KUBRA Dropcountr Quenches Your Customers' Thirst for Water Analytics

Consumers’ interest in knowing how much water they use is on the rise, and with that comes the need for tools to monitor consumption easily. Climate change, drought, and increasing water bills are all contributing to this interest. With conservation on the brain, having access to personal data and analytics about water use has quickly become an essential part of providing an exceptional customer experience. Below we talk to Robb Barnitt, Founder of Dropcountr and Vice President, Market Development at KUBRA, to learn more about KUBRA’s new water analytics solution.

What Is KUBRA Dropcountr?

Dropcountr is a cloud-based customer engagement and analytics solution with two distinct sides. On one side, it combines granular water use data, customer and household attributes, and even climate factors like evapotranspiration to educate consumers and help boost their Water IQ. On the other side, it allows utilities to understand their customers better and communicate directly with them via email, text message, and push notification.

What Are the Main Benefits of KUBRA Dropcountr?

Most people don’t know how much water they use or where. Dropcountr changes this with intuitive information and advanced water analytics, all accessible via an easy-to-use native mobile app or responsive web browser. Utilities that offer Dropcountr to their customers are helping to strengthen that utility-customer relationship. When rates go up, a water main breaks, or outdoor watering restrictions are imposed, a strong relationship comes in handy.

How Does KUBRA Dropcountr Differ From Similar Products Available on the Market?

From the outset, the focus of Dropcountr was to design products with the consumer in mind. It’s easy to build analytics, but it’s hard to create experiences that resonate with a consumer in a way that influences their behavior.  We meet consumers where they spend their time–on their mobile devices with native mobile apps that consumers can find in their App Store of choice. Mobile has overtaken the web in terms of consumer time, and 90% of mobile time is spent in these native apps. This reality informed our approach.

KUBRA Dropcountr doesn’t just present deep expertise in data science and analytics. It also has a water leak detection algorithm that alerts the consumer via email, text message or push notification when a leak is present. And speaking of algorithms, KUBRA Dropcountr also has a proprietary machine-learning algorithm that can identify and quantify outdoor water use. This is a huge blind spot for the average person. 60-80% of water use can happen outdoors in the summer. Ours is the only solution that offers this type of advanced transparency for outdoor water use.

There Is Growing Interest in Water Consumption and Efficiency Programs. What’s Driving This Interest?

Both macro global and regional factors and micro factors at the household and personal level are driving water consumption and efficiency programs.

On the macro side, water utilities face two significant issues–climate change and drought. When supply is at risk, we need to find ways of managing water demand. Water efficiency programs that include hardware rebates and educational software like ours can help manage demand while improving the customer experience.

Water rates are rising faster than any other utility bill at the household level, and 10% of homes have leaks that waste 90 gallons or more per day. When you consider that, it’s understandable why the average household is looking to be more water-efficient as a means of saving money. And finally, at the personal level, making sustainable choices is not only becoming more popular, but it’s a mandate for younger generations. Reducing their carbon, plastic, and water footprints are very important to the very large and influential Millennial generation.

Why Should Water Utilities Incorporate Water Analytics and Engagement Solutions in Their Offerings?

Analytics can support the business objectives of many different functional groups within a water utility. But, three big reasons are customer service, customer satisfaction, and conservation and compliance. Customers who understand their water use are less likely to call customer service with questions or complain about a high bill. They are also less likely to be delinquent in paying their bill. Lessening the load on customer service and reducing truck rolls for service calls is a huge financial benefit to a water utility.

As for improving customer satisfaction, customers who have access to information and self-service tools will be more satisfied with their utility service. This can pay dividends when rates change, or service is interrupted for any reason. Preemptively strengthening the utility-customer relationship is tremendously valuable.

And finally, these days, more attention is being paid to water conservation and even regional mandates that require this. Solutions that increase customer Water IQ can help consumers live within their means and ensure that their utility complies with mandates and restrictions.

Delivering personalized, detailed water analytics and leak alerts right to your customers’ smartphones is now possible! Contact us today to learn more about KUBRA Dropcountr.

Learn More About KUBRA Dropcountr

KUBRA Dropcountr is a cloud-based customer engagement and analytics solution that offers free mobile and web apps for your residential and business customers, called HOME and BUSINESS, and CLEAR Utility, a dashboard that provides analytics and communication for your staff. Click here to learn more about our dropcountr app.

Sources:

• People Spent 90% of Their Mobile Time Using Apps in 2021, MobiLoud
• Up 43% over Last Decade, Water Rates Rising Faster than Other Household Utility Bills, Bluefield Research, 2021
• Fix a Leak Week, EPA, 2021