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Canon Information TechnologyServices, Inc.Consona Knowledge Management

Canon ITS (Canon USA’s support company) is providing better customer support and self-service—in

spite of bustling sales and a continuously evolving product line—with the Consona Knowledge

Management suite from Consona CRM.

A rapidly increasing amily o millions o U.S. consumers with Canon digital cameras,copiers, printers, ax machines, camcorders,calculators and binoculars all call the sameplace with their questions and problems—Canon ITS (CITS) in Chesapeake, Va.—at thecurrent rate o 200,000 calls, 50,000 e-mails,and 1,000 letters per month.

It’s All About Customer SupportCITS was ormed in 1998 by combiningthe customer call centers or Canon USAand Canon Computer Systems, Inc. into asingle business unit that provides supportto all customers who contact Canon. Awholly owned subsidiary o Canon USA,the Chesapeake acility is now the singlecall center or the entire United States andprovides support services or all small o ceand consumer products. The mission o CITS isto maximize customer satis action and loyaltyto the Canon brand by providing industry-leading support.

More than 550 people occupy the CITS60,000 square oot acility. CITS supportrepresentatives eld over 200,000 calls permonth on almost 500 inbound telephonelines along with 50,000 e-mails and as manyas 1,000 letters per month. In all, they handleabout 3 million customer phone and e-mailcontacts per year. Support provided toCanon customers includes technical support,e-mail and web-based support, service

dispatch and other repair re errals, dealerre errals, accessory and supply sales, andcustomer relations. I a customer living inthe United States purchases one o Canon’sdigital cameras, printers, or other consumerproducts and needs help, he or she calls CITS

or assistance, where over 250 call supportanalysts are dedicated to providing the verybest in technical support.

While technical support is its primaryunction, CITS handles the direct sale o

genuine Canon supplies, accessories andoperational manuals. This service providescustomers with many items that dealer andretail outlets no longer ofer and allowscustomers who need to replace certainbatteries, ink cartridges or ribbons to continueusing their Canon product or years to come.

Every CITS representative is a vital pointo contact between Canon and individualcustomers. They seek to maintain the Canonreputation or customer driven excellence aswell as to help determine what new productdemands will drive tomorrow’s marketplace.An extensive CITS customer databaseprovides dynamic marketing in ormation andcaptures timely, topical end user eedback orthe sales divisions, providing a window to thevoice o Canon customers.

Return on Investment at aGlance:

CITS realized these results usingConsona CRM solutions:

• Enhanced customer resolutionrates rom 50 to 60 percentresolved.

• Increased call de ection to self-service, rom 55 to 71 percent.

• Decreased e-mail escalationrate 42 percent, compared to

the rst hal o 2007.

• Raised customer satisfactionscores or the knowledge base

rom 6.5 to 7.1 on a scale o 1to 10.

• Reduced training days for newhires by 17 percent.

• Gained the ability to supportagents who work rom home.

• Created a more completeand comprehensive (single)

knowledge base, eliminatingduplication and inconsistency.

• Improved customer service,and in particular sel -service, orincreased customer satis action.

CASE STUDY

Canon Customers Get Great Service Thanks to Canon ITS and Consona

©2008-2009 Consona CRM Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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“Consona CRM has been a very valuable partner in the CITS knowledge management initiative. The

Consona team has been very responsive to our needs and is truly interested in our success—and not

just selling us the next version of the software.”

— Elliot Cohen , Director of IT, Canon ITS

Growing PainsIn 2004, CITS did not have a centralizedknowledge base or its support agents;content was held in several diferentsystems—in a company intranet, on theCanon USA internet, in hard-copy manuals,and in an internally-developed, tree-structured knowledge system. CITS could notensure that all o the content was correct anddid not con ict with duplicate documentationin another system or in the manuals.

While CITS had initiated an online supportcapability, the knowledge base was notsearchable. The content was good but provedcumbersome or customers attempting tolocate the in ormation they needed. Supportagents were also inhibited by the need tosearch multiple sources o in ormation ondiferent products.

With sales o Canon’s many popular productlines growing steadily, the population o Canon customers and corresponding owo calls to CITS was also growing. CITS had to

nd ways to leverage support resources tomaintain the high level o customer servicethat Canon customers had come to expect.

Tools of the TradeCITS implemented the Consona KnowledgeManagement suite (then known asServiceWare and later known as KNOVA) in2004, in two major phases. First, the companyconsolidated the content that was scatteredthroughout its existing intranet, the CanonUSA internet knowledge base, hard copymanuals, and an internally developed Canon,Inc. decision tree-based system, into a single,comprehensive knowledge base or use by

“The Consona CRMknowledge base hasbeen a great help to ourservice agents and toour customers. It lets thecustomers get the answersto the ‘easy’ questionsthemselves, while reeing the agents to ocus on themore di cult problems.”

— Jay Lucado , Assistant Director,Knowledge Management and DeliveryCanon ITS

customer service reps. According to ElliotCohen, director o technology support,“Consona CRM has been a very valuablepartner in the CITS knowledge managementinitiative. The Consona team has been veryresponsive to our needs and is truly interestedin our success—and not just selling us thenext version o the so tware.”

In the second phase, appropriate portionso the knowledge base were rolled out toConsona’s customer- acing sel -serviceapplications. Key parts o the implementationefort included:

• Development of a knowledgemanagement culture : CITS started itsknowledge management program bybuilding support rom the top down. Seniormanagement was involved in the process

rom concept through deployment. Whilethe so tware installation and content buildwere in process, a major PR campaign wasconducted to develop awareness o theinitiative throughout the entire call center. The value o the knowledge base wascommunicated to all members o the team.

• Content built to cover all supported

Canon products : The technical supportengineers at CITS gathered the contentthat was currently held in diferentsources and built content in the ConsonaKnowledge Management suite. The CITSteam went rom absolutely no contentin the application to ull support or over800 Canon products. The knowledge basecontains approximately 100,000 contentpieces that support 99 percent o theproducts the contact center represents.

• Implementation of Self Support : TheCITS technology team and the Canon USAIT department integrated the existingknowledge base into the support site. Their work allowed the customer to getthe ull use o the knowledge base whilecon orming to Canon’s corporate sitestructure. The audience eature in theConsona Knowledge Management suiteallows them to use one solution conceptwhile maintaining appropriate wording orcustomer and agent.

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Consona Corporation450 East 96th Street, Suite 300Indianapolis, IN 46240

Toll Free/Fax:(888) 8 CONSONA(888) 826-6766

in o@consona.comwww.consona.com/crm

ResultsWith the new searchable knowledge baseand improved online sel -service capabilities,customers gained a convenient and e cientgateway into product in ormation and CITSsupport. Combining the in ormation into aneasily searchable repository was also a hugebene t to the service reps who could now

easily and quickly nd the documentationthey needed to help the customer andresolve his or her problems—all in one place.Customer satis action improved at the sametime that the population increased rapidly—atrue ‘win-win’ result.

During the rst half of 2008, the call de ectionrate, customer questions resolved online toavoid the need or a phone call, increased

rom 51 to 71 percent. This represents aconsiderable savings o support rep timewhile providing customers with better service.

Another measure o the need or ollow-up,e-mail escalation rate, decreased 47 percent

rom the same period in the previous year.

Overall customer satis action scores are uprom 6.5 to 7.1 on a scale o 1 to 10. Customer

resolution rates are up rom 50 to 60 percent.“The Consona CRM knowledge base has beena great help to our service agents and toour customers. It lets the customers get theanswers to the ‘easy’ questions themselves,while reeing up the agents to ocus on themore di cult problems,” said Jay Lucado,

assistant director o knowledge managementand delivery.

CITS has also been able to leverage theknowledge base to improve agent training. The new curriculum integrates the knowledgebase and ocuses on teaching the agents to

nd the answers in the system rather thantrying to teach them how to x all o the manydiferent problems that customers mighthave. In addition, the system-based training

is remotely available, which works well withthe new work-at-home program launched inDecember of 2007. Newly-hired agents work

rom their homes our days each week andare able to complete their training remotelyas well.

“Efective knowledge management is acritical component o our business. Froman internal cost containment perspective,it provides the opportunity or agentknowledge uni ormity: reducing handletimes, increasing First Contact Resolution

and ultimately de ecting contacts (phoneor e-mail) through sel -service. From anexternal customer perspective, efectiveknowledge management enables 24x7accesses to customer queries, providing themthe in ormation they need, when they needit. That’s good or customer satis action andloyalty to the Canon brand. Through efectiveknowledge management, we achieve animportant balance between customersatis action and cost containment,” saidDan Bell, senior vice president and generalmanager o Canon ITS.

“Through efectiveknowledge managementwe achieve an importantbalance between customersatis action and costcontainment.”

— Dan Bell , Senior Vice Presidentand General Manager,Canon ITS