Cleartrip has been my favorite travel booking website since its launch. In fact, I’m so happy with the entire experience on the website that I haven’t even tried any other travel site. Last week they did two small things that reaffirmed my faith in their focus on customer experience.
First, they gave me a Rs.500 voucher for being a regular customer. When I saw the email in my inbox, I half expected some convoluted scheme where I could redeem it only if I was booking a flight to Bhubaneshwar or some such rider. And I expected some complicated way of redeeming the voucher with messy codes etc… But their offer was surprisingly simple. No voucher codes, no riders. Just book your next ticket by June 5 using the same account and Rs.500 will be credited to you in a week. No need to copy-paste voucher number or claim rebates etc… Couldn’t have been simpler!
The second thing they did was something I had been thinking of for a while. They added a ‘book a cab’ option once you book your ticket. Makes complete sense, most travellers in cities like Mumbai need to take a cab to the airport. Why not tie this in with booking the ticket and in the process get a little extra revenue? Their share of a customer’s total spend on travel increases and it offers the customer the convenience to book everything related to a trip in a single process.
However, there are some obvious improvements which I hope they’ll make quickly. For one, their rates for a cab are much higher. A ride from my home to the airport in a Meru Cab costs about Rs.225, but their minimum fare is Rs.350 (for within 15 kms) For a difference of Rs.125 I expect a lot of people would rather make a seperate phone call to Meru and book a cab. I haven’t tried the service yet (and probably won’t, I take a Rickshaw which is much cheaper), so I don’t know if they’ve tied up with a cab service. But that would make perfect sense. Just book cabs for an existing service like Meru and get a commision.
Right now, the way it works is: you give them your number, they call you in a while (actually 4 hours) and make your booking (however, its been about 48 hours and they haven’t called me yet!). With their history of creating good experience, I expect they’ll soon move this process online. Just put in your address and when you want to leave. They send this information to a cab service (which is basically what they ask over phone) and you get a SMS confirming the booking and cab driver’s number.
Posted: June 5th, 2009 | Author: admin | Filed under: Good Service Design, Uncategorized | Tags: Add new tag, cabs, Customer Experience, Good Service Design, service design, travel booking | No
Comments »
There hasn’t been much publicity about it, but HDFC Bank has launched a new innovative game at select branches to make the customer experience more lively and fun. Aptly called ‘Treasure Hunt: Find the Drop-box’, the business objective is to increase the time customers spend at a branch, maximize interaction with as many different staffers as possible and to give customers a tour of the entire branch.
When a customer walks into the branch and goes to the teller to deposit a cheque, he is given a cryptic answer and sent to fill the deposit slip. Once filled, he is given clues to find the drop-box. This leads him to different areas of the branch and creates oppotunities for interaction with more bank employees in his quest to find the drop-box. Finally, he finds it hidden behind a desk on the first floor, reaching there only after crossing the deadly dungeon (narrow spiral staircase).
Ok, so its not a game. Just another example of how customer experience doesn’t figure in most descisions at service companies. But this is taking it too far! You don’t need a service designer to tell you that something as commonly used as a cheque drop-box should be in an open area, preferably close to the entrance and definitely with signage.
But then again, may be you do!
At Guts, we do a ‘Service Audit’ to pin-point these kind of situations. The Service Audit involves experiencing a company’s service through all possible touch-points and in every possible situation. This really helps find the pain areas in the company’s service delivery and a customer’s experience. In many instances (like the one described above), operational expediency overrides any consideration for customer experience. Setting this right is not difficult or expensive once you look at it through a ’service design’ lens.
Posted: May 6th, 2009 | Author: admin | Filed under: Bad Service Design, Customer Experience | Tags: Add new tag, bad service, Customer Experience, Customer Service, retail design, service design, touchpoints | No
Comments »
Redesignme.com is an interesting new platform that allows companies to harness the imagination and ideas of hundreds of people to create new products and services.
The idea is very simple. A company posts a ‘redesign’ project outlining the scope, limitations, expectations etc… Users who are interested in the area submit their solutions/ideas and the community rates and discusses each suggestion. Finally the company selects the best ideas and rewards them with points that can redeemed to buy products on the same site.
I guess most people are not doing it for the points. The website appeals to people who believe they have the ‘next great idea’. Real Companies posting real projects makes it a lot more ’serious’ than abstract discussions. Going by the activity on the site, there are a lot of people who are willing to put in a lot of effort (illustrations of schemes, 3D mock-ups…) to participate in the development of products and services.
For companies, it is a great way to harness the potential of what is fashionably called ‘crowdsourced innovation’. From 100 ideas, a company might actually find something that is really useful. Coming from ‘consumers’ rather than ‘consultants’, the ideas might reflect real needs though they sometimes lack a ‘business case’.
www.redesignme.com
Posted: April 13th, 2009 | Author: Abhisek | Filed under: Service Design Tools | Tags: Add new tag, crowdsourcing, service ideas | No
Comments »
