January 26, 2015
The Landscape of
Utility Communications
It interesting to explore the ways water and wastewater
utilities communicate, and the objectives behind these communications. Many would say that reaching out to the
public is an imperative simply because the utility exists, or because public
agencies need to be transparent. But
it’s a bit more interesting if we dig a little deeper and apply the context of
branding. Utility communications can be
broken down into several categories, including the following:
- Customer Service Interactions
- Communicating to Change Customer Behaviors (Water Conservation)
- Fulfilling Transparency Requirements
- Communicating with Policy Makers (Water Boards, City Councils….)
- Proactively Reaching Out to Community Leaders and the General Public
Exceptional Customer
Service – We can argue that utilities should provide exceptional customer
service simply because it’s the right thing to do. It should
be easy for customers to pay a bill or get a problem solved. In fact, “making it easy” should be an
overarching standard for delivering service, and utilities should develop a
series standards that define the specifics of the customer experience. But it’s also important to understand the link
between service, communications, and branding.
Branding Moments
- Service interactions create positive or negative impressions about the
utility, so it’s useful to refer to these interactions as “branding
moments.” When a customer is on hold for
20 minutes trying to get a problem solved, the utility is communicating more
effectively than in almost every other situation. The customer is clearly paying attention,
which is the first and primary challenge when it comes to effective
communications. Unfortunately, in this long-hold
time scenario, the utility is communicating that it doesn’t care about the
customer or that it’s incompetent. We also know that when the utility does an
excellent job solving a customer’s problem, then trust in the utility is
greater than if the problem never occurred.
It is true that a specific negative impression may not come back to
haunt the utility, because customers typically cannot choose another service
provider. But it’s clearly not fair to
customers nor prudent to be stock-piling negative branding moments due to sub-par
customer-service experiences.
Communication Choices
- So if it comes down to a choice over allocating resources, it’s better to invest
in decreasing phone hold times than to spend time and money trying to reach members
of the general public (who are not generally paying attention and may not even
be interested in paying attention).
Communicating to change customer behaviors, meeting transparency
requirements, and building relationships with community leaders are different
matters. These opportunities will be addressed
in subsequent Branding Updates.