Allen B.

Manalo August 19, 2019

BSIT IV

Case Study No. 1

eCourier, Cablecom, and Bryan Cave: Delivering Value through Business Intelligence

1. How do information technologies contribute to the business success of the companies

depicted in the case? Provide an example from each company explaining how the
technology implemented led to improved performance.
Information technologies are imperative to businesses and organizations that want to be
successful. In this case, there were three companies that demonstrated how information
technologies helped their business. The first company was eCourier. eCourier delivers
packages around London and wanted to “keep real-time tabs on customer satisfaction”.
eCourier used SeeWhy software to help give them customer data faster. This software
allowed eCourier to see when client’s accounts were going dormant or if there were
changes in the bookings. With this new data, eCourier saved money by not having to
add extra staff to monitor who was happy with service and who was not.

The second company was Cablecom. Cablecom was also interested customer
satisfaction. They used statistical software to look through customer data and filter out
trouble. They also found that using survey research in combination with statistical
software gave a more accurate look at customer satisfaction or dissatisfaction. These
two information technologies allowed Cablecom to see which customers were unhappy
and helped them retain those customers.

Finally, the third company was a law firm called Bryan Cave. Bryan Cave needed an
alternative to the hourly fee normally charged by law firms. Clients wanted “fixed
pricing and pricing that was adjusted during a project”. The law firm had spreadsheets
to help breakdown the collection of fees and how much profit was being made but these
spreadsheets were difficult and confusing. The company used business intelligent tools
to help “lawyers track budgets in real time so that they could quickly make
adjustments”. The use of this technology led to improved profitability for the law firm
and also improvement in hours worked by fee earners in the law firm.

2. In the case of law firm Bryan Cave discussed above, the use of BI technology to
improve the availability, access, and presentation of existing information allowed them
to provide tailored and innovative services to their clients. What other professions
could benefit from a similar use of these technologies, and how? Develop two different
possibilities.

Many professions can use business intelligence tools just like in the case of Bryan Cave
law firm. The banking industry can use BI tools to stay competitive. With competition
nature and increasing due regulatory legislation surrounding financial institutions, it is
imperative that financial institutions monitor customer's behaviors related to consumption
of banking products in an effort to retain the customers. Business intelligence tools are being
developed and marketed to banks to help monitor, analyze accounts, and determine
customer profitability. This type of business intelligence tool would help the banks market
to current customers based on their propensity to purchase products based on transaction
behavior and other products the customers currently utilize. Additionally, a business
intelligience tool that performs an analysis of the current fee structure charged for existing
products in relation to the competition in the marketplace would help the bank determine if
their pricing structure is competitive and in line with the competition. This technology
would also help financial institutions identify which customers are profitable and whether
or not fees should be increased or reduced. Currently, Chemical Bank has implemented a
business intelligience tool that commerical lenders will utilize by cross rreferencing their
loan portfolio and any prospect against to determine the profitability of the customer in
relation to the company's return on equity. The business intelligience tool will help the
commerical lenders determined if the loan rate is in line given certain parameters such as
the market, financial statements, and the customer's business plan. Additionally, the tool
will help determine if packaging a suite of products would benefit the customer if more
products and services of the bank were utilized. Finally, Chemical Bank is investigating an
innovative business intelligence tool called data cube is being considered for
implementation. The data cubes would be developed from different reports for regional
sales managers allowing them to manipulate the data to be more useful strategic planning
and determining staffing solutions.

BS&A software company could benefit from business intelligence tools. BS& A provides
tax software and assessing software to many Michigan townships and cities. Each platform
communicates with any of the other BS& A platforms. From personal experience it is a
wonderful program. To help retain current clients BS& A could use survey research to see
what needs to be enhanced for each client or what needs to be simplified for each client.
This would allow the company to then tailor its software to fit each customer’s needs.
At the township I work, we needed a way to enter credit card payments into our tax program
from BS & A. The only payments accepted in the software were checks and cash. By filling
out the survey and sending it back via internet I was immediately contacted and the program
writers made the necessary changes that allowed me to enter when a client of the township
 paid with a credit card. I was very satisfied with the results and BS & A retained my
township as one of their clients.

Cablecom developed a prediction model to better identify those customers at risk of

switching to another company in the near future. In addition to those noted in the case,
what other actions could be taken if that information were available? Give some
examples. Would you consider letting some customers leave anyway? Why?
Cablecom used two softwares, SPSS’s statistical software and SPSS’s Dimensions
survey research software, to study customer dissatisfaction. SPSS’s statistical software tells:
1. How many times problem occurred
2. How long does it took to fix the problem

Drawbacks of this software: This may or may not tell what the problem was. SPSS’s
Dimensions survey research software tells:
1. After how many months of service customers gets dissatisfied- 9 months
2. When customers switch most- between 12-14 months

Drawback: why to wait till 7-9 months to find the problem?

Actions to prevent switching:
Find the problem, fix the problem: Send monthly satisfaction surveys to find the
problem areas. If people are not responding very well then add some incentives to it like
lucky prizes from the drawings of responders.

Be PROACTIVE
1. Keep customers engaged by providing some money saving tips to customers with
their monthly bill. Some examples of tips that may improve customer retention are:
family plans over individual plans that would allow for a cost savings; Explain the
benefit of texting if it's cheaper than making phone calls; explain the benefits of
bundled plans over individual plans for phone, cable and TV; tips to increase the life
of the products that Cablecom provides.
2. Newsletters about new products and services, explaining how these are useful to
customers and how they are better than competition. Brining a value added benefit
to customers on a monthly or quarterly basis will create an affinity for the services
a company provides.

I will not consider letting some customers leave anyway, unless those are financially
unsustainable on long-term basis. There are different reasons for this:
1. If customer is there then job is available.
2. It takes lots of advertising resources to get one customer.
3. One satisfied customer brings more customers by word of mouth.
4. One unsatisfied customer talks bad about company more loudly than a satisfied
customers talks good about company
5. Your competitor is getting your business