Responsive customer service is a hard find wherever you look these days it would seem, however, I choose to discuss the software/internet/search engine business and their approach to customer service. Due to a complete lack of customer service I no longer do business with Symantec. I was a good customer for years and they made a lot of money off of me. I had bought a new laptop and did a couple re-formats on old machines and they said my suite of software could not be reloaded again. I looked for a way to communicate with them so they would have the opportunity to do right by a loyal customer. Finally, I gave up, and the thing is there are many options available, and I have tried a couple I am happy with, like Kapersky, and there is no reason to ever go back. In a competitive business like theirs this is very, very stupid because I influence others as well.
Google lately has surprised me with their approach to communicating with them; try to do so, I dare you! I had an idea to make their products better and really there is no way to even get a hold of them. One commenter (James Gecko), on a blog comment wrote I could go to a “feedback forum”, yes I suppose I could James. IMHO, telling your customers to go post on a forum is the equivalent to telling them to fuck off, because you are too busy to help them. Let’s say I was in a line at a customer help desk and I finally get up to ask a question and the clerk says “Geez can’t you ask a simple question like that to someone ELSE in line”! That is equivalent to a “help forum” as far as I am concerned.
So to start some semblance of service the customer has to have an open, very easy to find line of communication available. Alan Hogan talks about the arrogance of Google in this post http://alanhogan.com/arrogance-of-google . Sure Google has a monopoly at the moment, they have about 85% of the search engine market, and that is a monopoly in my book. Basically the customer service issue is this: just try and contact them, see if it is even possible. I wrote this post “Google are you there”?http://425talker.blogspot.com/search?q=google to voice my frustration, I couldn’t get through the “cone of arrogance”.
I started to think to myself are Microsoft and Yahoo just as elusive to contact as Google? So I decided to run a test. It would be to go to the home page and count the clicks to “feedback”, or maybe “contact us”. Simple enough right?
At Microsoft.com, “contact us” was on the home page; three clicks later are phone numbers, e-mail customer service, and mailing addresses.
At Yahoo.com “send feedback” is on the home page.
http://www.bing.com/ has “feedback” right on the home page.
http://www.ask.com/ has two clicks to get contact info.
So, really Google you are in left field as far as any customer service gestures go. It is not so much you hear but you don’t listen to customers, (to read an analysis of the difference try this post by Lisa Hoesel http://conversationalchaos.blogspot.com/2009/07/are-we-hearing-or-merely-listening-to.html ), you allow your customers no chance to be heard in the first place. I am sure your many young billionaires are quite pleased with their new found purchasing power and it is hard to be humble. Competition can come quickly though as http://www.myspace.com/ has found out.
When Bing debuted I remarked I hoped it would be a success because Google really needs some competition, to light a fire under their complacent asses. I encourage everyone to spread the love around a bit in the search engine department. If they have no customer service now, imagine what it will be like with their new Operating System!
Google lately has surprised me with their approach to communicating with them; try to do so, I dare you! I had an idea to make their products better and really there is no way to even get a hold of them. One commenter (James Gecko), on a blog comment wrote I could go to a “feedback forum”, yes I suppose I could James. IMHO, telling your customers to go post on a forum is the equivalent to telling them to fuck off, because you are too busy to help them. Let’s say I was in a line at a customer help desk and I finally get up to ask a question and the clerk says “Geez can’t you ask a simple question like that to someone ELSE in line”! That is equivalent to a “help forum” as far as I am concerned.
So to start some semblance of service the customer has to have an open, very easy to find line of communication available. Alan Hogan talks about the arrogance of Google in this post http://alanhogan.com/arrogance-of-google . Sure Google has a monopoly at the moment, they have about 85% of the search engine market, and that is a monopoly in my book. Basically the customer service issue is this: just try and contact them, see if it is even possible. I wrote this post “Google are you there”?http://425talker.blogspot.com/search?q=google to voice my frustration, I couldn’t get through the “cone of arrogance”.
I started to think to myself are Microsoft and Yahoo just as elusive to contact as Google? So I decided to run a test. It would be to go to the home page and count the clicks to “feedback”, or maybe “contact us”. Simple enough right?
At Microsoft.com, “contact us” was on the home page; three clicks later are phone numbers, e-mail customer service, and mailing addresses.
At Yahoo.com “send feedback” is on the home page.
http://www.bing.com/ has “feedback” right on the home page.
http://www.ask.com/ has two clicks to get contact info.
So, really Google you are in left field as far as any customer service gestures go. It is not so much you hear but you don’t listen to customers, (to read an analysis of the difference try this post by Lisa Hoesel http://conversationalchaos.blogspot.com/2009/07/are-we-hearing-or-merely-listening-to.html ), you allow your customers no chance to be heard in the first place. I am sure your many young billionaires are quite pleased with their new found purchasing power and it is hard to be humble. Competition can come quickly though as http://www.myspace.com/ has found out.
When Bing debuted I remarked I hoped it would be a success because Google really needs some competition, to light a fire under their complacent asses. I encourage everyone to spread the love around a bit in the search engine department. If they have no customer service now, imagine what it will be like with their new Operating System!
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