Postal costs rise – eBilling costs fall

The Royal Mail has implemented another increase in postal costs in the UK. Increases between 10% and 13% were applied from 4 April 2011. I say “another” because the costs of postage seem to rise every year, generally far in excess of inflation. It stands to reason that the use of eBilling as an alternative to paper is on the rise and as more and more billers and customers move to eBilling, these costs are dropping.

Both models are volume dependent and include both fixed and variable costs. As the volumes increase or decrease, the average costs adjust. The good news for eBilling is that the volumes are going up (and consequently costs down), but the bad news for postage is that the postal infrastructure costs are being spread over fewer statements and bills and hence costs have to rise.

eBilling – the Tipping Point

There has been talk of a “tipping point” for eBilling where there is a significant increase in adoption rates. The tipping point should not be confused with the milestone of the majority of bills being delivered electronically (i.e. > 50%). The tipping point may be reached before or after this event, but it all depends on the eBilling model adopted.

In 2009 we said that billers following the portal (pull) model could expect roughly 5% growth per year, whilst email (push) billers could expect growth rates of 10% - 15%. These stats have proven accurate each year.

We have also said that portals and email complement one another – in fact we believe that there will always be 3 ways to deliver bills: Print, Pull and Push.

It’s a matter of choice and customer convenience

Some customers will never change – and you will need to print their bills until they are no longer customers.

Some customers like the idea of being pulled back to a portal where they can fetch their bills as and when they want to.

But most customers just need to see the amount due and when they have to pay by; and pushing an email bill to them is perfect solution.

We are seeing a significant rise in the number of calls from billers that implemented a portal and are now looking to add Push email billing to the delivery mix to enhance their paperless adoption rates.

Email is also a very simple way of making bills accessible on a mobile device, without the additional costs of redeveloping a portal to render correctly on different mobile phones (not to mention iPads and tablets).

Do any of these statements apply to you?

• We can’t afford a 10% increase in our statement costs.
• I’m worried about achieving our paperless adoption targets this year.
• We offer paperless billing but our customers aren’t signing up.
• We’re having to increase our marketing spend to get customers to move off paper.
• I’m not sure how we are going to meet our cost reduction budgets next year.

Give us a call and ask us to assist you with saving costs, reducing paper and migrating customers to paperless billing and make sure that the only one to feel the effects of the postal increase is the Post Office!

Michael Wright
striata.com

When it comes to eBilling, are you just ticking the box or making it work commercially?

As I travel around Asia talking to companies about eBilling and looking at what eBilling solutions have already been implemented, it strikes me that the whole eBilling business is mired in misleading projections and statistics, and in many cases, apathy. Surely this is a key reason why so few people actually utilize eBilling, and why so few companies actually save money when implementing it. "In what ways?" I hear you ask! Well, I'll explain…

Let's start off with what the end-customer – the recipient – is told. Generally eBilling is sold to the end-customer as being environmentally friendly. In Asia we have GreenBills, GreenPost and other such names for electronic bills and statements, yet we know that the real reason companies implement eBilling is cost-saving. I'm not suggesting that we stop pushing the environmental aspect, but let's be honest, it's efficiency that's driving the change too.

Convenience and ease of use drives customer adoption

People appreciate efficiency, and if that efficiency actually contributes to the customer experience; the ease of receiving, opening, filing, printing (if necessary) and paying the eBill, it's going to be popular. But dressing up an inconvenient, time-consuming "log in to our portal and search for this month's bill" solution, as an environmental initiative isn't going to work for any except the greenest of customers – the rest will stick with paper, thank you very much!

eBilling portals don't drive paper turn-off – email billing does

How about the eBilling portals themselves – both corporate and consolidator portals? Just how many customers have signed up for the service? Or more importantly, how many paper bills have been turned-off? You could argue that this is commercially sensitive information and can't be divulged, but is that really the case? Contrary to this, I can quote 68% paper turn-off for Wesbank eStatements in South Africa, or 12% turn-off in 10 months for City of Tallahassee Utilities in North America - clients of Striata that aren't shy about telling the world how eBilling has helped them realize their paper turn off targets. Occasionally analyst reports come out with figures that show average eBill portal adoption rates of 2-3% per year, which maybe explains why some don't quote hard figures…

Choose an eBilling solution that works for you and your customers

And finally there is internal reporting and target-setting within the companies themselves. I've spoken with consultants working on a government eBilling initiative with a target of 5% paper turn-off in 3 years. Another example is a major utility that was looking for 2-3% paper turn-off per year. These are figures that they're hoping for – not necessarily figures that they'll reach! Hey, some people are probably getting bonuses for achieving adoption rates that would result in us having strong words with our paperless adoption consultants!

CFO's are being misled into believing that 2% or 3% adoption is good and all that can be expected, even though the business case just won't add up with figures like that. Why would they do this? I think it's partly due to my last observation: apathy.

In many cases, it seems that eBilling is implemented because "everyone else" is doing it, and it's more a case of ticking the box rather than actually trying to make it work commercially. Once the solution is implemented, it's often left to stagnate. Adoption is rarely the responsibility of one person – it's more likely a small part of the Marketing department's remit and so the savings never accrue. There's a hope that there will be a return on the investment, but not really an expectation.

What can be done about this? Doing some proper research on eBilling before deciding on what solution to implement is a good start. Establish what paper turn-off rates can be expected? Understand what has worked well in similar companies or what you need to do differently to be successful? Set tough but achievable adoption targets and make someone responsible for hitting them. Look to provide an eBilling service that your end-customers will want to use, not feel forced to use. Don't play at eBilling – work at it!

Want to know what eBilling adoption rates you can really expect?

Keith Russell
striata.com

It's an integrated messaging world

Having been in email marketing for the better part of 10 years, I believe in the medium, so why then do I find myself unsubscribing from countless newsletters that offered so much value in the past?

The answer: Those same companies post their newsletter articles on their Twitter feed either at the same time or worse – a few days before the newsletter is distributed. By the time that newsletter arrives in my inbox, it's old news. I've most likely already read and tweeted any snippets or articles of interest that appear in that email.

So where's the value in the email newsletter?

Email still has a stronghold in the notifications market, because aside from a web page, it is your repository for all purchase confirmations, welcome notices, eStatements… to name a few.

But in the marketing space the value needs to be about exclusivity, and personalisation, otherwise customers just won't sign up, open and click rates will continue to decline and unsubscribes will increase.

Email subscribers want to receive exclusive deals based on their interests. What are they getting in that email that they can't get anywhere else? And yes, pictures do sell compared to 140 characters on Twitter, but are you providing the right content to keep email subscribers glued to their screens when your email comes rushing in, along with 100 others?

Competing for share of eyeballs

It's not just other email marketing messages you're competing against. In a world where all messages come into one platform, like Rockmelt for example, message notifications look the same, whether they are for Facebook, Twitter or an email. So it's time to differentiate email content to ensure that the same message doesn't appear three times, just because they're a fan on Facebook, follow you on Twitter and subscribe to your email. You need to make them want to open that email with personalised and unique content.

Let's not forget that email doesn't stand alone in the messaging world, so social sharing links are really important on your marketing emails. If the content is relevant and targeted, those customers will want to share that information - spreading your message further. This is also a great opportunity to increase email sign ups by including a registration for email marketing on all landing pages that are likely to be shared on social networks. You can make it easy to share your email pearls of wisdom by creating 140 character pullouts that can be easily shared in other media.

Email – the evolving stalwart of messaging

The way we use email is constantly evolving, and so should email marketing evolve to match consumers' behaviour. Email is such a powerful medium when used correctly, which can achieve a far greater ROI than other messaging mediums. Think about how people read email and where they get information, then reinvent that email newsletter to provide the content that will make your newsletter stand out. And why? Because email newsletters work when they are strategically planned and the content is personalised and relevant.

Are you communicating with your customers regularly and effectively – Need more info? An eMarketing specialist is just a click away ..

Mia Papanicolaou
striata.com