1. Customer
Intelligence
Mohamed Shaaban| Systems Analyst
June 2011| mohamed.shaaban@mail.link.net
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2. Test!
• What do you want to know about your
customer?
• What do you do to find information?
• Is it about impressing people? Or there’re
other incentives?
• How would you communicate to the customer
what you’ve known about them?
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3. I. Introducing Customer Intelligence (CI)
Concept
“the process of gathering and analyzing information regarding
customers; their details and their activities, in order to build
deeper and more effective customer relationships and improve
strategic decision making” Source: Wikipedia
Tools: Speech Analytics, Click Tracking, and others
CI and Analysis
“a set of research techniques that help analysts investigate the
current state of their customer business, market trends, and
technology capabilities, so that they could give a context to future
requirements elicitation” Source: Me
Tools: Benchmarking, Document Analysis, and others
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4. I. CI Dynamics
• KNOW
– Your Customer
• Check About us, FAQs sections
• Goals and desired outcomes of the project
• Align with their goals
• Prioritize features accordingly
– Get familiar with terminologies and abbreviations
– Find history of similar projects/portfolios/vendors
– Your customer’s customer
• Achieve better usability
• Demonstrate ownership
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5. I. CI Dynamics
• IDENTIFY
– Metrics and KPIs: to support benefit management
and reporting
– Solution Approach: the general approach taken to
delivery of new solutions required by the business
– Assumptions and Constraints
– Priorities: time–based, business need, user group
needs… etc
– Risks: to assess potential risks that may impact the
solution, and the associated costs, early enough
– Best source(s) of requirements
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6. I. CI Dynamics
• ORGANIZE
– Solution: Functional Decomposition
• Make the best out of stakeholders experience and time
– Come up with Accurate Plans Based on:
• Prioritized modules
• Involvement of the right stakeholders
• Well-defined scope
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7. I. CI Dynamics
• CONTROL
– Scope
• By handling potential creeps proactively
– System Integration
– Reports
– Data Migration
– Others
– Users Buy-in
• You’re not ‘selling’, you’re consulting
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8. I. CI Dynamics
• WIN
– Customer Satisfaction (and Involvement)
• Strategic alliance
– High-Quality Requirements – SMART
– Generate Leads!
• Advise on new, yet relevant, features
• Further solutions
• Be careful: Scope must be considered
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9. I. CI Dynamics
• TECHNIQUES
– Study
• Customer
• Technology e.g. SP, DNN, MS Commerce, RMS
• Business/Market
• Existing solutions: snapshots. documentation. log files.
satisfaction surveys. support reports
– Benchmarking
• Against industry standards. Example: Telco, Airlines, BPM
• Against competitor’s advantages
– Brainstorming – capture a 360 view of the solution
– Invent!
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10. I. CI Dynamics
• COMMUNICATE
– Findings come in the form of perceptions that are
to be validated
– Come in the form of suggestions, not instructions
– Uphold high professional standards
• Example: mentioning pitfalls
– Exhibit neatness and accuracy in presenting data
• Example: which competitor does what, when, and how
– Consider intellectual property rights
• Example: considering the fire back of your skills
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11. I. CI Dynamics
• CHALLENGE
– Lack of Resources
• Usually about customer, not business
• Insist on a good presales handover session
• Study similar customers (within the same location/domain)
– Lack of Time
• First Things First
1. Solution and technology
2. Customer
3. Business
4. Market
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