STUDENT TEAM - INDUSTRY PROJECTS
The brightest e-business minds at UW-Madison (affiliated faculty and students) work with companies on semester-long course projects ranging from competitive analysis to strategy design and justification, to roadmap development.
2004 PROJECT SPONSORS
American Family Insurance
American Girl, Inc.
Brady Corporation
CUNA Mutual Group
Grainger
Lands’ End
ORBIS Corporation (a division of Menasha Corp.)
State of Wisconsin
Sub-Zero Freezer Company
The Swiss Colony
Questions or Comments
Contact Dr. Raj Veeramani, Director,
UW E-Business Institute & UW E-Business Consortium
608-262-0861
email raj@cae.wisc.edu
STUDENT TEAM - INDUSTRY PROJECTS
American Family Insurance
Multilingual electronic communication and interaction: technologies and business practices
Project Goal
Investigate technologies and business practices to provide and manage multilingual communication through Web site and e-mail
Outcomes
- Investigated vendors of multilingual technologies and services
- Studied other UW E-Business Consortium member companies use of and views on technologies and business practices for multilingual communication and interaction with customers
- Provided American Family with an assessment of the state of available technologies, and recommended how to efficiently provide and manage multilingual communication and interaction
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American Girl, Inc.
Analysis of international expansion opportunities
Project 1 Goal
Develop a strategy for American Girl to enter international markets (Canada, UK and Japan)
Outcomes
- Offline and online market analysis of chosen countries
- Analyzed US competitors serving chosen countries and local competitors
- Documented marketing channels and strategies
- Identified potential barriers (product-related, regulatory, etc.) to serving chosen countries
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Non - members view executive summary
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American Girl, Inc.
Web content management strategy
Project 2 Goal
Help American Girl develop a strategy for improving the Web content management process
Outcomes
- Completed process mapping of "As Is" content management process (both for major updates and minor changes)
- Researched leading content management system vendors
- Analyzed leading content management practices from other companies that are members of the UW E-Business Consortium
- Defined a "Future State" of content management and the improved process and system functionalities underlying it
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Non - members view executive summary
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Brady Corporation
Strategy and business plan for Seton Nordic e-commerce
Project Goal
Create a business plan to launch the Seton Nordic business with an e-commerce- only start-up model (including launch plan and ROI analysis)
Outcomes
- Analysis of Seton competitors' online business efforts in the Nordic marketplace (Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Norway)
- Identified companies that have successfully launched "e-commerce only" businesses (no direct catalogs and/or call-centers)
- Researched the business case of the "Seton start-up formula" of purchasing mailing lists for catalog distribution (cost of buying lists, costs of printing catalogs, cost of mailing catalogs). Determined comparable online start-up models and costs to reach same volume of potential customers (how many keywords purchased, how many search engines paid for favorable listings, etc.)
- Business Plan and recommendations for Seton Nordic e-commerce business
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CUNA Mutual Group
Usability and accessibility analysis and strategy for cunamutual.com
Project Goal
Analyze usability and accessibility issues pertaining to cunamutual.com and help CUNA Mutual Group develop a strategy to address the issues
Outcomes
- Usability evaluation of cunamutual.com and Web applications
- Conducted a comparative analysis of cunamutual.com and other credit unions
- Conducted a usability assessment of cunamutual.com
- Conducted usability testing of two specific B2B Web applications
- Accessibility-related analysis and strategy
- Researched types of disabilities, demographic information on disability, accessibility laws, and industry trends
- Evaluated cunamutual.com to identify potential accessibility issues
- Recommended a strategy for addressing accessibility issues
- Identified ROI for accessibility strategy and risks of non-implementation
- Analysis of CUNA Mutual’s current usability methodology
- Reviewed CUNA Mutual’s current usability methodology, a combination of Weinschenk, Nielson, and CUNA Mutual’s Solution Delivery process
- Researched how companies define, maintain and practice Web standards to ensure usability of sites and applications
- Proposed changes to CUNA Mutual’s usability methodology, including a process to tie Web standards to the usability methodology
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Grainger
Improving access and delivery of product information to customers through multiple channels
Project 1 Goal
Identify and analyze the need for and usage of product information by repair technicians, and determine how this information can be best provided through various channels (Web site, CD-ROM, printed docs)
Outcomes
- Conducted qualitative telephone interviews to identify and profile the information needs of facilities maintenance repair technicians who use one or more channels to obtain product information to support the repair and maintenance of HVAC, tools, machines, plumbing, security, Jan San, landscape
- Performed analysis and customer research to identify how information is used and best information delivery mechanisms (e.g., an exploded view diagram online is used to identify and purchase the part, but the same information needs to be printed on paper to support the actual repair)
- Researched how customers value product information, including willingness to pay for the information and likelihood to buy the repair part from the information provider
Grainger
Analyzing customer usage of multiple e-channels for purchasing products
Project 2 Goal
Perform analysis and identify & develop a profile for customers utilizing multiple e-channels— web site, e-procurement, CD-ROM, EDI, Direct Connects—as part of the procurement process. Assist Grainger develop a holistic business strategy to serve customers using multiple e-channels.
Outcomes
- Identified and profile customers utilizing multiple e-channels and data provided by Grainger as a baseline
- Conducted basic statistical analysis on the customer e-channel usage data to evaluate customer behavior
- Performed analysis and customer research to identify how customer e-channel(s) accounts are used and how it relates to the purchasing process (e.g., product research, finding product, product inquiry, checking price, requisitioning, approvals, product purchase, post-sale technical support, etc.)
- Conducted a survey and interviews with customers to understand their purchasing process and how they use e-channels
- Documented the customer's definition of the "purchasing process" and how this aligns with Grainger's offerings. Provided recommendations on how Grainger can best utilize multiple access methods to provide value to customers
Lands' End
Enhancing Lands' End's Web sites in the UK, Germany and Japan
Project 1 Goal
Perform a competitive analysis and develop recommendations for enhancing design, functionality, shopping tools and user-experience of Lands' End's Web sites in the UK, Germany and Japan
Outcomes
- Documented functionality & features of Lands' End UK, German, and Japanese Web sites
- Documented competitor Web site features and functionality
- Identified best practices in each country, including regulatory & legal requirements
- Based on the above analysis, provided recommendations to enhance current design, functionality, shopping tools and user-experience of Lands' End Web sites in the UK, Germany and Japan
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Lands' End
Analysis and improvement of Lands' End "Smart Service" for customers
Project 2 Goal
Help Lands' End refine its "Smart Service" by analyzing customer interactions from the "Smart Service" pilot and research industry best practices
Outcomes
- Call analysis
- Analyzed actual customer calls to identify specific phrases or statements spoken by the customer or the CSR, and conversation "paths" that are predictors for specific interaction outcomes. These predictors could then be integrated into the CSR training to 1) increase confidence in presenting a Smart Service opportunity 2) provide an indicator not present in an effort to enhance customer satisfaction or 3) provide new approaches to increase average order value
- Compared other data to determine if certain customers are more likely to purchase a Smart Service item. This helped feed a skills-based call routing system to ensure calls are handled by a CSR with appropriate skills
- Best practices related to "Smart Service"
- Researched other direct marketers / catalog merchant successes with customer service strategies to increase average order value (e.g., up-sell, cross-sell) and customer satisfaction; Documented CSR skills training, human resource management and incentive systems
- Researched companies in other industries (e.g., in the hospitality industry) to identify "Smart Service" leading practices
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Lands' End
Sell clothing as outfits on the Lands' End Web site
Project 3 Goal
Perform a review of how Lands' End sells outfits online, and a competitive analysis to develop recommendations for enhancing the selling experience
Outcomes
- Documented functionality and approach to selling outfits on Lands' End Web site
- Identified best practices of apparel and non-apparel online merchants
- Reviewed offline strategies for selling outfits that could be used/improved for an online experience
- Conducted usability tests on Lands' End Web site
- Based on the above analysis, provided recommendations to enhance the current approach to selling outfits online
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ORBIS Corporation
Strategy to improve ORBIS employee portal
Project Goal
Analyze ORBIS' employee (intranet) portal and provide recommendations for improvement
Outcomes
- Analyzed how ORBIS Advantage employee portal serves the needs of plant personnel and remote sales personnel
- Conducted an online survey
- Conducted interviews
- Performed portal usability test
- Organized and executed an employee focus group discussion to generate improvements
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State of Wisconsin
Assessment of local government information technology needs and issues
Project Goal
Gain insight of technology issues facing local units of Wisconsin government, and identify areas where enterprise architecture could provide significant benefits to local government
Outcomes
- Developed Web-based survey questions and response format
- Created database with survey response information
- Analyzed and reported survey responses
Sub-Zero Freezer Company
UWEBC assisted Pacific Cycle's management team to better understand the impact of RFID-enabled operational improvements. Process mapping and redesign of customer touch-point scenarios
Project Goal
Develop ideal scenarios and processes for all customer touch points
Outcomes
- Mapped current and future scenarios for customer touch points
- Analyzed current process flow and defined future process flow
- Define measurement metrics based on internal analysis, and researched metrics used by other companies
- Recommended software requirements to support these processes
- Developed recommendations to increase customer product registrations through competitive and "like" luxury product registration analysis
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The Swiss Colony
Assessment and enhancement of The Swiss Colony Web sites
Project Goal
Conduct usability and accessibility evaluation and search engine performance of three Swiss Colony Web sites and provide recommendations for improvement
Outcomes
- Performed usability tests of three Swiss Colony Web sites
- Performed accessibility evaluation
- Performed a competitive benchmarking analysis of direct and indirect competitors
- Conducted search engine ranking analysis
- Provided recommendations for improving Web site usability
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Non - members view executive summary
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