Customer Insights on DTA Deployment

Success Factors for DTA Deployment– Analog Darkness

A customer recently visited to discuss DTA Fulfillment, and mentioned over “7 stars” taken from the meeting. Each star is a key take-away and at least 7 stars meant enough value was received making the trip worthwhile! Here’s what they got:

* Determine local post offices for each launched market. Contact & alert them to volume. DTA boxes are designed to fit into a standard postal box. If a few hundred are dropped off at the local post office one day by FedEx (the origination carrier for SmartPost), that puts a strain on them. Best to alert them.

* Ship up to 250 DTAs per day. Don’t hold orders too long as customers may get antsy and start calling which you’re trying to avoid, and don’t release orders too big either as it taxes local postal carriers. A good benchmark is once a week, or when you hit 250 orders.

* Dedicated option for DTA troubleshooting in IVR. DTA packaging with instructions along with the simplicity of auto activation minimizes calls. Still, there likely will be some calls, so it’s best to route these to a few trained support representatives.

* How will walk-in inventory be managed? No matter how valiant your effort to notify subscribers, many will not order until they lose signals, and then want immediate remedy which is only possible if you provide a local pick-up option, or (ugh) roll a truck. Some customers talk of charging for a visit to discourage a home visit.

* What # is the DAC looking for? Each DTA has 3 identifiers: Serial Number, MAC Address, and Unit Address. The complete set of product identifiers is sent electronically upon inventory consignment or fulfillment. Most billing systems and conditional access require both serial number and Unit Address.

* Need to track serial # for warranty work. Each DTA has 3 identifiers: Serial Number, MAC Address, and Unit Address. The serial number is used for warranty validation, so you’ll want to store that in your inventory system. The complete set of product identifiers is sent electronically upon inventory consignment or fulfillment.

* Need to have web form lookup during our trailer POS weekends. This allows customers to enter their requested number of units which may be cross checked with walk-in locations and prevent duplication.

* Create an internal email alias for distribution of customer lists. Fulfillment options require exchange of customer order lists and order fulfillment with shipment tracking. Make sure you have operational processes for easy exchange.

Our customer uses the phrase “Phases of Darkness” for how they will “sunset” their analog channels. They plan to eliminate analog channels in groups, each of 3 groups about 7 days apart. Darkness descends in 3 phrases! Of course, the phases of darkness were preceded by mailers and robo calls to non-responders. As they eliminate a set of channels they will broadcast information to instruct how to obtain a DTA. Their plan is to have employees submit videos playacting programs to communicate the happening. Now that’s creative! We’ll look forward to posting updates on their results.