Exterminate Bad Experiences RightNow

October 29, 2009 3 Comments

At its user conference in Colorado Springs, RightNow Technologies announced a new mission: To rid the world of bad experiences. CEO Greg Gianforte unveiled the mission along with its three pillars:

  1. Invest in its solution to help RightNow clients eliminate bad customer experiences from their consumer base.
  2. Improve the way it engages with their clients to ensure they always have great experiences when interacting with RightNow
  3. Give back to the communities in which it operates.

Here are some details that went along with the announcement:

  • It renamed its platform: RightNow CX, the customer experience suite.
  • It announced three new social media offerings (RightNow Support Community, RightNow Innovation Community, and RightNow Social Experience Designer) which are integrated with its Web and contact center components.
  • To enhance its relationship with its clients, the company announced its CX Commitment which has three elements: relentless focus on business results, expertise on every engagement, and delivering on the promise of SaaS.
  • It’s adding Client Success Managers to every RightNow account, free of charge. These people won’t carry sales quotas and will be measured on the business results of their clients.
  • RightNow won’t start an engagement until the client and RightNow agree on what the results will be; and they won’t consider a project finished until they’ve delivered those results.
  • The company has ambitious plans for its SaaS platform which include a commitment to no shelf-ware, complete pricing transparency, and what it calls “invisible updates” – frictionless changes from version to version.

Gianforte ended his remarks by inviting attendees to join RightNow in ridding the world of bad experiences.

My take: I’ve seen many vendors create missions like this; announcing audacious statements about how they want to be perceived. Most fail miserably. But RightNow’s announcement is different from most.

Since the mission dovetails completely with my focus, I sat down with several people across RightNow including its CEO, CMO, and COO to understand what this mission really means. Here’s how I’d rate RightNow’s mission against the 6 criteria that I use for evaluating organizational missions:

  • Is it compelling? YES
  • Are employees bought-in? YES
  • Is it consistent with the company’s core beliefs? YES
  • Is there value for all key constituents? YES
  • Has the company aligned its investments to the mission? YES
  • Are significant changes being made to align with the mission? YES

Ridding the world of bad experiences is more than just a slogan for RightNow, it’s a commitment to an operating model that’s driving all of its key decisions.

I am particularly impressed by the company’s commitment to align itself more fully with its customers’ success – instead of just selling software. If successful, RightNow might actually redefine a more customer-centric model for software companies. That would certainly rid the world of many bad experiences!

The bottom line: Let’s collectively rid the world of bad experiences.

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About Bruce Temkin, CCXP
I'm an experience (XM) management catalyst; helping organizations improve results by engaging the hearts and minds of their employees, customers, and partners. I enjoy researching and speaking about these topics. I lead the Qualtrics XM Institute, which is the world's best job. We're igniting a global community of XM Professionals who are inspired and empowered to radically improve the human experience. To achieve this goal, my team focuses on thought leadership, training, and community building. My work is driven by a set of fundamental beliefs: 1) Everything starts and ends with human beings, so you need to understand how people think, feel, and behave; 2) XM is a discipline that needs to be woven throughout an organization's entire operating fabric; and 3) Building the XM discipline requires a combination of culture, competency, and technology.

3 Responses to Exterminate Bad Experiences RightNow

  1. Bruce Temkin says:
    October 28, 2009 at 8:00 pm

    To be fully transparent, RightNow is a client of Forrester and I have worked with the company for many years. Having said that, my blog is completely independent from Forrester and any of its clients. I receive NO compensation for my blog and no one at RightNow had any input into any of the content of this post.

    I decided to highlight this announcement because I think it showcases a couple of things: 1) how a company can align around a mission; and 2) how companies can raise their intensity on becoming customer-centric.

    And, of course, what could be more up my alley than an effort to rid the world of bad experiences?!?

    Reply
  2. Michael Whitlow says:
    October 30, 2009 at 9:04 am

    What do you and your readers think? I Posted today at The Buzz Bin – http://bit.ly/3h1giF . Do we really need The New York Times and legions of repeating bloggers to take on our customer service complaints. Is every negative customer experience newsworthy? I understand the company’s need to make things flawless, but if they aren’t why do I need to see it splattered all over Twitter (or, in this case, The New York Times)?

    Reply
    • Bruce Temkin says:
      November 1, 2009 at 3:31 pm

      Michael: Thanks for commenting! I often tell my clients that the best social media strategy is to make customer happy in the first place. At the end of the day, every large organization will deliver some bad experiences to some people (no one’s perfect). And periodically some of those events will make their way onto the social media space (like United Breaks Guitars). If your company does a good job with most of it’s customers, then those social media outbursts will be naturally contained. You run into problems when those stories resonate with the experiences of other customers. I also tell clients to respond to customer issues that come from all listening posts; and don’t overly respond to social media outlets like Twitter and YouTube.

      Reply

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