Relationship Management: Adding Value By Integrating Multiple Systems

What is integration?

The first issue discussed at length was the definition of integration. Thomas Nordby of NDIA raised the point that "fully integrated" to me may mean something entirely different to others.

The panel provided their insight and as moderator, I added that I believe integration is acheived when redundant data entry is eliminated, whether by the staff or by the member/customer. So some examples of integration include:

1. moving summary financial data from the AMS to the financial management system without re-keying.
2. setting up meetings and registration information in the AMS and having that information appear on the website without any additional data manipulation
3. allowing members to login to your website once without having to relogin in other areas of the site that may be managed by third parties.

How does your organization define integration? And how far should we go with integration? Where is the "tipping point" for too much effort without enough return?

Where is the "R" in ROI for your online investment and what are the right benchmarks?

Following are links to the presentations and handout from this session:

• Presentation (ppt)
  
• Handout (pdf)
  

Additional thoughts from the ROI Session -

Of those within the target market that visit your site, you can identify measurable objectives based on other communication goals, marketing objectives, and sales objectives.

These objectives might include:

• The number/percentage of target market site visitors that subscribe to receive ongoing information from your company via email;
• The number/percentage of target market site visitors that will request additional information about your organizations products or services;
• The number of customers who successfully resolve customer service needs online.
• The projected number of products and services sold online, or transactions originating from Internet visits.
• The number of new monthly visitors and repeat monthly visitors to your Web site.

Using Web statistics, you can calculate a number of useful marketing-relevant indicators:

Penetration = [unique visitors to home page] / [unique visitors] Penetration reflects the percentage of site visitors that go beyond your organization's home page. It's not uncommon for Web sites to lose 50% or more of its visitors before the home page finishes loading. A home page that has 5,000 visitors a month with a penetration of less than 50% may be less effective than a site with 4,000 visitors with higher penetration.

Conversion = [unique visitors taking desired action] / [unique visitors]Conversion reflects the percentage of site visitors that take a desired action. You can measure the conversion for several actions simultaneously. For example, the percentage of site visitors that purchase online; and the percentage site visitors that subscribe to your organization's electronic newsletter.

Migration = [visits to content area]/ [site exits from the content area]Migration refers to the number of site visitors that leave your site from a specific content area. Content areas with the highest migration are typically less effective than areas with lower migration.

Clicks to Action = [Average number of clicks from home page to desired action]CTA reflects the number of clicks it takes from the Home Page to reach a desired action. For example, reducing the CTA to complete an order should result in a measurable increase of customer conversion for online orders.

Source: http://www.evolt.org/roI-how-hard-is-your-web-site-working

Is your organization working towards effectively monitoring these activities so you can display the ROI for your online investment?

Web 2.0 (Blogs, RSS, and Social Bookmarks) and implications for Higher Education

Abstract: Web 2.0: A New Wave of Innovation for Teaching and Learning? Web 2.0 maybe a misleading title, the elements of RSS, Blogs, and Social Bookmarks are defining a new course on "digital writing".

Author: Bryan Alexander
Date: Educause March/April 2006

Takeway:

Web 2.0’s lowered barrier to entry may influence a variety of cultural forms with powerful implications for education, from storytelling to classroom teaching to individual learning. It is much simpler to set up a del.icio.us tag for a topic one wants to pursue or to spin off a blog or blog departmental topic than it is to physically meet co-learners and experts in a classroom or even to track down a professor. Starting a wiki-level text entry is far easier than beginning an article or book. What new, natively digital textual forms are impending as small-scale production scales up? “Web 1.0” has already demonstrated immense powers for connecting learners, teachers, and materials. How much more broadly will this connective matrix grow under the impact of the openness, ease of entry, and social nature of Web 2.0? How can higher education respond, when it offers a complex, contradictory mix of openness and restriction, public engagement and cloistering? How do we respond to the possibilities of what some call “E-learning 2.0,” based on environments, microcontent, and networking?

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Web 2.0: Mash-Ups

Abstract: Mash-ups are web application hybrids that combine two or more web-based information sources to create something new. Still in its infancy, Mash-ups are poised to redefine the value of the WWW.

Author: Colm McBarron
Date: April 17, 2006

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The Web-Powered Control Shift: Social Computing

Abstract: The idea of social computing is getting a lot of play these days, most notably this week as folks discuss the fall-out, good and bad, of Chevy's own large-scale experiement in this space, Chevy Apprentice. Forrester's Charlene Li wrote some good coverage about this yesterday, as did ZDNet's Dan Farber. For those of you not following the premise yet, social computing is the fallout of the mass deployment of two-way style Web 2.0 technologies to a world-wide audience that is ready and eager to use them. What happened with Chevy Apprentice? Chevy created a community Web site where anyone could post their theme-based remix videos in an Apprentice style competition for their Chevy Tahoe product line. Over 22,000 videos were ultimately submitted.

Author: Dion Hinchcliffe
Date: April 7, 2006

Takeway: Illustration provides good contrast in culture and style of organization (association-governance) driven communities and organic (member-driven) communities that have emerge. There are significant differences in how organic communities are setup and managed.Power to the Periphery continues to expand.

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Best of the 2.0 Web

Abstract: The next generation of the web is here! With new kinds of desktop-like applications being released left and right, how will you know where to go and what to use? This site shows you the best of Web 2.0 that you can get the most out of.

Author: Vince Veneziani
Date: February 23, 2006

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What put the ‘2’ in Web 2.0?

Abstract: As Tim O’Reilly’s Meme Map shows, Web 2.0 services share many attributes. But which create competitive advantage and prompt fast growth? By tracking the services that embrace Web 2.0, we can identify attributes that have made a difference.

The foundation attributes that enable the economics of Web 2.0, such as the network effect and the Long Tail, pre-date other attributes by several years. They exist in many non-Web 2.0 services. Experience Attributes have surfaced much more recently, and these give Web 2.0 services a strongly differentiating competitive advantage: relevant, human, and surprising user experiences.

Author: Adaptive Path
Date: October 15, 2005

Takeaway: Chronology of Web 2.0 and its implications, Foundation Attributes in Web 2.0.

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What is Web 2.0, Design Patterns and Business Models for the Next Generation of Software

Abstract: Defining just what Web 2.0 means (the term was first coined at a conference brainstorming session between O'Reilly and MediaLive International, which also spawned the Web 2.0 Conference), still engenders much disagreement. Some decry it as a meaningless marketing buzzword, while others have accepted it as the new conventional wisdom. Tim O'Reilly attempts to clarify just what we meant by Web 2.0, digging into what it means to view the Web as a platform.

Author: Tim O'Reilly
Date: September 30, 2005

Takeway: The arguments will rage on when Web 2.0 was born and what it really is, but this is a good primer in understanding the key elements especially conveying the message that Web 2.0 is really a computing platform. The reality is that Web 2.0 is a marketing term coined a few years ago by O'Reilly Media. Some would even argue that the web is way beyond 2.0 stage, more like Web 8.0. Others would argue that Tim Berners-Lee's orginal vision of the web where he envisioned the highly participative Web that we are moving towards not the static Web where we have been. That means that the early web was a beta, and we are not only approaching Web 1.0. Confused, don't be. O'Reiily's document does a pretty comprehensive job of explaining what Web 2.0 is about, no matter what you label it.

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Web 2.0 and The Long Tail

Abstract:The theory of the Long Tail is that our culture and economy is increasingly shifting away from a focus on a relatively small number of "hits" (mainstream products and markets) at the head of the demand curve and toward a huge number of niches in the tail. As the costs of production and distribution fall, especially online, there is now less need to lump products and consumers into one-size-fits-all containers. In an era without the constraints of physical shelf space and other bottlenecks of distribution, narrowly-target goods and services can be as economically attractive as mainstream fare. The Long Tail article is about the big-picture consequence of this: how our economy and culture is shifting from mass markets to million of niches.

Author: Chris Anderson
Date: September 24, 2005

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