Danish Commerce and Services
Introduction
Danish Commerce & Services (DC&S) is a private employers' and trade interest organization that represents more than 25,000 Danish enterprises within a range of verticals.
The goal of DC&S' portal www.dhs.dk is to bring relevant information to its over 6,000 members who consider it one of the organization's most valuable interfaces. A great web site is of high significance because it can federate members. With a little help from Mondosoft’s search solution, the portal also helps synchronize DC&S's services to the demands of its members, as well as creates new business opportunities.
Portal Manager Jakob Boyer-Dræby is responsible for running, maintaining and developing the portal. Jakob decided to purchase the Mondosoft solution when the organization implemented a new publishing platform: BroadVision CMS. Before, DC&S used an HTML-based platform, developed by IT consultants and a search engine that didn't meet DC&S' expectations. Although remotely hosted by their former search provider, it didn’t offer any kind of insight or overview, and it wasn’t stable. This didn’t match DC&S' demand for a highly competitive web site. "The quality just wasn't adequate," Jakob says.
As DC&S tested a selection of search engines, it became obvious that Mondosoft offered the best solution on the market. It was the only one to meet all of DC&S' tough requirements for seamless co-operation with BroadVision, analytics functionalities, categorization, and flexibility as well as service and reliability.
Value-added Quality Assurance
The first requirement for DC&S is to deliver content that has great value for its members. Visitors to the web site have to locate information easily and fast. This is why DC&S considers the search functionality to be an essential tool. On the DC&S site, MondoSearch ensures that relevant search results are found approximately 97 % of the times users search. Thanks to Mondosoft's advanced toolset, DC&S furthermore optimizes the results and conducts quality control on strategically important areas, such as their consultancy services.
For quality assurance, Mondosoft SearchHeaders is Jakob's favorite functionality. A SearchHeader is a short piece of HTML (or other browser-compatible content) that is displayed in response to a specific query, typically at the top of the full result list. "We create SearchHeaders with the 3 most selected links for each of the most frequent search terms. We have a goal that users should be 80 % assisted through SearchHeaders," Jakob explains. Once these search assistants have been set up, the work is done. And although there is variation in the users' behavior, there is also a high repetition of search terms related to the most popular content on the portal.
Expanding the scope of business
Excellent service for visitors is far from the only advantage DC&S harvests from Mondosoft. "We use the search engine to show us what our users want," Jakob explains.
Our visitors' search behavior supplements our knowledge. Now it is very measurable, and in this respect it's a great source of information both in terms of quality and quantity
Initially DC&S dedicated a full-time person to set up and optimize the search functionality. Soon, gaining new knowledge for the organization became the key benefit of using Mondosoft. Jakob spends only a few hours a week monitoring BehaviorTracking. He makes sure everything functions well and gets new ideas to perfect the usability. Also, he easily adjusts SearchHeaders to the changing site content, and particularly, tip off in-house sales consultants on member prospects that pop up in the user behavior reports.
New Business Opportunities
Mondosoft's solution helps monitor user interests at a very detailed level. DC&S has set up "watches" on competitors and the press, to gain insight on these special visitors' interests. Besides the watches, BehaviorTracking gives DC&S comprehensive reports on who searches for what and when, which allows them to detect member prospects. This information is delivered to the relevant in-house consultants in the organization's appropriate sales teams.
Jakob explains:
This happens all the time. I could go into BehaviorTracking right now and pinpoint a new potential member. Yesterday for example, I found 2. The sales associates of course are grateful, and they use the information to prepare a qualified sales call.
Increased user satisfaction and fewer calls
Implementing the Mondosoft solution has had a positive effect on DC&S' customer support centre. This department employs 4 people and receives 25,000 calls each year. The employees experience that the calls they get are more qualified. This is due to the improved service on the portal itself.
And it's not just an assumption that the visitors are pleased. "We ask our visitors when they leave the site if they found what they were looking for – and the users reply with a YES!," Jakob explains. MondoSearch effectively guides visitors to the wanted information, and the web site gains an increasingly stronger foothold with members. This is also expressed through growth in the number of registered users, as well as in a growing number of signups for newsletters and members' bulletins.
Business Impact
The overall impact of Mondosoft's solution for DC&S is the remarkably improved service for visitors, and a strengthened competitiveness. Being able to offer relevant information 97% of the time people search is remarkable. The portal’s content offers, flexibility and service level is way above average, and DC&S competitors, who are also on their toes to create visibility of their web activities, look pale in comparison.
The benefits however are also felt within the organization. Because of Jakob's ongoing monitoring, DC&S can capitalize on the interest that existing or potential members show when they search the portal content. DC&S has transformed knowledge of its visitors' interests into new business opportunities, improved service, reduction of call center costs, and has made adjustments on operational as well as strategic levels.
"I distribute a report to the management team and the functional managers on a monthly basis, and in the web team, we make weekly statistics to be used for our various optimizations." In this way, management also gains insight to the members and the market, and can navigate accordingly. And even though the team is busy, Jakob believes that prioritizing and monitoring the visitors' behavior is beyond discussion. "It doesn't just mean improved service for our members, it means better results! We still have to be visionary – but we are very close to our goals for the portal!"