Customer strategy plan
The fundamental objective of the customer strategy is to ensure that the traffic department can enhance the value of its customer base. This is because a customer-centric business considers customers as the vital source of the short-term revenue and as well as the long-term value creation (HHH). In other words, customers are the individual financial assets, and for that reason, Traffic Department should be in the frontline to increase their total. Therefore, it is significant to develop a customer-centric strategy because customers are scarce, they are the source of revenue, and they create value in different ways. The first step of the implementation plan is to determine the customers' wants.
Determining the customers want
According to the UAE Trade & Commercial Office (2016), the traffic department is entitled to facilitate fast, safe, efficient, accessible and convenient transport system. Therefore, a working strategy should ensure that all these consumer wants are met to retain the existing customers and attract the potential ones. In addition, the United Arab Emirates has consumers from over 120 countries hence indicating that the consumers' needs are diversified regarding cultures and backgrounds. In this case, the traffic department should continue investing in training its employees or the officers to facilitate their ability to manage the cross-cultural customers. To ensure that the traffic department builds a substantial customer-centric strategy, it is important to develop customer relationships for the cross-cultural customers. Due to the diversified consumer base, the traffic department is required to treat its customers differently through integrating them into the business and adapt its services and products to consumers own, individual needs (NNN). In this case, it is significant to engage in a process known as IDIC (identifying, differentiating, interacting, and customizing the customers).
IDIC implementation task
Identifying customers
According to Peppers and Rogers (2011), all enterprises must be in a capacity to recognize their customers when they attend them in the second time. The author argues that the relationships are only effective only with the individual consumers rather than markets, populations, or segments. In this case, the customer relationships cannot be built with the customer segments such as private citizens and corporates but on with the individual customers in the region. Therefore, the traffic department must organize it various information resources to take into account the customer-specific perspective of its business (Mizuno et al., 2008). The department should install and effectively implement the customer relationship management (CRM) system to help them collect data on the individual customers (Buttle et al., 2015). For the department to gain a competitive advantage over its competitor it must use the information to identify its individual customers through the CRM approach (Al-Mudimigh et al., 2009). Such approach may be integrated with the use of the social media such as Facebook and Twitter to bring the department into closer touch with customers and be able to learn about each of the customers and subsequently deliver greater value to each one of them.
Differentiating Customers
This is an important step that requires the traffic department to recognize their customers' different levels of needs and values. There are two main ways of differentiating the customers: the convenience-seekers and the brand choice-seekers (West et al., 2015). Recognizing that the customers are different may help the traffic department to invest and organize it resources to the customers that of great value to its business. In addition, the department will be able to design, implement customer-specific strategies that satisfy each customer needs, and enhance each customer experience (Peppers and Rogers, 2011). For the case of the traffic department, the customer grouping is exercised. The customers are grouped into two main categories; private non-corporate customers and corporates. This is a critical step in understanding and to best serve the customers.
Interact with customers
According to Peppers and Rogers (2011), enterprises should enhance their effectiveness on the customer interaction and turn each customer interaction into a growth opportunity. The department should ensure that the customer interaction takes place in the context of the previous interactions to ensure that the customers are not asked the same question twice. An effective customer interaction is needed to shed light on the customer's needs. For instance, the traffic department should invest in training its employees or the officers to facilitate effective customer interactions. Such training should be based on the answering the inquiries efficiently by ensuring that all the officers are in a position to handle the needs of the customers from different cultures and background in the UAE. In addition, the traffic department will use the technology to capture feedbacks that are more personal (Bonnell & Gold, 2006). For instance, the department will use the customer support solution to derive interactions from every perspective in one place. Such solution will capture the feedbacks from the interaction to help the department act on them, and subsequently, enhance the customers' value and profitably serve them. The feedbacks are important in helping the company modifying and customizing the products and services to meet the consumers' needs.
Customizing treatment
The last process of the IDIC is the customize treatment. In this step, the traffic department will adopt some traits of its behavior toward their customers, regarding on the individual's value and needs. This is an effective way of showing the understanding of the customers and the efforts to satisfy their expressed needs. According to Peppers and Rogers (2011, p.78), "this might entail mass-customizing a product or tailor some aspect of its service." One way of customizing the traffic department services and products is through the automated system to enhance convenience. For instance, the issue of issuing and revoking the licenses should be automated to ensure that the consumers are served conveniently. In addition, traffic signs should be written in a different language such as Arabic, English, French, German, and Portuguese to accommodate the diversified road users in the United Arabs Emirates. Significantly, the process of paying the fines will be automated to the extent that the offenders can be able to pay fines through their mobile phones or their laptops. The permit to allow the foreigners use the roads in the UAE will also be automated to allow the traffic officer determine whether a particular driver is a legitimate driver even without asking for the visa, trading license, and other documents.
In conclusion, the IDIC will ensure that the traffic department is a position to create a customer-centered culture within the department. This will be done through implementing a customer service training program for the officers in the department and integrate accountability for standards and CRM into the IDIC strategy. In addition, the department will continue increasing and developing the potential and availability of online information, e-solutions, transactions, and mobile application to ensures that the department has vital information on each customer.
References
Bonnell, B. & Gold, T. Eds (2006). Electronic Customer Relationship Management (2002). England: M E Sharpe
Buttle, F. & Maklan, S. (2015). Customer Relationship Management: Concepts and Technologies (3rd edn.). United States: Routledge
Mizuno, M., Saji, A., Sumita, U., & Suzuki, H. (2008). Optimal threshold analysis of segmentation methods for identifying target customers. European Journal of Operational Research, 186(1), 358-379.
Peppers, D. & Rogers, M. (2011). Managing Customer Relationships (2nd edn.). New York: John Wiley & Sons
UAE Trade and Commercial Office (2016). National Transportation Authority. Accessed on 20th May 2016 from http://www.uaetrade-usa.org/index.php?page=economic-sectors-in-uae&cmsid=61
West, D., Ford, J., & Ibrahim, E. (2015). Strategic marketing: creating competitive advantage. Oxford University Press.
Al-Mudimigh, A. S., Saleem, F., & Ullah, Z. (2009, May). The Effects of Data Mining in ERP-CRM Model- A Case Study of Madar. In S. Chen (Ed.), WSEAS International Conference. Proceedings. Mathematics and Computers in Science and Engineering (No. 8). World Scientific and Engineering Academy and Society.
