CDMS & SDG take home Retail Week's Responsible Technology Award

Leading direct marketing services company CDMS has landed the Responsible Technology Initiative award at June’s Retail Week 2009 Retail Technology Awards for its work with Shop Direct Group (SDG) on the development of digital catalogues for call centre staff.
The Retail Technology Awards represent one of the most coveted accolades within the retail industry. The Responsible Technology category rewards the impact that the innovative use of technology can have on reducing a retailer’s carbon footprint, or demonstrating commitment to social responsibility.
The award winning solution devised by CDMS provides the UK’s leading home shopping company with digital catalogues, replacing the thousands of physical copies of the seasonal ‘big-books’ and leaflets issued to SDG’s 7 UK Call Centres and an increasing number of home-workers. SDG’s call-centre staff can now access and provide relevant information to the customer easily at the click of a mouse using Virtual Books. Advisers are able to deliver enhanced customer experience by accessing relevant pages in real-time without having to leave the customer on hold or schedule a call back in order to find a hard copy publication.
A significant reduction in cost and environmental impact has been achieved through time and paper savings. Previously, ten thousand copies a year of the main books (over 1000 pages) would be sent to the contact centres, as well as copies of all the leaflets (varying from 6-120 pages in length). Print, postage and storage of these publications has been drastically reduced, as well as improvements in call handling time for staff. The value of these savings is estimated to be £220,000 over the next year.
Graham Ibbetson, Commercial Director at CDMS, comments: “We pride ourselves in the efficient delivery of end to end marketing solutions ranging from data quality and provision, to the creation of high quality marketing materials and catalogues optimised for delivery across multiple channels. Because we believe consumer habits are constantly evolving, we are committed to keeping our clients up to speed by devising solutions that respond to their needs, whether these are focused around accelerating trading performance, reducing cost or carbon footprint. With our investment in cutting-edge technology and integrated services, CDMS is well ahead of its game and ready to take on our clients’ points of pain.”
For more information about CDMS, visit www.cdms.co.uk.
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About CDMS:
CDMS transforms the return on investment companies achieve in Direct Marketing through innovative and quality service provision. Using the unique data assets within the Transactis data pool and unrivalled execution platform, CDMS is helping clients to exceed performance and gain maximum value from their marketing investment, whilst communicating in more responsible ways. Industry accolades include award wins at the 2008 Connect Awards and 2008 Data Strategy Awards for helping their clients deliver fruitful customer relationships and continually developing dialogue with customers. For more information, visit www.cdms.co.uk.