Who ‘drives’ the ROI on your eBilling solution?

Over the past several months I’ve seen an incredibly positive shift in thinking, with far more companies not only looking at new technologies to help reduce operating costs, but also at how their IT departments can build these solutions in-house. This makes sense, with every job being scrutinized and IT wanting to demonstrate their value (and secure their jobs for the foreseeable future).

eBilling is again on the agenda as a potential cost saving, however it is NOT a solution you should be looking to BUILD without very careful consideration.

We see it time and again. There are two key components owned by two separate departments that every company with a “build mentality” underestimates. Implementing the right technology first time around (IT’s job) and having a customer adoption strategy to give you the quickest ROI and maximum savings thereafter (marketing / customer care’s job).

Let’s consider the following analogy for your eBilling solution. Imagine you could change to a more efficient fuel for your car that will reduce your cost at the pump by 60 - 90% and cut the cost of services and maintenance. Sounds amazing, right? What’s the catch? Well, there are two actually.

Challenge # 1:
This new fuel requires a new engine. How do you get this new engine into your car?
a. Do you ask your very good, but very busy local mechanic to build this new engine – either from scratch or from off-the-shelf components?
b. Or do you get the manufacturer to install the perfect engine for your car?

Challenge # 2:
To date, only a small number of filling stations have adopted this new type of fuel.
You will have to convince each filling station owner, one-by-one that this new fuel is better for the environment and that because it’s quicker to fill the tank for your new engine, it’ll make their lives much easier. Oh, and it’ll save them about the cost of a postage stamp each month to fill up your car.

Now let’s go back to your eBilling application.

Migrating your paper communications to electronic will save you 60 - 90% on print and mail costs, along with many other soft cost benefits, but how do you get customers to give up paper?

Selecting an eBilling solution that works best for your business and your customers is KEY.

Making sure it’s implemented quickly and professionally is just as important. With a solution that is fundamentally changing the way you communicate with your customers, are you happy to let your local mechanic (your IT team) build your eBilling solution by trial and error? In most cases, for the safety of your passengers and the longevity of your car, you’re going to put your trust in the experts. The same concept should apply for your eBilling solution.

Now on to challenge number 2 – Strategy:

Understanding how to get filling stations (your customers) to adopt this new concept is essential. How do you convince them to go green? Do you offer incentives? What’s the most cost effective way to drive enrollments? What is your goal for the next 3 years – 10%, 20%, 60% of gas stations (paperless customers)? These are all questions that require considerable experience, planning and strategy. And it’s likely that your strategy will need to adapt several times over the next 3 years. In today’s market, companies have neither the budget nor the time to experiment with customer adoption tactics.

IT projects tend to focus on the development and not the roll-out. More often than not, developing and implementing a customer adoption strategy isn’t part of the project. In addition, your customer service and marketing teams won’t know how to design their customer communication strategies until they’ve seen the technology in action and are comfortable that it works as promised.

So, before you decide that your business requirements are unique, that you have a complex or legacy system, or that your corporate culture is to build everything, don’t underestimate the intimate relationship between technology, strategy and experience when making a decision on whether to build or outsource your eBilling solution to the experts.

As Mark Lutchen, Head of the IT Effectiveness practice at PricewaterhouseCoopers puts it, the rule of thumb is to buy applications to the maximum extent possible to cut costs - freeing up resources for whatever really needs to be built in-house.