The Coffee Rant

You know, I’m getting to the stage where I KNOW I inhabit a different world than everyone else. Up until I got older, I used to only suspect that that was the case. Now I know it.

I’m turning into a curmudgeon – what am I going to be like when I get old? I’m less tolerant than ever of ‘fools’.

The latest outrage is having to learn the lingo in order to achieve the simplest of purchases. And all those who INSIST that I use their exact dialect in order to part with my hard earned cash and pay their wages.

All I want is to buy a coffee. Albeit an upmarket, yuppiefied bloody expensive coffee, but coffee nonetheless.

This basic of life – at least according to Jack Aubrey, and who would disagree with him? – this basic, is now unobtainable without entering into some foreign language negotiation. A bit like giving the password to demonstrate that one is entitled to drink it, or to be in the club.

Perhaps they know that I’m only pretending to be a cool, self-assured executive?

Let me explain……… Depending on where I am, I have to use the appropriate code to order the volume of liquid required – Starbucks insists on Venti; Peet’s on Large; Costa on Massimo…… for the same thing. Woe betide anyone who mixes the metaphor – have you seen the look one gets asking for a Venti in Peet’s? Or vice versa, of course. Perhaps it is to discourage those of us who have been known to do deliberately!

A simple use of the English language (I include American English in this definition) such as ‘the largest latte you have’ results in an indoctrination in their particular dialect of the code.

The WORST example, I’m afraid to say, was on a trip to the UK. The Costa Coffee bar in Reading, Berkshire. (That’s BARKshire for my US based colleagues, despite the way it is spelt).

‘Yes?’ says the barista (see, the language has started already). ‘The largest non-fat latte you have, please’.

‘You mean a skinny Massimo?’. ‘I mean the largest one you make, made with non-fat milk please.’ ‘Yes, that’s a Massimo.’

‘Then I’ll have one of those please. To go’.

‘ONE SKINNY MASSIMO LATTE, TO FLEE’. That’s another thing – it seems to be part of the culture to have to bellow the order from one person to another – it must be written into their procedures manual – even when, as in this case, they are standing three feet apart. And ‘TO FLEE’?

Where are they from? This is pretentious nonsense at its worst. Are they trying to make me feel totally alienated? Do they intend to try and make me feel like I’m not of their clan?

Their whole marketing thrust is presumably the inverse, to make me feel good about them and their product. Somewhere there is a poor bloody marketing gal working hard to create this ‘ambiance’ that makes me feel ‘welcome’. At one with them and their brand.

Advice to poor bloody marketing gal (or guy) – all my interactions with your brand (and I do mean ALL of them) affect my perception. Including – nay especially – with your people. When they look down their nose at me because I choose (remember, I’m a curmudgeon) not to use their language. When I’m indoctrinated in (their version) of ‘correct usage’. Why not just smile and do it, they MUST know exactly what I meant and want. But no, I have to be disciplined.

You will come to learn that one of my principles (Graham Principle #1) as far as customers are concerned is ‘Smile while they kick you in the teeth’. Perhaps not quite literally, but you get my drift. The customer is Queen (to quote Tom Peters read his freely downloadable presentations). We will come back to this in subsequent posts.

So I shall do as I have always preached, and vote with my feet. I don’t inhabit Costa anymore. I’ll walk further, spend more if necessary, elsewhere.

And that, dear readers, is the key. Unless we vote with our wallets/pocketbooks nothing will change. Graham Principle #2.

And whilst the coffee vendors may be frustrating, they are far from the worst offenders. Lets’ talk (in a future rant) about ISPs – I just went through what mine described (and I didn’t detect the humor) as a ’service upgrade’. And, as Jimmy Cricket says ‘C’mere, there’s more’.

Soon.

Tags: andy sernovitz

WOMMA

I mentioned in my last post that I’d been at WOMBAT (Word of Mouth Basic Training) in San Francisco. It was a pleasure to get a comment (my first!) from the author Jackie Hubba of the amusingly (to me, anyway) named Church of The Customer who gave a lunch time talk. This is covered in the WOMMA blog. For those of you new to the topic on WoM, you can listen to an interview with her here. I haven’t yet read Jackie’s book, but will after hearing her talk.

For those of you new to Word of Mouth, I’d recommend taking a look at the WOMMA site and think about signing up for some of their newsletters. I was surprised how far the science has come in a very short time, as a marketer measurement crops up a lot on the lips of my CEO. The emphasis on measurement and effect of actions was refreshing and long overdue.

I also loved the emphasis on ethical WOM – something we need to live and breath if we are to avoid the negative aspects – Andy Sernovitz compared it to the risk of email marketing, where we tend to think of all email marketing as SPAM. WOMMA has a code of ethics, please think about using it as your way of implementing WOM and ask your suppliers (better still include it as a requirement in your contracts).

What is YOUR view on the ethics statement? I loved it, think Womma members have done a great service to the industry.

42?

Tags: BlogDesk

As I sat at the Word of Mouth conference run by womma listening to Andy Sernovitz, a few light bulbs illuminated. First, Andy’s passion for the ethical approach to WOM resonated with me – can we get our profession to help people buy what they want/need rather than ‘persuade’ them with misleading information.

Second, I feel strongly – and talk about – the user (and in this blog I’ll use customer and user as synonyms) experience for products, services I use and things I care about. The whole experience, including things such as how hard it is to buy X, or how does a company expect me to work out how to use the product with instructions like this – or big sin #1 in my book, how did you think I was going to break into your product when it’s encased in plastic armor (Logitec, phone companies, take a bow) that only submits to very sharp scissors and brute force.

And finally (they taught me at school never start a sentence with ‘and’: that gives you clues about where, when and how much impact my education had on my behavior) where does all this brand stuff fit? Why don’t companies get that every interaction with ‘their’ brand impacts my view. Yes, Mr CEO, even the driver of your vehicle who cuts me or someone else up on the highway. Every interaction, every touchpoint, every person – and we often talk as though it’s ALL people, when it’s not – affects me in some small way. It can, of course, be positive – but most often we hear the bad. I’ll try and point out both. And also (twice in one paragraph!) the ridiculous.

So that’s what you’ll see here.

My personal aims are to have a point of view (instead of demonstrating my excellence in fence sitting), to have passion, and to try and change some of the things that need to be changed – especially if it is a person’s perception. So why do I care about this stuff? I’m a long time professional marketer and sales guy, working for the longest time on the fringes of high tech, currently VP of sales and marketing with The Open Group. I’m in Oakland, California and as a friend says I wasn’t born here, but I got here as quick as I could. I’ll try and bring the quirky sense of humor (if you understand, you’ll be able to explain the title), and the perspective of being born and brought up in Europe to bear in these observations.

So this is where it all starts. Stand by for the coffee rant, what I love (and the few things I don’t) about American Airlines, good and bad customer support (and why the smart companies (take a bow, HP) are realizing that support is an added value, not a cost center and bringing them back to their home country. And more…….. Much more.