By Martin Vedris
SYDNEY: RightNow Technologies Inc, which provides organisations with customer relationship management solutions, has launched a new software and online service to help consumer electronics companies maintain relationships with their consumers.
Called RightNow Consumer Electronics, the new offering combines the company’s on demand customer relationship management (CRM) solution with its experience of working with consumer electronics appliance manufacturers such as Black & Decker, Canon Canada, LeapFrog, LG Electronics, Logitech, Nikon, Sharper Image, and TomTom.
According to RightNow, 68 per cent of consumers visit a manufacturer’s web site to research a digital camera or television purchase before visiting a retail location. Also, according to the company, consumers who have visited a manufacturer’s site typically spend 10 per cent more when making an in store purchase than consumers who have done no web research.
Also, according to the July 2007 Forrester report ‘Must-Haves for Manufacturer Web Sites’, visitors to manufacturer’s web sites have a high intent to purchase: 16 percent plan to make a purchase immediately, 14 percent within 48 hours and 18 percent within a week.
According to RightNow, which has an Australian office and local clients including JetStar, this new service can help consumer electronic and appliance manufacturers deliver excellent experiences to end consumers before, during, and after a purchase.
For example, the new service helps companies present relevant product information to consumers before they make a purchase and after the purchase it provides services such as product registration. In addition, RightNow Consumer Electronics helps companies measure customer loyalty and satisfaction with their brands by collecting feedback throughout the customer life cycle.
The solution is available under RightNow’s software-as-a-service delivery model and aims to help businesses capitalise on the increasing use of the internet for pre-purchase research by consumers.
RightNow say that their Consumer Electronics solution helps manufacturers maximise the first interaction with a consumer, before a retailer is involved or a sale is made. To do this, RightNow enables manufacturers to take dynamic content from their RightNow knowledgebase, such as frequently asked questions, product specifications and warranty information, and make it available on specific product pages.
“As more consumers turn to manufacturers’ web sites both before and after a purchase, organisations need to deliver information that can guide buying decisions and provide complete post-sales support,” said Chuck Udzinski, consumer services manager for Black & Decker in the USA.
“RightNow makes it easy for consumer electronics and high tech appliance manufactures to tap into their rich RightNow knowledgebase and deliver relevant content to customers both before and after making a purchase, helping to ensure a positive customer experience, regardless of when or how consumers interact with a manufacturer.”