Aug 19, 2021

Shift Happens: Why I Joined SupportLogic

I have been working in the technology sector long enough to see several major shifts happen before my eyes. The largest was probably the move from client/server to SaaS and now Cloud-based computing models. But concepts like mobile technologies for business, social media, and now the pandemic-driven push for support of remote working have had similar impacts on the space as a whole.

These market shifts have had tremendous impact on our lives – sometimes changing them in such profound ways that it is almost impossible to measure the net effect. I mean, can you imagine not being able to get your work email any time, anywhere? Or, imagine still having to be in an office to access critical information and applications. These scenarios seem ludicrous to us today. In short, our lives and even our business brains have been re-wired due to these major shifts.

I come from the CRM world. And while these shifts have affected that industry in major ways – I think another major shift is upon us. What is it? I believe that the Experience Economy is having a prolonged disruptive and transformative effect on how companies deliver products, services, support – in short the whole customer experience – to their customers.

When we see the confluence of cloud/SaaS delivery, the subscription economy, and the dominance of consumer technology experiences bleeding into the business worlds – we can see a sort of perfect storm emerging. Older CRM approaches are incomplete, and even the first generation forms of CX management are missing the mark.

Why are these approaches insufficient? Well – first – CRM systems and support ticketing solutions are antiquated, relational database driven systems of record. They lack intelligence, cannot manage unstructured data well or at all, and lack the performance to consume and interpret customer sentiments in real-time or at any real scale. What’s more – typical “voice of the customer” based approaches to CX are post-scriptive and usually tackle only a subset and certain type of customer. And call recording and analytics companies fail in providing any truly proactive value for managers and agents alike. Basically, existing approaches fall very short of providing real-time, actionable insights for customer-facing professionals.

But without an efficient method for interpreting customer signals at scale and in real-time, companies open themselves up to serious vulnerabilities. In the subscription/experience economy, customer churn can be as little as one mis-step away. And everyone is getting wise to the fact that we are competing on experience, not price or feature set (especially in tech).

So, when I learned about SupportLogic and what we’re trying to accomplish, I was more than intrigued. Here is a company looking to transform the role of support in some key markets – and doing so with truly encompassing and innovative technologies. We are uniquely able to empower support teams to act on unbiased signals from actual customer interactions in real time. This is a really big deal. Not only is there an enormous untapped market for this type of solution, it is the kind of mission that taps into the initial passion I had for the CRM space when I joined decades ago. It’s about finally being able to truly drive relationships and lifetime value.

As chief evangelist and head of solutions marketing, I’ll be – as the name suggests – looking to amplify the message around our vision and mission. We are solving problems in a way that no one ever has before – so we need to get LOUD and tell support managers and executives that we’re here to help! I will be a voice for SupportLogic, but also a voice for the concept of Service Experience Management in general. In addition to being the public evangelist – I will be helping to develop and bring to market products and services that make it even easier for our customers to optimize and transform their support organizations to adjust to this new market shift.

While today we are focusing on support agents in the complex world of B2B technology – the sky’s the limit. In the world where everything is “blank-as-a-service” when you stop and think about it – creating an optimized service experience is critical. It drives the customer relationship, protects revenue and helps grow the lifetime engagement between business and customer.

We have created a “System of Intelligence” that acts as a force multiplier for existing Systems of Record (CRM, ticketing systems, etc.). We have a unique ability and approach using AI and Machine Learning that these legacy systems were not built for. While they serve a huge purpose, we are building on that foundation to provide actionable insights into the customer relationship based on real, unbiased signals historically trapped inside the silos of unstructured interaction data. It is, truthfully, kind of a big deal.

And again, we are just getting started at SupportLogic. I am beyond proud to be part of the amazing team that is bringing this game-changing vision into reality. As it becomes more evident that the service experience is the key to growing and protecting revenue, the good news is that we’re here to help. I look forward to sharing more of my thoughts as I continue what is sure to be an awesome journey with SupportLogic!

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