Let’s take a look at some of these capabilities. 

After incident reporting, the police departments use their self-service virtual assistants to educate the public on community outreach and safety prevention. Watch both videos to see some of these interactions or visit the sites by click the links below.

Winston-Salem, NC Police Department                                                                                   Reno, NV Police Department

Read the USA Today article.

Read the Reno, NV article.

Read the Winston-Salem, NC article.

As we reach the last post in our series, “Maximizing Online Outcomes,” it’s time to switch gears from using your website to increase revenue to the concept of using your website to save money. It’s not a surprise that the payroll for customer support often accounts for a large portion of a company’s personnel budget. Yet, customer support is not somewhere you can afford to cut corners – after all, a bad customer service experience can frustrate or even alienate customers. Moreover, the proliferation of social media sites means that when one person has a bad experience, they’re probably sharing it with 200 others. Given this balancing act of trying to keep customer support payroll under control while providing excellent customer service, your company may be considering strategies to make the website the hub of customer support. The challenges associated with making a website a customer support resource include:

• Content. Perform an audit of your website content.  From landing pages and download able brochures to portfolio pieces and corporate news, it is amazing how quickly such information becomes stale or outdated.  Utilize your website metrics to determine the most heavily-trafficked pages and focus on updating them, if you don’t have the resources to tackle a full-scale content overhaul.  Also, look for pages with higher than average bounce rates (commonly defined as the percentage of visitors who enter the site and quickly exit rather than viewing other pages within the same site).  An abnormally high bounce rate indicates your content isn’t aligned with visitor expectations and fails to engage them.  This simple audit will help your content feel fresh, on-point and more interesting for visitors – which helps create engagement with your brand.

• Personality. As you’re auditing your content for accuracy and timeliness, also consider whether it presents a clear voice that speaks to your various buying persona.  A website that offers third-person, formal copy might work for an investment banking company but feel too formal for a luxury vacation website.  In addition to creating a consistent tone, explore the demographics that typically visit certain parts of your website.  For example, if your business sells vacation packages and the section on spa getaways is skewed female, consider writing copy that would be more engaging to woman.   A consistent tone and engaging viewpoint will create a connection with visitors.

• Crisp Imagery. While compelling content is important, your website should have clean, vibrant images.  Whether you sell actual products or use imagery to convey a feeling or mood, viewers expect to see original and relevant images throughout the website.  Not only do images convey what your business does visually, but also they strengthen your brand identity.

• Social media. If you aren’t utilizing social media to connect with leads and customers, you’re missing an opportunity to create engagement and bring your brand to life.  LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook are great ways to share special offers, news, events and get feedback from the people that know your business the best – your customers.  While the “open mic” premise of social media might make you feel vulnerable or as if your weaknesses are exposed, view it instead as an opportunity to learn and engage with website visitors.

• Digital characters. Another way to create a more dynamic website experience is to use digital characters to guide the visitor experience.  Different from an impersonal video clip or talking head, technology companies are creating interactive digital characters.  The characters can be customized (age, gender, appearance, etc.) so they feel engaging to your most popular demographics.  From answering frequently asked questions to helping viewers complete conversion forms, these digital characters can be utilized in a variety of ways to create a heightened level of interactivity.

“Best Practices: A Guide to Enhancing The Website Experience”

  The approach of websites and online customer experience has changed little over the last 15 years.  The approach is essentially one of read-and-click, look-and-click, read-and-click, navigating through a hierarchical collection of pages containing all this read-and-click content.  Granted, there is “shinier” content on pages, but the basic approach hasn’t changed in the last 15 years.  The problem is this approach has some fundamental flaws.   The biggest problem is this approach isn’t optimal for getting conversion results with real humans. Simply put, huge amounts of information all somewhat randomly available isn’t optimal for moving potential customers to make decisions, take actions, and click to the results you want as a business.  The overwhelming number of choices created by this approach to websites is part of the problem. We tend to not make decisions as humans when we have too many choices. But the other big problem is the almost exclusive appeal to reason that’s embedded in this approach.  In other words, the approach assumes if you have rationally compelling information and value in the content on web pages, and logically organize the pages so people can find the content on them, then you’ll maximize results.  But it’s becoming increasingly clear based on recent research on human decision and customer behavior, it isn’t an appeal to reason that moves us to action; it’s engaging at the level of intuition and emotion that is most powerful.  And that’s in short supply online, and candidly at odds with the approach of websites today.   We are beginning to see a number of emerging innovations that seek to change the dynamic of interaction on websites.  One is represented by Landing Pages and Microsites.  In the case of a Landing Page, the page is designed for one main purpose, to get a person who lands on the page to take a specific action.  As a result, the entire design of a landing page is optimized to this end.  Or similarly, Microsites are designed to step a person through a stream of clicks, through a carefully planned online experience.  Again, the organizing principle is the experience for a particular type of person and offer.   There are a number of other innovations seeking to transform the dynamic of interaction.  At CodeBaby, we are seeking to transform the dynamic of engagement to something that is aligned around a common human interaction model: a Conversation.  We use a digital character to engage site visitors with a more human dynamic. And the conversation embodies three essential qualities: it’s personally engaging based on what we know or can predict about the site visitor; it applies basic principles of emotional intelligence … factoring both blocking emotions as well as positive emotions; and it’s highly interactive in a way that moves real people to action.

“Best Practices: A Guide to Enhancing The Website Experience”

These days, I’ve been spending more time around web metrics andanalytics folks. These people apply technology to capture, measure, and analyze the data of site visitors on a website. The goal is to use all this data and analysis to optimize sites to get the best results. At the most basic level, Google Analytics provides basic analytics on “bounce rates”, time on site, page views, click thru rates, and so on. More advanced products provide not only deep views into more detailed data on click data on sites, but also correlates the data to user segments and personas. Similarly, sophisticated testing products give the ability to perform A/B split tests, but also very complex multi-variant tests to determine the most effective combination of options to get the best results on a website.

There are other products that will analyze click streams to determine what web experience streams are most effective, and to determine the points where web experience streams break down. All this represents state-of-the-art of web analytics.

While I recognize the benefits of this “science” of the web, I’m also concerned about a potential bias or “blind-spots” that this focus on eMetrics creates. After all, there are humans on the other side of the mouse. And it is human behavior and motivation that makes them click. My concern is that the focus on analytics leads us to forget these human behavioral dynamics. At best, eMetrics and web analytics represent the symptoms of customer motivations. In other words, web analytics give you the effect, but they may tell you little about cause or human dynamics.

Often, the focus created by a preoccupation with web analytics leads to two approaches. One is to try to find places in a website that are broken. In other words, is there something confusing about a particular point of web navigation? Or is there a place that can be simplified to get better user outcomes? A second preoccupation is with trying various options to see what works best.

I must admit that many of these efforts of testing strike me as blind trial and error without much insight. It makes me think of the line, “Even a blind squirrel find a nut occasionally.” Even if this pattern of randomly testing option leads to better web results, I’m concerned that it doesn’t lead to fundamental insight. And if you don’t know why a particular configuration of web options leads to better website results, then it’s unlikely you’ll be able to gain insight and consistently engage the human motivations that lead to optimal results.

We must remember, it is humans that click, and human motivation and behavior is the ultimate cause.

“Best Practices: A Guide to Enhancing The Website Experience”

As of December 31, 2009 there were an estimated 1,802,330,457 Internet users, according to Internet World Stats. Internet usage worldwide has increased 399.3% since 2000, and now more than ever, it‘s crucial for companies to communicate effectively online with non-English speakers. CodeBaby offers a solution that does just that.

The top language used online at the end of 2009 was English, with 495,800,000 users. What language was second? Chinese, with 407,000,000 users. In third place is Spanish, with 139,800,000.

So how do you communicate with your non-English speaking customers online without a translator? Use a CodeBaby Character. Eva from Colorado Gear Up greets website visitors and immediately offers the option to converse in Spanish.

“Hola! Soy Eva y yo quiero dar la bienvenida a Colorado GEAR UP. Yo puedo decir lo que quieras saber sobre nosotros. Así que lo que puede le ayuda con el primero?”

Or, for non-Spanish speakers, “Hi! I’m Eva and I want to welcome you to Colorado Gear Up. I can tell you anything you want to know about us. So what can I help you with first?”

Eva is a great tool for Colorado Gear-Up, as a large part of the demographic they reach are Spanish speaking. She even remembers visitors who have chosen Spanish previously, automatically conversing in Spanish when they return to the site. By allowing a CodeBaby Character to speak the site visitor’s language, you can overcome the linguistic barrier that international and multi-language organizations face, vastly improving online effectiveness and customer experience. Below, you can see the example of a Spanish CodeBaby Character: