The problem of dependency

Regular readers will know that we've just launched our new web site. There are some teething issues, in certain, thankfully infrequently, situations the CMS system we're using doesn't like presenting the page to the site visitor.

My team are in close contact with EPiServer to get it sorted but it's leaving us feeling a little out of control. It doesn't sit well with the control freakery I've cultivated.

One of the key tenets of the Esendex Messaging Systems that has developed over the years is doing it ourselves. We've developed, much to the surprise of many people we interconnect with, our own protocol implementations to interact with their systems. On top of that are our own messaging systems, underpinning our customer applications. Our mantra has become:

DIY to get it right

I appreciate this might sound a little like I'm blowing our own trumpet and you're probably right. We're actually very proud of what we've done and it's given us a strong reliable platform that our customers can rely on.

Enter the third party CMS system. We're using it because it is very functional, does far more than our in house system we had built, and gives us the control we need. However when there is a problem we're paralysed. Frantically trying to debug the problem on behalf the supplier to try and sort the problem. It just doesn't sit right with us.

I have no doubt this was the right decision. The EPiServer platform is a cut above anything else we evaluated and gives us so many more features. We've just got to accept that sometimes we can't fix it.

Customer Service - BT this time.

I've had a fantastic week of customer service rounded off nicely by BT.

Currently setting up BT Business Broadband at home on a new phone line. There were some issues at the exchange which prevented them from activating the ADSL straight away. I received this text message on Friday, twice.

BT Business Broadband Order xxxxxxx Please contact us regarding your order on 08002346553, access PIN xxx by 09/10/07 to prevent the order being cancelled

Cancelled! What was going on?

I phoned the number and the lady at the call centre told me it was just the standard message and nothing to worry about. They just wanted to tell me that the ADSL would be enabled on the 11th October.

So plus marks to BT for using SMS to keep me updated about the order. Minus marks for:

1. Sending it too me twice
2. Using a standard template which made me think there was a problem
3. Not using the text message to tell me the information and save me a call

Time and time again companies implement customer service systems with apparently little thought to the implementation. Julian had a similarly frustrating experience with the Easyjet SMS updates : EasyJetText Alerts from StreamThru - First Encounter.

Frustratingly it seems that companies feel they just have to deliver some, any, information via SMS and they've ticked off that feature. It's a different channel with it's own vagaries that must be respected if these features are to be useful.

The good news is that when I got home, the broadband was already live.

I have a new homepage

No, not our rather sexy new web site www.esendex.com, but this totally mesmerising service in our EPiServer CMS system called EPiTrace.

It tracks people as they interact with your web site in near real time. The results are displayed on a flash animation which comprises a drag and clickable site map with little spheres orbiting the pages. Each of these spheres represents a person visting your site and the bounce around each page very agreeably. You can even setup audio alerts to ping whenever someone visits certain pages.

EPiServer very bravely have a live demo running showing what's happening on their web site.

Not sure of the commercial value of seeing this info live, Google Analytics is probably better for overall trend analysis.

Still it looked fantastic on the 40" flat screen TV we've got in the office.

BlackBerry Free Island Offer

Came across a very funny bit of marketing from Sprint for the new BlackBerry 8830.

A limited time offer of a free island with every purchase for only $10.5M.

Private Island Offer.

Another fantastic example of third party support

I came in this morning to another fantastic example of support. This was from the company who provide one of our systems management tools. We contacted them after we found a problem while testing an upgrade. Bear in mind we pay for this software and for support as well.

I wanted to let you know that this issue has been escalated to development, who are working on a fix for a release in the near future. When this release is made available, I’ll be happy to update you with download information.

Lucky we don't want to use it anytime soon then.

New Ecommerce Payment Processor Required

Aaaaarrrrgggghhhhhh!

We use HSBC for payment processing on our website. It has made sense from a commercial point of view to use the service provided by our bank. We have so many bank accounts in different countries and currencies, anything to keep it simple.

Tonight I've had enough.

The support has always been atrocious, a non-technical helpdesk trying to support an integration product by script rather than getting access to people who know what they're talking about. If it goes down, we just have to lump it.

This evening the PAS processing, for Visa and Mastercard secondary validation, was broken.

We phoned the helpdesk.

After holding for an half an hour we got through to someone to be be told:

The technical department has gone home, could we email in detail of the problem so someone could look at it in the morning.

So sorry customers, especially in Australia, you can't charge up your accounts because our payment provider can't be arsed to sort the problem.

So that's been the final straw, time to search for someone else to provide our payment processing.

I'll keep you posted on our search.

Presence, it's pretty binary - well not quite

I posted back in June from Global Messaging 2007 about a point Mathieu Saccharin of Bouyges Telecom made about presence.

He left a great comment on the post over the weekend so I thought I should bring it front and centre. Do have another look : Presence, it's pretty binary.