The Future of Communication Technology: Tom Rahder Of Esendex On How Their Technological Innovation Will Shake Up How We Connect and Communicate With Each Other

Active listening is also a key skill. Successful communication is at the heart of what our technology supports but we can all improve this at a human level, otherwise so much can be missed. The old adage of “two ears and one mouth” is as true now as it was before the advent of our always-on world.

The telephone totally revolutionized the way we could communicate with people all over the world. But then came email and took it to the next level. And then came text messaging. And then came video calls. And so on…What’s next? What’s just around the corner?

In this interview series, called ‘The Future Of Communication Technology’ we are interviewing leaders of tech or telecom companies who are helping to develop emerging communication technologies and the next generation of how we communicate and connect with each other.

As a part of this series, I had the pleasure of interviewing Tom Rahder.

After graduating from college, Tom Rahder spent the first years of his career working on superyachts, before moving into tech. He joined Portsmouth (NH)-based Bottomline Technologies, with roles in sales, marketing and product management. He consolidated this experience by working for global tech players such as Experian and Sage, before focusing his time on high growth, private equity backed scale ups, which includes his current position at Esendex, part of Commify.

Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Before we dive in, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘backstory’ and how you got started?

My move into the tech sector was almost by accident. I had been working as a crew member on superyachts traveling across the world, when I had a conversation with one of the owners who was an investor. He had been moving much of his wealth out of real estate and into B2B tech businesses in the early 2000s, recognising their potential.

His advice was to get a job, any job, in this sector as I wouldn’t regret it. I knocked on a few doors and got my first break with Bottomline Technologies in an internal sales role, and the rest is history.

I now lead the product management and marketing functions at Esendex, where I act as the link between Commify’s technology teams and the sales function to drive commercial performance. I also help the development of Esendex as our enterprise brand and the simplification of our local brands through enabling a migration.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

My favorite inspirational quote comes from my college tutor, Dr Richard Barkham, an economist who is a global authority in his field.

At a time when I was questioning the next steps in my career, he once told me: “You can’t keep cream down”, meaning if you back yourself, you can get where you want without requiring the support structure of a very formalized career path.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are?

It was back when I was 19 that I made the change which shaped my future.

I had fought hard to get onto a highly competitive college degree in commercial real estate, but after two semesters I realized that it wasn’t for me. The career path was too fixed and based on time served, rather than meritocracy, for the first 10 years or so.

This is when Dr Richard Barkham shared his advice with me, giving me the confidence to back myself, despite the fact it would mean I abandoned his course. His words have stuck with me ever since.

He demonstrated to me that not everything needs to be focused on what is immediately in front of you and he was humble enough to point out the drawbacks of spending time in his chosen field. He probably didn’t expect me to spend the first few years of my professional career washing yacht decks however!

Can you share a story about that?

It is still the initial moment Richard gave me this advice which remains most prominent, but there are many instances of when I’ve implemented this wisdom throughout my career.

Having the confidence to back yourself and not follow a predetermined path promotes innovation and creativity, allowing everyone to best use their evolving interests and strengths.

You only have to look at how business communications have developed over recent years to see that ethos in action. Technology such as artificial intelligence (AI) has become a game-changer in recent years, facilitating enhanced personalisation, but it always takes individuals thinking outside the box to get there.

How have you used your success to bring goodness to the world?

I have been fortunate enough to be able to be in positions of influence in organizations throughout my career.

Early on, my experience working for US-based organizations highlighted the value of ‘giving back’ through initiatives including corporate-sponsored community days.

This was an alien concept to many European businesses until recently, and I am happy to say that I have helped introduce this on a number of occasions now.

Ok wonderful. Let’s now shift to the main focus of our interview. Can you tell us about the cutting-edge communication tech that you are working on? How do you think that will help people?

Our Esendex platform provides businesses and organizations with the ability to converse with their customers over the most effective messaging channels, without the need to invest in hugely expensive enterprise communications platforms.

For the consumer, our communication tech delivers a straightforward benefit: it reduces the frustration commonly felt when trying to interact with a business or organization.

We ensure that the consumer has a simple and effective method of communication, based on their preference (e.g Text, MMS, WhatsApp, iMessage), with retailers, healthcare providers, logistics or finance organizations.

What’s more, it’s all based on conversational, two-way messaging via their mobile devices, avoiding the need to deal with ‘No-reply@’ emails. Research shows that businesses who are able to communicate effectively with their customers are more likely to retain and grow their customer base.

How do you think this might change the world?

Consumers want organizations to be ‘always on and available’ for when they want to shop, order, re-schedule appointments, re-arrange deliveries, get travel updates and other daily tasks.

More importantly, they want this information to be available in the palm of their hand, using their preferred messaging channel. And they want to be able to have a two-way messaging conversation, so they can make amendments, ask questions or add additional information. This is where RCS (Rich Communications Services) messaging comes in.

It’s this two way, conversational messaging that is so critical. The consumer moves into a position of power, on equal terms with the organization they are dealing with. They no longer have to hang around waiting for their logistics provider to update them, or wait on hold with their healthcare provider.

We are seeing that businesses who offer two-way, conversational messaging are outcompeting their peer group who simply ‘broadcast’ information using traditional technologies such as email or one way mobile messaging.

One such example is The Vaillant Group, an international family-owned company providing customers with energy-saving and easy to operate solutions for heating, cooling and hot water.

When using channels like post and agent-based calls, their customer engagement rate stood at 2%, but after switching to rich, mobile-focused messaging, this response rate grew to 40%.

Keeping “Black Mirror” in mind, can you see any potential drawbacks about this technology that people should think more deeply about?

While the consumer wants ‘always available’ conversational messaging with organizations, the risk is there’s a fine line between easy availability and a sense of those organizations intruding into their personal lives.

Messaging channels such as WhatsApp are very powerful and effective customer marketing and customer service tools, but they need to be used carefully by businesses as customers need to be able to maintain control of when and how they interact.

Esendex ensures that businesses are able to manage these boundaries with their customers, by giving the customer control over their preferences, including the time of day for contact, in addition to guaranteeing that the technology is compliant with all relevant legislation in the specific geography it is being used.

Was there a “tipping point” that led you to this breakthrough? Can you tell us that story?

Like many tech stories, the tipping point from one-way messaging to two-way conversational rich messaging has its roots in the Covid-19 pandemic.

With physical offices and buildings closed, everyone was more reliant on their devices to communicate. Consumers, stuck at home, needed to be able to contact organizations not only to receive updates but to browse, purchase goods, book appointments, change their preferences and make payments, all within the messaging channel itself.

The key was to avoid the need for customers to navigate away from a WhatsApp message or SMS text to an organization-specific app or website.

Businesses have long recognised that engagement with their customers falls away if they chop and change communication channels, so two-way messaging helps meet them ‘where they are’. Choice, consistency and relevance of the messaging channels lead to a long and profitable relationship for both parties.

What do you need to lead this technology to widespread adoption?

The power of the simple text message is its ubiquity — no matter which country, operating system or device you use, you know as a business when you send a text message it can be delivered to the recipient.

The richer messaging channels which better support two-way conversations between the consumer and business have suffered from a lack of interoperability until recently. This meant that many organizations were reluctant to send a message that might not be received by their end-customer.

Thankfully, this has changed rapidly in the last three years. The latest example is Apple’s announcement this year of their support in iOS for Google’s Rich Communication Service (RCS), the more powerful successor to a simple text message.

The huge adoption of WhatsApp by much of the world — standing at over 2 billion monthly active users globally — as their preferred messaging channel with all of the rich, interactive elements it supports has also been a significant factor.

The pandemic has changed so many things about the way we behave. One of them of course is how we work and how we communicate in our work. How do you think your innovation might be able to address the new needs that have arisen as a result of the pandemic?

During the pandemic, many businesses expanded their customer base from their traditional, local geographic focus as they moved or increased their presence online.

Years later, remote or hybrid working, which was normalized during the pandemic, is also here to stay, with workers scattered across countries, hundreds or thousands of miles away from their offices and colleagues.

Both of these factors drive the need for enhanced communication technology to be both effective, efficient and retain a competitive advantage. That’s where our Esendex brand communication platforms come in — able to meet this need and adapt to changing consumer behavior.

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me Before I Started” and why?

The first is to just get started — the power of tech businesses is that we typically are happier to try something and fail, than many traditional industries.

Nevertheless, we can all try to move faster. I see that as tech businesses mature many start to fall into the ‘old industries’ trap of paralysis analysis. Self-awareness of this is a very powerful antidote.

For me, when hiring, attitude and intelligence always trump time served in a role. Of course, domain experience can be valuable but great teams more often come from people doing things smartly and quickly rather than based on how they saw something working 10 years ago.

An example here would be when I worked for a FinTech growth company in FX (Foreign Exchange). We hired the brightest school and college leavers rather than established industry experts when we challenged the big banking sector. And our hungry youngsters beat the competition time after time.

Active listening is also a key skill. Successful communication is at the heart of what our technology supports but we can all improve this at a human level, otherwise so much can be missed. The old adage of “two ears and one mouth” is as true now as it was before the advent of our always-on world.

Another recommendation is to find your sweet-spot sized organization to spend the major part of your career in. Organizations, even in the same industry, are very different from startups to global Fortune 100s. Try different businesses for size — I definitely enjoy the ride from $10m to $1bn best!

Finally, please have fun. For the vast majority of us, however passionate we are about our technology or products, very little of it is truly life-saving or up there with the work of a heart surgeon.

So when times are tough, sometimes taking a step back and remembering to laugh or joke about the situation can be a great tonic for everyone involved.

You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. :-)

Almost every drama, conflict or disagreement has at its heart a lack of, or poor communication between the protagonists, whether at a family or cold war scale!

I am passionate about improving communication between people, and I hope that through providing examples of technology supporting this, we can reduce the future potential for misunderstandings.

How can our readers further follow your work online?

Please visit https://www.esendex.com/ to view our latest blogs, thought leadership and tips on how to improve communication with your audience.

You can also view our new report, The Connected Consumer Report 2024, to understand the latest changes in consumer behaviors.

Thank you so much for the time you spent doing this interview. This was very inspirational, and we wish you continued success.