Customer satisfaction is perhaps the one benchmark with which utilities should measure their own success as well as differentiate themselves from their competitors. When we talk about Smart Grid we think of smart meters, technology stacks, and integrations with energy specific applications but in reality a Smart Grid done right enables you to know your customers allowing you to offer those experiences that delight them. Utilities can also respond to them smartly and quickly.
Utility providers need to realise that the Smart Grid era requires customers to be an active participant in the relationship with the utility. Self-proffered customer data forms a critical part of the data Utilities can mine for efficient cost effective operations, savings and initiatives. Only the providers that put customers at the center of their IT investments will thrive if they wish to move beyond the meter to cash process of the basic service.
Smart meters: Smart meters are often the first step towards a smart grid. I feel that in emerging markets, smart meters are also the first step towards wastage control and energy theft, with availability of clearer data and ability to gain insights into outage management. They enable grid reliability as well as significantly bring down meter reading costs. But their customer impact is potentially incredible. Utilities that engage the customer on smart meter rollouts and benefits, and then provide pro-active data regarding usage stand to benefit from greater customer loyalty. Additionally, utilities can enable prepayment with proactive warnings as usage comes close to limit that benefits their cash flow and customer planning both!
Digital channel: Customers want a multi-channel experience and they want self-service. Most customers in mature markets only call a contact center when disappointed or confused by other (mostly digital) channels. Engaging the customer with a digital experience designed with superior user experience (UX) at its heart is now mandatory. This means everything from usage data to billing information to payments needs to be enabled via mobile and the web.
Business process management: While we're tempted to say analytics is a key initiative, I will go with business process management because our experience tells us this is where an organization's vast energy is being sucked in. BPM will allow a utility to get its house in order and be more productive so that it can focus on customer centricity. It allows for creation of a smooth multichannel customer experience we already talked about. It also enables a successful smart meter rollout. Re-engineering and transforming processes to best-in-class and then unifying a utility's internal processes with its customer facing ones for a faster more responsive organisation is at the heart of the modern utility.
These are not the only initiatives. Big data is key to understanding your customers and operations, and improving them. Regulatory hurdles are only increasing and governance risk & compliance initiatives are key but there are initiatives that provide tangible relatively quick benefits and enable further digitization. These are also not easy decisions to make. They are painful at a cultural level ripping apart existing silos, forcing new internal alliances and KPI's and creating multiple levels of accountability. But these are necessary decisions to make for an organisation that is customer oriented, future proof and more profitable. Especially, in years to come when private companies (as opposed to governments) will provide utilities, and customers will have the option of switching providers. Every percentage point of market share will count.