Commercial Intimacy

Self Service and Commercial Intimacy

The ability to access products and services without requiring personal assistance is a relatively new phenomenon. In the bricks and mortar world the first example was probably the supermarket. Since then internet and kiosk based versions have revolutionised the retail environment and beyond. Everything from government information through banking, travel, groceries right through to pornography can be accessed privately and without help.

Perversely, this lessening of person to person contact is a powerful driving force for greater personalisation of service. For a start the ability to capture, store and process data from the digital interface is much greater than from the face to face encounter. Data underpins the ability to tailor offers to personal preferences and needs. Secondly reducing the number of face to face contacts, and consequently the staffing required to support those, allows suppliers to employ fewer service people but of a much higher quality thereby improving the service, whilst reducing its cost.