Where everybody knows your name



Making your way in the world today takes everything you've got

Taking a break from all your worries sure would help a lot

Wouldn't you like to get away?

Sometimes you want to go - where everybody knows your name

and they're always glad you came

You wanna be where you can see - our troubles are all the same

You wanna be where everybody knows your name

You wanna go where people know people are all the same

You wanna go where everybody knows your name

Cheers theme song

The service at Sam's bar on Cheers was about as personal as it gets, a metaphor for the kind of recognition and comfort we all crave in the services we use.
 
Now it appears, it is a reachable standard for virtually any kind of service organization with multiple "touchpoints" such as stores, telephones, smartphones, tablets, desktop, etc.
 
And it has a name: "Agile Commerce."
 
According to Forrester Research, who has just published a new report on the subject, the proliferation of devices has raised the urgency of developing the technology, and the organization structure, that will allow employees manning the touchpoints to not only know the customer's name, but their buying habits, preferences, experiences and anything else related to their contacts with the company.
 
The author of the report, Brian Walker, writes: “Today's multichannel organizational approaches do not reflect the new reality of engaging and serving the customer across touchpoints — from online search to affiliates to marketplaces to branches and stores to websites to mobile sites to call centers to Facebook.”

In its blog, Forrester says of the report's findings:

"Agile customer service requires fundamentally re-evaluating how customers are engaged and assisted across a growing number of touchpoints. Customers don’t consider the technical or operational complexity behind resolving their issues. They simply want to contact you on the device of their choice and get what they want when they want it. And they expect you to know who they are at every point along the way."

This trend is not limited to the retail world. Virtually any kind of service -- consulting, medicine, government, finance, et al -- has access to technology that can enable its people to know every customer's name.