuracy & Error-Checking: Automated alarm systems notify physicians if drugs prescriptions are contraindicated for patients
2. Reporting & Decision Support: EHRs Healthcare professionals may compile & analyze data to spot trends
3. Medical Knowledge-base: Advanced EHRs allow physicians and nurses to stay abreast of medical protocols, and in key developments
4. Near-time Actionable Insight: Intelligent health records systems (IEHR) that exploit  natural language processing [NLP] or semantic analytics to aggregate & analyze unique clinical data

• Increased compliance in diabetics from 8.6% to 28.5%
• Reduced errors in patient charting for allergy information from 36% to 11% via electronic reminder alerts for prescribing clinicians
• Increased the percentage of women over age 42 receiving mammograms from 24.5% to 49.4%
• Avoiding approx. 42 potential anti-coagulant overdoses per month via alerts on duplicate prescriptions

August 12, 2009:

NEW REPORT: "What Healthcare CIOs Need to Know About the American Recovery & Reinvestment Act & Electronic Health Records: EHR Technology & Government Funding"

Research Trends Overview Webinar: "Enterprise Feedback Management to Actionable Customer Insight: Maturity Models & Best Practices"

To reserve your space, please email:research@HypatiaResearch.com.

June 15, 2009:

Visibility & Usability Pose Challenges: Previous quantitative research performed by Hypatia revealed that use of timely, complete, and accurate information leads to improved customer service levels, reduced operational costs, increased revenues, and higher customer satisfaction and retention rates.  In short, it's all about revenues and customers-market share growth and enhanced retention rates. In fact, use of marketing science and information analysis services has moved beyond a competitive advantage for companies that seek to grow aggressively. It has become necessary to stay in the game. Leading companies consistently focus on retaining customers and growing revenues through the use of customer data for the following business functions:

•   Customer service & support: Operational (64%)
•   Corporate Planning: Strategic (56%)
•   Product design: Strategic (48%)
•   Business development / Sales: Operational (36%)
•   Marketing: Operational (20%)

Note: All content excerpted from "Decision Science & Customer Analytics: Competitive Advantage or Necessary to Compete?" by Leslie Ament. ©2009 Hypatia Research, LLC. To purchase or license the complete report, contact: ZGR@HypatiaResearch.com

May 21, 2009:

Over 250 users of EFM and Customer Insight techniques have responded to our survey thus far.  Please take a moment to complete our survey and receive a complimentary version of the report in July 2009. The survey will close this Monday May 25 on Memorial Day!

Transforming Enterprise Feedback Management into Actionable Customer Insight: Maturity Models & Best Practices

TAKE THE SURVEY

Our next research study will benchmark the current state of the market by identifying best practices and performance metrics used by successful companies to improve performance and profitability via EFM and Customer Insight initiatives.

Hypatia will assess the processes, organizational expertise and key performance indicators that set top performers apart such as:

• Which team or role is responsible for analyzing and sharing this insight throughout your organization?
• How successful are organizations in systematically capturing, managing, analyzing and applying customer intelligence throughout the enterprise?
• What tangible benefits are realized by those who invest in customer knowledge?
• How effective are various technologies or processes such as: Customer Experience, Enterprise Feedback, Business Intelligence, Marketing Automation, Customer Relationship Management, Web Analytics, Speech Analytics or Customer Satisfaction in facilitating creation of actionable customer insight?
• Why do some organizations utilize market research service providers or agencies for customer insight while others prefer to operationalize this process internally?
• Is free text [blogs, call center notes, phone interviews] integrated and analyzed along with structured information such as purchase price, survey responses, and demographic data--or not?
• Which metrics, key performance indicators or closed-loop processes are used?
• What do successful companies do differently?

From the Blog Meister:

Our next research study is designed to benchmark the current state of the market, identify best practices and performance metrics used by successful companies to improve performance and profitability via EFM and Customer Insight initiatives. Survey respondents who complete all applicable questions are eligible to receive a complimentary executive summary of the report.

How successful are organizations in systematically capturing, managing, analyzing and applying customer intelligence thrhoughout the enterprise? What tangible benefits are realized by those who invest in customer knowledge? Our research will benchmark the current state of the market, future plans for selection and investment in technologies or service providers. Moreover, we will assess the processes, organizational expertise and key performance indicators that set top performers apart such as:

• Which team or role is responsible for analyzing and sharing this insight throughout your organization?

• How effective are various technologies or processes such as: Customer Experience, Enterprise Feedback, Business Intelligence, Marketing Automation, Customer Relationship Management, Web Analytics, Speech Analytics or Customer Satisfaction in facilitating creation of actionable customer insight?

• Why do some organizations utilize market research service providers or agencies for customer insight while others prefer to operationalize this process internally?

• Is free text [blogs, call center notes, phone interviews] integrated and analyzed along with structured information such as purchase price, survey responses, and demographic data--or not?

•  Which metrics, key performance indicators or closed-loop processes are used?

•  What do successful companies do differently?
  

New Research: Two Converging Trends for Software as a Service: Business Intelligence

Acquiring business intelligence (BI) capabilities through a software-as-a-service (SaaS) model versus enterprise BI  represents the inflection point of two separate trends in business._[1] One trend signals the increasing importance of gaining insight into all manner of business events. These events encompass not just transactions, but patterns in activity as widespread as customer responsiveness, network management, supply chain performance, and fraud detection. The focus on BI comes from business grasping the importance of the axiom: "if you can't measure it, you can't manage it"

_{Note: All content excerpted from Connectivity Options & Evaluation Criteria for Business Intelligence Software as a Service  by Howard Baldwin & Leslie Ament.©2009 Hypatia Research, LLC.}

Louis Olds has significant expertise in business intelligence, analytics and enterprise software. Prior to joining Hypatia, Olds was VP at KXEN a provider of data mining tools, VP at PeopleSoft [acquired by Oracle], and Senior Analyst at First Nationwide Bank and TMAC.

As an independent consultant, Olds focused on helping clients define strategic requirements, understand competitive threats and opportunities, survey the market for compatible technologies and provide guidance for solution features and architecture.  His research coverage will focus on end-user experience with business intelligence and analytics [structured data] software solutions and services.

Hypatia Research, LLC today released a report entitled Business Intelligence: Connectivity Options & Evaluation Criteria outlining best practices, vendor solutions and selection criteria for deploying SaaS-based business intelligence solutions.

McKesson Pharmaceuticals, Welch's, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Florida, Nike, Car Toys and Shaklee are just a few of the firms that utilize SaaS-based business intelligence to both save on implementation costs and to take advantage of business intelligence insight faster. Customers noted that they could frequently deploy SaaS-based BI initiatives at one-fourth the cost and in one-fourth the time.

Hypatia's analysts determined that the popularity of SaaS-based BI represents the inflection point of two separate trends in business: the increasing importance of gaining insight into all manner of business events, and increasing interest in the idea of leasing rather than buying a software application, and accessing it over the Internet. With a SaaS application, companies can generally:

• Deploy applications faster
• Reduce the cost of deployment
• Avoid the cost of hardware and associated maintenance and monitoring
• Eliminate the need for on-site expertise in the application itself
  

"One of the most striking elements we uncovered in this research is the number of vendors who are licensing their business intelligence software engines to other application vendors. This means that companies looking for BI capabilities have even more options for accessing insight," added co-author and senior analyst Howard Baldwin.

December 31, 2008:

New Report: Business Intelligence Technologies, Tools & Services in the Healthcare Industries

Healthcare organizations in the U.S. are suffering financial strain. In the case of healthcare providers, such as hospitals, those financial pressures are particularly severe. While the current economic crisis has certainly made things worse for healthcare providers, the problems that beset them have been in the making for several years. Declining admissions, rising costs for medical supplies and services, and less generous reimbursements from the insurance industry has put many hospital and clinic operating budgets into the red.

Payer-side health insurance companies, too, are feeling the pinch of rising costs and lower employer contributions.

To survive the fall out and make the most of hair-thin profit margins, many are re-evaluating their approach to using business intelligence technologies and services. The complexity of the healthcare industry's business, administrative and clinical processes--as well as its myriad regulatory and Medicare/Medicaid--make BI essential to understanding the nature of problems and creating more cost efficient processes.

Senior analyst Sue Hildreth and I will share our "prognosis for BI usage in healthcare" in our next newsletter... will president Barack Obama and his team be reading it?