Amazon – Why not Comment on Service

As regular readers will know, I’m an avid customer of Amazon I love the books section and buy most from there. I do however, buy other things through merchants there form time to time.

As you may know, the buyer is asked to comment on the purchase after the event. I’ve had a couple of bad experiences recently (one will be written up here shortly) and so I clicked the link. The problem I had was with the merchant not with the product. However, Amazon’s system will only let me comment on the product not with the service which is where the problems were.

I can’t understand why Amazon would do that, after all the customer experience is often marred or made by the service – irrespective of how good the product is.

Bad system Amazon.

{Product Management, Brand, Customer Service, Marketing, Product}

Technorati Tags: Brand, Customer Service, Marketing, Product, Product Management, User Experience

Tracks Are Dangerous!!!

I’m a fan of Michael Robertson – I subscribe to his ‘Michael’s Minute‘ and admire his drive to break the status quo and agree with many of his articles. Interestingly, as I realize when writing this, I have subscribed to only a few of his companies services and not stuck with them, why is that? I shall ponder and pontificate in a later blog perhaps.

I got Michael’s latest missive and his premise is that you should buy a CD from them, AnywhereCD and get not only the CD, but also the MP3 as a download. Now that appeals to me! But……

The reason I like this idea is that when I try to buy a track from the local classical radio station KDFC (Get this music right now!!!) – I have to place an order for a CD and it takes whatever time to ship to me. In contrast, I can go to Apple and download it in an instant. Hmmmmmm, let me think…….

Now, along comes Michael with the perfect combination – get an MP3 online and get the CD as well. Fantastic! But, oh the user experience. The top selling album still (and I waited a couple of weeks before posting this) still has Track 01, Track 02 in the listings for the album. There are many in classical like that. And of the THREE opera recordings available (yes I do mean that there are only THREE) each and every one has the same problem.

To be balanced, in Rock and Pop there is a much wider selection and better tagged, though even there Mark Knopfler’s One Take Radio Sessions suffer the same fate.

So, in short I love the idea but execution is sadly lacking. Sorry, Michael

{WOM, Brand, Marketing, media, Product Management}

Technorati Tags: Brand, Marketing, Media, Product Management, User Experience, WOM

Send your prospect away….

I was early for a meeting yesterday and across the way was a Magnolia Audio & Video store. We keep pondering the high definition TV and I’ve wandered through the store once in a while. They claim “At Magnolia, we provide an exceptional experience from the moment you walk through our doors. Our stores feature comfortable demonstration rooms, knowledgeable consultants and premium brands that deliver outstanding performance.”

So I strolled! I was greeted pleasantly and left to wander – great start! I spotted a lot of Bose equipment and it struck a chord. We have a Bose Lifestyle system at home, and I’d called Bose last weekend – don’t you love those 24×7 order lines? – and ordered a replacement for the remote control which didn’t seem to be working. It came promptly, and I put in batteries only to find that I STILL had to be within two feet of the unit for the remote to work. That’s the problem we had with the old unit, so i seemed that my assumptions that the remote was faulty were wrong. Hey ho. Add a call to Bose to my GTD list (BTW, I use an application called iGTD on my Macbook that is quite stunning). But here I was with a pile of Bose equipment and a row of experts as long as my arm.

“Can you repair my Bose Lifestyle?” “Did you buy it from us?” I sensed the conversation was headed downhill. I was right. This gist was if I didn’t buy it from them, no dice.

It always amazes me when companies adopt that as (what I assume is) a corporate policy. Here am I admitting that I have a broken piece of high end audio and they see me as an annoyance to be shooed out. They don’t see me as a potential customer (it’s broken after all), they don’t see me as a revenue stream for additional items (they didn’t know I wanted a big TV – have to get one within 18 months). But what a lost opportunity to ask me a few questions, see what I have, offer their expertise and advice (from their knowledgeable people about their premium brands – at least one of which I own). I was smartly dressed (not always the case – and I have been known to dress down when going shopping), had given information that should have triggered some sales smarts, yet all three of the unoccupied people let me walk out. Worse still, they let me walk out with a severely damaged view of their organization. To the extent that when I do spend my dollars – Magnolia will not be on my list for consideration.

So they have just kissed around $5,000 goodbye. Was it guaranteed – absolutely not. But they have – in that instant that I call the ‘decisive moment’ – converted me from a recommender (I advised a friend to try there within the last month) and potential revenue stream – I won’t even think about lifetime value – to a detractor. And here is the kicker, they have little to no opportunity to redress that situation. How can they? Advertising will just remind me of the last experience – and reinforce it probably. It’s the difference in impact between a personal interaction and a cold reinforcement of a Brand Name.

Compare and contrast with Apple. I have talked before about the Genius Bar and the way that the folks there connect and, even when delivering bad news, do it in a way that keeps people as customers. Could that be why Apple’s retail sales are FOUR times higher than the best of the retailers?

{WOM, Brand, Customer Service, Marketing, Product}

Technorati Tags: Brand, Customer Service, Marketing, Product, User Experience, WOM

KQED – can you believe it goes on, and on………….

It really is hard to believe it, but KDED continues to charge my credit card month on month. And they have sent me another missive, pleading for more money!

It is hard to know what more I CAN do. I have written to the head of radio, JoAnne Wallace; I have written to the membership department (including copies of all previous communications), and STILL KQED writes to me.

I see that the page with the individuals who are responsible for what has gone, or at least I can’t find it; so perhaps my letters did have some effect – KQED don’t want me taking up the valuable time of their people! I jest of course, it would be nice to think that feedback from a ‘Member’ would be the most valuable commodity that KQED could find, but I don’t fool myself that anyone has taken any action.

Still, it does emphasize again and again, the points I have made in this and the previous posts. An organization that is not in touch with it’s customers doesn’t deserve to succeed. Perhaps that’s the lesson for all of us. When I was in a corporate position, every time I had a poor experience I would think ‘How do we look to our customers, are we as bad as this?’ That’s why I replied to EVERY comment and complaint personally – we often did small things like sending a beer cooler or logoed item as a ‘thankyou’ for bringing a problem to and as letting us fix it.

I’ll own up here, there are, I think, two complaints I didn’t respond to in my time as the head of marketing and sales at that organization. I always tried to, even where some were of questionable authenticity. I tried to reply in tone, but one did completely fox me. It was a request to rename part of the UNIX operating system known as a ‘deamon’ as it conflicted with their religious views. To this day I do not know if it was serious or a joke, but I keep it still!

So, I see that there is a pres@kqed.org (which interestingly is not noted as the president’s email, but the ‘office of the president’. I’m thinking I’ll send an email linking to this blog entry and sit back and wait.

My sweepstake starts here…….

Turn on your ears and react to your customers. All of us. All the time.

{WOM, Brand, Customer Service, Marketing}

Technorati Tags: Bad Customer Service, Brand, Marketing, Media, Product Management, User Experience