A look back, and a look forward
Every December we take time to reflect on what we accomplished that year and sketch out next year’s area of focus: how do we help water utilities improve their customer service and self-service tools?
It’s a rewarding, humbling, inspiring, galvanizing exercise.
2018 was a keystone year for us with several high water marks:
✓ We met a broader cross-section of our community than any year prior;
✓ Our utility partners spoke at more events about their Dropcountr programs than any year prior
✓ Our programs were included in more grant funding events than any year prior; and,
✓ We saw more activity and interest among small-to-medium sized utilities than any year prior.
The last point – interest, activity and partnerships among small-to-medium sized utilities – is a promising sign of things to come for the water industry. No longer are digital customer services and analytics limited to the well-financed major metros; it’s becoming important enough, and valuable enough – especially with AMI – that smaller, leaner utilities are leading the change.
We want to highlight some of our 2018 wins below and give all a taste of 2019. We have a big year ahead of us and could not be more excited to march into it with you, our community.
Cheers to 2019, forward ho!
Kellock + Team Dropcountr
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Industry Participant, not just a Vendor
We knew our community was strong, but the H2duO really brought things to the fore in 2018. Dropcountr sat down with Stephanie and Arianne and proudly sponsored Season 1 of “Water in Real Life”, a podcast that brings together water utility staff, conservationists and communicators – i.e. you! If you haven’t subscribed yet, please do!
A month later we shared the stage with Mary Ann Dickinson at WSI, discussing the importance of engaging your Spanish-speaking customers. Talk to any of us if you’re building a strategy around your Spanish-speaking customers – we’re here to help.
Impressive Work in Denver
We wrapped an impressive pilot with Denver Water that was shared at the AWWA Sustainable Water Management Conference in Seattle. See how we drove >30% adoption and helped DW save $343/AF compared to previous conservation efforts at this link.
Austin and New England Too
Our partners in Texas and New England were quick on their customer engagement as well. Dropcountr was there to support Austin Water’s week-long boil advisory in October; an unprecedented event that saw a wonderful amount of neighbors helping out neighbors. Southwest of Boston our partner Dedham Westwood Water District was surgical in their messaging around hydrant flushing – reducing customer service call traffic and keeping customers informed and happy .
New Partners of all shapes and sizes
As an organization we take the long view with our utility and partner relationships. More importantly, the people that make them work. We could not be more excited to be growing the Dropcountr network in Colorado, Texas, Montana, Florida, Georgia, California and beyond. Thank you for the continued support and partnership – you make us better.
Eager Water Wonks
We have a partnership with researchers at UC Riverside to pilot programs that help us and the utility better understand what messaging strategies and content drive water efficient behavior. When are your customers most receptive to messaging? What types of messages do your customers respond to? How satisfied are your customers?
Drop us a line at data@dropcountr.com to learn more.
Taste of 2019
This year we’re going long on automating routine tasks and actions, for both utility and customers. Improved leak resolution, thresholds, messaging, clustering, templates, UI, billpay, slowdowns and more. We’ll continue to champion our partners at regional AWWA conferences, on the airwaves, and in the press. Our goal, as it’s always been, is to help utilities and their customers save time, money and water.
Let’s get to work!