Authentication as a service

Here’s a prophecy: pretty soon Google, Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn will be generating an income from managing an essential part of your customer contact list. Okay, I agree, it’s a bit of a cheap prophecy, because many online services are already allowing users to log in with their Google or Facebook accounts. Although it’s free right now, we predict a change.

So, if a third party supplier, such as LinkedIn, would start requesting a fee for being your authentication provider, it will prove that there is a business case for doing so, and we think they are right. It’s one of those classic win-win situations. Your business partner can log in using an existing LinkedIn account (meaning: no extra user name or password to remember) and eliminating the need to save, manage and protect that authentication information.

We are currently proposing this authentication method with Facebook accounts to a utility company that is interested in issuing a maximum number of electronic invoices in an effort to reduce paper and postage costs. A similar approach is in the pipeline for another test project that is under consideration, by a public authority for local e-government services. In this instance, residents would have the option of using their Microsoft Live ID, Google or Facebook accounts, or the traditional log in name with their personal password.

Talk to marketing

And there is more to it than purely simplifying your IT infrastructure. Have you considered suggesting this social type of media authentication approach to your marketing department to see how they could use this information to foster a better interaction with your customers.

Standards apps -a one trick pony

What may seem like a revolutionary idea, creating apps for use in ERP systems on smart phones and tablet computers, is probably no more than a fad. Clearly, the virtue of standard apps is that they show what is technically possible and their ability to inspire us to explore new ways of working more comfortably and efficiently is undeniable. But that’s where it ends. If you want to get mobile devices to work faster (which we think is a sound idea), you will have to rely on custom-made mobile applications, irrespective of whether they are based on existing apps.

Our take on things

Here is why we believe only custom-made apps will actually work:
- an ERP system is never completed, which in itself is a good thing, because business innovation should be integrated in your software
- there is no such thing as a standard document (even a purchase order  varies from customer to customer)
- there is definitely no such thing as a standard business process, otherwise, this would leave little room to inject competitive advantage
- most companies do not work with the fully updated and latest version of an ERP software, and guess what, standards apps would probably only work on its most recent version
- most companies use more than one ERP software application, making integration necessary
- mobile input should be considered as one of the many channels in the process flow

Five steps to consider

In order to enhance the connection to your processes, we can help you develop fully integrated apps after we’ve established the following:
- what business processes are relevant to enable a semi or full transfer to a mobile platform
- which actions in those processes need to be mobile accessible
- what data sets do you need to perform those actions
- what systems hold and manage these data sets
- what identity or role-based security protects these systems

Once we’ve gathered this information, we will enact a dry-run and insert the smallest piece of data appropriately, under the right circumstances and with adequate protection. For almost ten years now Cnext has been successfully supporting companies. The main change to the business model tends to be seen in the change applied to the interface.

Are your customers still content with a 9 to 5 service? Really?

Customers demand more flexibility than simply offering them the chance to call up your support centre during standard office hours. They want an ‘around the clock service’, so that they can call, mail and go online with you at almost any time of the day. It’s clear that a telephony exchange system cannot meet the challenge to form the core of a next-generation support service.

We think that changing to a multichannel support service offers more opportunity than just shortening your turnaround time and lowering your cost. With true customer interaction, you can get more value out of your contacts. This is only effective if your contact agents have an overview of your customer’s profile and history.

 To achieve this, our customers use the Customer Care Accelerator software. It’s probably a lesser known Microsoft application, but according to Gartner, it’s one of the best tools for Customer Service Contact Centers.

Listed among our references are N-Allo (Belgium) with De Stroomlijn and Ores, Vodafone (United Kingdom), Batelco (Bahrain) and SNS Bank (the Netherlands, with Tieto). These companies have attained a better customer experience and higher levels of customer satisfaction, transforming their customer contact centers into efficient and process-oriented organizations.

 
screenshot: all customer information integrated in one desktop application