Giving Solar Victoria one clear picture of its customer journey

Building on a program that already works

Solar Victoria runs the rebates and interest-free loans that have helped more than 250,000 Victorian households and businesses take up solar panels, batteries and energy-saving products. Its 2023–28 Strategic Plan promises to put customers at the centre.

The people who keep that promise sit in different teams. Program design, communications, the contact centre and retailer relations each see one part of the customer's journey. Contact centre staff hear about application problems they cannot fix. Retailers do most of the talking with customers, and they told us they wanted more support from Solar Victoria. With no single view of the whole experience, it was hard to agree where to focus next.

Solar Victoria asked us to build that view with them. They wanted a clear picture of the customer experience they are aiming for, and a plan of actions to reach it.

Listening to everyone who shapes the experience

Over 18 weeks we spoke with more than 60 people. We interviewed 24 customers. Some had applied and missed out, and some had not applied yet. We interviewed 7 retailers, from family businesses to large installers. We spent time in the contact centre, watching calls and application processing, and talked with 17 staff. We also spoke with 12 people from inside Solar Victoria, across the CEO's office, digital, communications, strategy, policy and risk.

We then ran idea workshops with customers and retailers, and checked the ideas that came out of them with Solar Victoria teams. We worked through the final documents together in three sessions with the core project team. Before any of this, we read 18 existing documents, including a behaviour change report and a map of the current customer journey. That meant we built on what Solar Victoria already knew instead of repeating it.

A vision and seven promises

The research led to a customer experience (CX) vision. In short: help more Victorians use Solar Victoria's programs, and make the experience so good that people go on to take up more renewable and energy-saving products. Under the vision sit seven CX principles, written as promises to customers: be accessible to more people, empower the right people at the right time, uplift industry, be a trusted voice and guide, make it efficient and effective, hero CX in decision making, and be bold and innovative.

Each principle comes with a gap analysis. That is a short record of what Solar Victoria already does well, where it could go further, and the signs that would show it is working, such as shorter application times or fewer people giving up on an application. Any team can use it to test a decision against the principles.

A blueprint from program design to program close

The blueprint is a map of the ideal customer journey in seven phases. It also shows what happens behind the scenes at Solar Victoria to support each phase. Two of the phases are internal. Phase 0 is designing and launching a program. Phase 6 is winding it down. Customers are not present in either, but decisions made there shape everything customers later experience. Putting them on the map means the teams doing that work can see themselves in the journey.

For each phase, the blueprint lists the problems customers, retailers and staff described, the opportunities that answer them, and the actions to take. Actions are sorted into Now (6 to 12 months), Next (1 to 2 years), Future (2 years or more) and Further Exploration, for ideas that need more work. Some actions, like a single customer profile, appear in several phases because they unlock work elsewhere. Customer stories from the interviews, such as Jerri's first application or Larry's experience as a retailer, sit next to each phase to keep real people in view.

Built for everyday use

Solar Victoria teams told us how they would use the blueprint. To help new starters find their feet. To help retailers understand the rebate and loan process. To see where their own work fits in the wider operation. And as a shared space for deciding what to do first. We delivered it as a living document they can update as programs change.

We paired it with a simple test for new ideas. It asks whether an idea is desirable (do people want it), viable (does it make sense for Solar Victoria) and feasible (can it be done). It adds a fourth question just for Solar Victoria: does it have integrity, meaning does it hold to the strategy, the principles and customer safety. Teams can run their plans through the test and decide where to start.