[Sigia-l] Forcing use of Web pages instead of email

[Leonard Will]

In message <d960bfc40608301025l6c7bd7e3s5115c3d125bb98f4 at mail.gmail.com> 
on Wed, 30 Aug 2006, John Benjamin <john.benjamin at gmail.com> wrote
>Leonard,
>
>You have some excellent points, especially with regard to making these
>email forms more friendly. I have some comments, that I've added
>in-line. I'll skip everything I just agree with. :)

John -

Thanks for your sympathy.
>
>What these forms really do is provide an amount of control over the
>routing of customer communication.
>
> It still doesn't work as well as we'd like, because people won't send 
>appropriate messages via appropriate channels.

It's quite possible to ask the user to select a department, etc.,  from 
a drop-down list on a web site, and then put that and any other 
appropriate routing headers into an email message template in the user's 
email program, which can even include some pre-set body text. See, for 
example, the suggestion about this at 
<http://www.devx.com/vb2themax/Tip/18810>.

>Much of our emphasis right now is on "live chat" interfaces-- secure,
>java-style pop-up chat windows that let you IM with a representative.
>If you don't have a technical problem preventing you from getting
>online, this is the next best thing to a phone call, maybe even better

It depends whether you can keep a record of the conversation. I often 
want to think carefully when wording an email message, and not have to 
respond in real time. I might also want to include quotes from previous 
contacts, error messages that appeared on my screen, and so on, and it 
is easier to compile such things off-line.

I am also wary of telephone contacts, because you don't have any record 
of what was said or what promises were made. If I make a complaint or 
enquiry that the call-centre operative cannot deal with immediately, I 
like to have something in writing as an assurance that my message has 
not gone in one ear and out the other, or disappeared into a black hole.

>> 4. Organisations do not seem to have heard of secure email with
>> electronic signatures using PGP or similar systems. They think that
>> "secure Web pages" are the only way to send confidential information.
>
>See my previous comment. Also, I suspect part of the problem is that
>most organizations don't have a customer base that is used to using
>secure email, so using that method to communicate would require
>training their users, which would just frustrate everyone.

If secure email was more widely used and promoted, it would become as 
commonplace as using another add-on such as Acrobat reader or a spam 
filter, for example.

>> 5. Companies send out advertising mail and service messages by ordinary
>> email, but then say "Do not reply to this message as replies cannot be
>> read; please use our Web page if you want to communicate with us". This
>> strikes me as particularly rude; surely they can provide a valid "Reply
>> to:" address in their emails, even if they are sent out by a mailing
>> list robot.
>
>It all comes back to the kind of feedback you're going to receive from
>such a reply, and whether you have the technical means to make what
>you get useful to either your organization or your users.
>
> If the message says "just hit reply" you're kind of indicating that 
>all replies will be read and dealt with appropriately-- even if they're 
>inappropriate ("why'd you send me this, stop it").

I would say that "Stop sending these messages" is a very appropriate 
response that should be dealt with appropriately. A message can always 
include several "mailto:" links for replies, with specific routing 
addresses as discussed above.

Best wishes

Leonard

-- 
Willpower Information       (Partners: Dr Leonard D Will, Sheena E Will)
Information Management Consultants              Tel: +44 (0)20 8372 0092
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L.Will at Willpowerinfo.co.uk               Sheena.Will at Willpowerinfo.co.uk
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