I was reading a recent study by the Patricia Seybold Group (posted on ATG's website) and was struck by a comment by Susan Aldrich:
"In 1995, unbeknownst to almost all of us, the majority of businesses in the world were catapulted into the publishing business."
It's true that burgeoning online communication channels make it more and more obvious which companies do not understand how to make it easy for customers to interact with them. And the wealth of self-service channels, and easily available content makes it imperative that companies put some strong analytical thought into publication systems, processes and measurements.
I would contend that, like a top-notch human resources practice, having a well defined publishing model for business information was a necessary competence for well-run companies prior to the internet. The internet merely made it more transparent and obvious when a company is not customer-centric. Both the digitization of information, and customer expectations of self-service empowerment, now, more than ever, require that companies continuously investigate customer goals, and the processes customers would like to go through to acheive those goals.
In other words, good companies think critically about the customer experience, and design processes, content and interfaces to make that the best experience possible. Is that such a surprise?
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