TWITTER USER:
For the record - going into week 6 without useful tech support from Conde Nast for New Yorker Mag iPad app. #Fail
SAME TWITTER USER ONE HOUR LATER:
RE: Conde Nast Tech support: Last email was a form letter describing how to solve a different problem (crashing)... That doesn't bode well
I posted these two tweets from my Twitter stream because it speaks to the topic for today, Customer Service, or lack there of, with companies in the digital space. Whether it be old companies like Conde Nast in this example or LinkedIn/Twitter/Facebook/Zynga/Groupon etc. Companies in the digital space are orders of magnitude worse about the experience of their customers when it comes to service on the whole.
To be frank with you, I am perplexed at this reality and have no real answers as to why this is the case, but I know it is the case. I have heard many a story and had my own experiences where the talk certainly does not match the walk with these companies. And I guess that is the part that is so frustrating to me as a avid watcher of the customer service marketplace. Every website you go to or every leader you talk to at a web 2.0 company or a digital offshoot of an older company, talk a great game. They talk about how they don't have an IVR to burden their customers. Or talk about how they think that customers are happy with an email response to issues or how customers will just put up with web self service because they are a new company.
Problem is that people are measuring them against the best of the best. Just because you are social media company or a web 2.0 company or a cloud based provider of this or that, does not mean that you are somehow judged differently in the long run. Nope, sorry to say that you will be judged just like all the other companies and technologies before you. Does your stuff work and if it does not, how good are you at helping me fix it. You will be judged against the likes of USAA and Zappos, who universally get it right, not against the 5 competitors in your space.
When will these companies day of reckoning come you might ask? I just don't know. But what I do know is that the customers will speak with their wallets and their feet or digital feet. The lip service about how their customer service is different will only hold up for so long and then customers will be on their way when they actually experience the sub par service that is seemingly common place at these companies.
I am an interested bystander on this one. Wondering if anyone else sees it the same way....
1 comment:
Doesn't the lack of response from Conde Nast prove that customer service doesn't matter?
This person has been waiting for 6 weeks for a response... and gives every indication that he/she will continue to wait additional weeks for the problem to be resolved.
Why would Conde Nast fix the problem today when they will still apparently have the same customer a few weeks from now?
Until people vote with their wallets to place a premium on customer service, companies will continue to strip down their customer service resources to the absolute bare minimum.
For every Zappos example, there are hundreds of profit maximizing companies that flourish on minimal customer service.
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