See It In Action
To the left you’ll find our final experience prototype that illustrates the various new touchpoints and organizational changes that we made to meet the values we set.
Continue scrolling and you’ll see just some of the methods we used to reach our solutions.
Who?
This project was created within the new Service Design B.F.A. program at SCAD and summarizes the collective work of eleven undergraduate service and industrial design students. We chose AT&T as the subject for our research and continued to create new service strategies and touchpoints under their brand name.
The Climate
As market saturation has occurred and economic changes have affected consumer attitudes, expectations of wireless services are shifting. phone replacement, touchpoints used (look up), 4G transition, no one offers anything different
The United States is behind other developed nations in wireless and broadband infrastructure. In this transitional period of wireless infrastructure implementation, investment in 3G is waning in expectation of 4G technologies such as WiMax and LTE.
We created a variety of models to help communicate our research, better pinpoint points of tension, and begin to quickly iterate on design opportunities. We focused on two models specifically, the first, the customer lifecyle map, illustrates points of frustration and negative emotion that cause people to terminate their service and switch to another provider. One of our driving goals became to shift the areas in the negative red areas to the positive green areas to make customers more happy and therefore keep them attached to a provider they actually want to be with. The second model, a service ecology, shaped our key strategy change for AT&T, to move away from just being an access provider and move towards being a content provider.
Customer Life Cycle
Through looking at the customer life cycle, we can see the break down of various experiences that the customer has when traveling through the cycle of the AT&T service. Our goal with out solutions was to move the experience points in the red areas up into the gray and green ones.
Service Ecology
A service ecology is a collection of touch-points and support processes that together create a sustainable and successful service. These ecologies can expand across institutional boundaries. This is the ecosystem in which a service lives. We use this tool so we can understand the larger context in which a service functions.
Customer Journey
Using this tool we can break down the step-by-step process that a customer goes through when interacting with a particular aspect of a service. By breaking the journey down into granular elements we can focus on the usability of each step in the overall process.
Physical Sequence Model
We use flow models to examine a sequence of actions as they occur in a physical environment. Using these models we can find design opportunities in the physical space in which the interactions within these services take place.
Service Blueprint
A service blueprint is a graphic representation of how elements of a service interact with one another to form the larger service experience. A blueprint can be used both as a planning tool for new services or as a tool for analyzing existing ones. We can use a blueprint to examine how different elements and actors within a service interact and where, if any, possible areas for improvement exist between the interactions of the varying elements of a service.
Experience Storyboard
Creating storyboards and quickly acting out scenarios lets us test the validity of some of our more simple organizational solutions without having to to commit many resources into the mix.
Revised Service Overview
As a whole, our changes to AT&T’s overall service shift the priorities away from individual devices and segregated service offerings and instead put the spotlight on customer content. Access to the customer’s account lives above the phone level and many new touchpoints can tap into the individual’s “number” and fill the gaps we’ve identified within our research.
Our most significantly present values are unity and accessibility and they portray themselves through most of the considerations in our new and revised touchpoints. We’ve tied together and provided a reliable access method for all customer content with our idea of the AT&T Communication Hub. We’ve created seamlessness between the entertainment and communication environments within the customer’s daily life with our idea of the AT&T Home Server. We’ve also cut cycle time within in-store purchasing processes and support activities by better connecting each and every relevant piece together.
By focusing on reducing tension points within our customer life-cycle map, we’ve also developed ideas based around encouraging exploration within AT&T’s offerings, creating a more transparent overview of the customer’s position within AT&T, and acknowledging customer loyalty through a rewards system.
With all of our solutions combined, we’ve created a vision for a new AT&T that differentiates itself from the competition, creates new offerings that combine AT&T’s services with other customer needs, provides customers with a larger AT&T presence within their daily lives, takes strain off of cell tower infrastructure while increasing customer connectivity, and provides new market opportunities for the company.
Accessibility
Many ways to access account services.
Your most vital data everywhere.
Scalability
Output reflects touchpoint format. Moving between touchpoints is seamless. Service adapts to you.
Reliability
Access is redundant. Data exists in multiple locations. Weight taken off of cell infrastructure.
Transparency
Recommendation engine suggests options. Loyal customers are given incentives. Speech protocol is down to earth Service status is always shared.
Exploration
Touchpoints fill a variety of uses. Service expands based on desires. Self-teaching leads to accomplishment. Service encourages try-ability.
What is it?
The AT&T communication hub is the place where customers go to see a single view of all of their electronic communications. These communications are compiled and transferred to the communication hub via the customer’s mobile phone and associated messaging protocols such as email and instant messaging. Email, text messages, call history, photos, chats, voicemails, calendar items, and tasks are placed into a single inbox or timeline of communications. This allows users to keep track of their conversations no matter what medium is used to conduct them.
Communication Hub
What is it?
In addition to its content distribution and media management abilities, the home server acts as a networked hard drive allowing for backup. This data is stored on a hard drive in your home and on a virtual hub, which can be accessed at any time, from any touchpoint. All of your devices are seamlessly connected to this home server. If ever a device should fail or you need access to your data while away from home, all of the user’s information is mirrored on AT&T’s remote servers, ensuring availability and accessibility of personal communication and media anywhere and anytime.
Home Server and Tablet
What is it?
The Kiosk Virtual Representative, also known as the V-Rep, combines the current in-store touch screens with an AT&T sales representative to improve speed and customer satisfaction. The V-Rep allows customers to buy phones, plans, accessories, and to view and manage their acccount.
The kiosk design has a card swipe slot with a chamfered edge and self-ejecting ramp at the bottom for the card. Below it is a table to place place your products and an RFID reader is built into the screen to scan them. The Kiosk lights up when a sales representative is required.
In-Store Kiosk
What is it?
The AT&T card is the customer’s gateway to the reward points system. As customers interact with AT&T they earn points that can be redeemed for discounts and products. Tied into this, is a database that tracks customer’s purchase history and spending habits in order to gift them benefits that are relevant to their interests. Both the points and rewards encourages customers to try new AT&T content and services.
AT&T Card
Service
An intangible structure or framework created to provide the public with commodities, while facilitating their requirements of accomplishing specific tasks related to their needs and desires.
Experience
The reaction to and accumulation of participation in a particular context at an emotional and cognitive level.
Journey
The unique path of progression a user takes while interacting with a service.
Service Blueprint
A graphic representation of how elements of a service interact with one another to form the larger service experience. A blueprint can be used both as a planning tool for new services or as a tool for analyzing existing services.
Touchpoint
An interface that connects the user or audience to a service. Touch-points can take the form of tangible or intangible interactions. Examples of touch-points in a banking environment include: website, tellers, ATMs, bank cards, statements, call centers, and bank branches.
Stakeholder
A person, group, or other entity that has a vested interest in the specific outcome of a product or service.
Service Ecology
A collections of touch-points and support processes that together create a sustainable and successful service. These ecologies can expand across institutional boundaries. This is the ecosystem in which a service lives.
