Customer Service - From Promise to Performance

I travel frequently and often am challenged to choose "lunch" from a newsstand or dinner from a one-step-above-drive-thru chosen by business colleagues. Occasionally, I travel to very exotic places and always want to carry something I'm confident I can eat without risking a reaction. So, when a nutritionist told me about "You Bar", it seemed like a promising option.

I give "You Bar" high marks for customer service. The website is pretty simple and the user interface for ordering is self explanatory. You click on the items you want and the amounts you want. If you have questions or comments, you can put them in boxes right alongside the item(s) in question. And, there's a nutrition calculator button on the ordering page, so you can see exactly what the bar's nutritional content will be as you add or change each ingredient. You can name your personal product, making it easier to order again or differentiate among them if you're ordering multiples.

I thought all that was enough to constitute good customer service and I placed an order. As it turns out, that was only a hint of customer service to come. I don't know if this young company can keep it up as they grow, but they were amazing about sending emails to respond to my questions (I challenged them to stick to my ingredients but change the nutritional ratios) and trying to help. Even with sticky questions, the bars arrived much sooner than promised. Although I loved the long-lasting energy produced by my non-traditional no-sugars bar, it turned out I reacted to the particular protein I'd chosen. I sent You Bar an email and got back a fast response offering to replace them under their satisfaction guarantee. A couple of clarifying emails later, a new batch was promised and is on its way. And, they're expediting at no charge just to make sure I can take them on my trip to the Artic next week! That's great customer service.

It's a topsy-turvy world when it comes to customer service. I've written before about the subversive shifts in business/customer relationships. For example, I wrote about what it implies when a business stops calling a customer a customer and instead calls him a "guest." Social norms say customers are always right, but guests should be acommodating and grateful. I'd rather be a customer.

Today, I'm offering another report from upside-down world. This is the Alice in Wonderland world in which landlords agree to rent their property through a third party (broker) who holds auctions for the lease but won't tell the landlord what the winning rent bid is or what percentage of the rent the broker is charging as a fee. In addition, the landlords must agree that they won't share the statistical information they get from the broker that might provide insight into how their cut of the rent is being determined. They let the broker unilaterally determine how much money has to accrue in the landlord's account before the broker has to release the money to the landlord. And, last but not least, the broker doesn't have to retain that money in an interest bearing account for the landlord's benefit; the broker can invest the money and reap the benefit.

Perhaps it's just because I've been exposed to the laws that regulate real estate brokers for physical property that I find all this quite odd. These sorts of practices are generally not permitted in the United States if the real estate in question is physical real estate (real land, real buildings). But, it appears to be the norm in the Wild West of the internet. Owners of websites are owners of virtual real estate. Allowing other people to place ads on their website's pages is essentially granting an incredibly short-term lease (a fraction of a second to a few seconds). Why, then, are those landlords agreeing to rent through a broker who won't tell them what rent tenants will pay, are paying, or the size of the broker's cut? As I understand it, that's what Google Ad Sense does. Here's what they tell a landlord (a website owner considering renting out space through Ad Sense):

"How much do I get paid?
How much you earn depends on a number of factors including how much an advertiser bids on your site -- you'll receive a portion of what the advertiser pays. The best way to find out how much you'll earn is to sign up and start showing ads on your web pages."

(https://www.google.com/adsense/login/en_US/)

Google says nothing in particular about what they're earning or what the landlord will earn despite Google's significant influence over how many potential "tenants" bid on the lease and some of the best analytics around. Interestingly, Google goes even farther than not telling the landlord what they know; they prohibit others from providing some of the most telling information (see the confidentialy section of the terms & conditions).

Don't get me wrong. There are a lot of things I love about Google. I regularly use all their basic services - search, maps, map search, news, images - and some of their mobile services - .mobi, 411, my location, etc. Against my own best judgment, I even let them data mine my gmail account. I admire much about their technical prowess and even their hiring decisions -- they've hired two of my favorite people.

All the happy stuff said, I understand that Google makes the vast majority of its revenue from advertising. And, I understand why they'd want to use their dominant market position to take the highest advantage of both buyers and sellers. What I don't understand is why people let them.

Sometimes, something works so well we don't even see it.  I'm a regular traveler on Amtrak and it works pretty seamlessly. 

I make reservations on the web.  The reservations page is intuitive and easy to use.  If you buy your tickets online, you get an email with a link that makes it just as easy to cancel them if your plans change.

Amtrak is an early adopter of .mobi.  This means if you're in the taxi on the way to the station, you can get access to the Amtrak website (make reservations, check train status) specially built to fit in the tiny window of your phone.  Just type in www.Amtrak.mobi instead of www.Amtrak.com.

Amtrak was also an early adopter of the automated ticket kiosk in the station.  Unlike airports, you can arrive about 15 minutes before your train, pick up the ticket you bought in that taxi, and make your train.  Except for major holidays, there are enough kiosks around that there's never more than three people in line for one.  You can count on getting ticketed quickly.

Also unlike air travel, at least in the northeast corridor, the trains are almost always on time.  And, so far, they haven't had big increases in their fares.  There are power outlets, so you can plug in your laptop.  There aren't transmission restrictions, so you can use your phone or laptop air card.  And, of course, the stations are in the center of major cities, rather than 30 minutes or an hour's drive away.  When traveling between Washington, Philadelphia, New York, and Boston, I've given up flying altogether. 

Many thanks, Amtrak.

Just a short while ago, I wrote about the great job DreamHost had done in quickly self-identifying and correcting it's own billing error.  This week, I've got to take back a few of their gold stars. 

PROBLEM #1:

DreamHost is in the business of providing web hosting services, but last week it had delays and outages that make clear it shouldn't host stream-of-commerce businesses.  On the same day that I sent out announcements that I was making my new business site available for testing, it was essentially impossible to get to it.  It took more than five minutes for the homepage to load.  

The DreamHost team tried to help, but needed to have done a lot more.  Apparently, they knew that they had reached some scaling limits and had planned to spread the load in a new facility.  They ultimately sent a note to users that they were planning to have a twelve hour outage to address the problem. 

SOLUTIONS:

First and foremost, you can't be a webhost if you need to have twelve hour outages; they needed to have a backup or fail-over facility. 

Second, if you are having an emergency (both your operating and fail-over facility are hit by simultaneous tornados), you need to know exactly what the damage is.  DreamHost has a status page that was supposed to report system problems.  Prior to the scheduled expansion, it was reporting occasional serious system delays and outages.  However, more often than not, they were listed as resolved while a string of user-submitted comments indicated they were not or had been supplanted by new problems.  If you're posting notices to your customers and allowing them to write back, you need to read what they write, and hold a responsive dialogue.  Things would have gone more smoothly if DreamHost had replied to all the posted comments and explained why they weren't part of the same problem, how they were being addressed, etc.

PROBLEM #2:

While all of this mini-mayhem was going on, I discovered a problem unique to my site and went to pull the back-up copies of files.  They didn't seem to be there, so I sent a note to customer support and signed up for the enhanced call-back-by-phone support.  The new phone support required me to provide a number and a multi-hour preferred calling window.  Later in the day, I discovered that they had called while I was handling some other business responsibility.  The support person left a message that he had made the attempt to call and would now be sending me an email (with no opportunity for interaction).  No return number was offered nor any explanation for why not.  Needless to say, I don't consider that phone support and canceled the service. 

SOLUTION:

If DreamHost wants to offer fee paid phone support it's got to have a method that takes into account that the customer may not be free at the moment DreamHost decides to call.

ONE THING DONE RIGHT:

I'll give them credit for one thing.  When I canceled the phone support, they didn't whine, wheedle, or attempt to cajole.  They just politely informed me that they'd credit my charge card. 

This weekend, I was in a Circuit City store because I needed to buy an inexpensive mp3 player.  Similar to their competitors, the players were locked in a glass case.  The items neatly displayed with prices did not match the boxes I could see in the case and I wanted to find out the prices of what I suspected were the less expensive items.

While I was looking for help, a salesman came along with another customer.  He unlocked the case and pulled out a box for the customer.  I told him that I, too, wanted help in the case.  He asked me to wait a minute, locked the case, and walked away with the customer.   As he was returning to me, someone asked him for his set of keys and he gave them away.  He then turned to me, heard my question, and told me he had to get keys.  He again walked away.  When he returned with the keys and took out the boxes in question, they were not marked with a price.  He again walked away, ultimately returning to tell me the price of a Sansa 1MB player....$10 more than I had recently paid elsewhere.

On reflection, I realized that several things have changed.  My local Circuit City used to be big, but not big box size.  I used to shop in the old store frequently and almost always found the staff to be attentive and have strong technical knowledge about the products.  It's just reached my consciousness that since they've moved to the big box store, the model has changed.  Now, I'm often talking to sales persons who don't seem to be assigned to any particular part of the store and don't seem to know the products.  

And, the salesmen, like the one I encountered Saturday, don't appear to have much customer service training.  With the smallest amount of thought, the salesman would not have given up his keys while returning to meet me at a locked case.  In a perfect world, he would have let me state my question before walking away the first time...I might have had a simple yes/no question for which I wasn't willing to wait five minutes.  And, he would have had at least a rough idea of the cost of the items.

I see that Circuit City's sales are down and that this has been attributed to the downturn in the housing market, reduced consumer spending, and competition from Best Buy.  But, in my experience, Best Buy isn't consistently cheaper.  Could it be that the stiff competition arises from better trained customer service?

It's a busy day, but this fabulous email was too good not to post right away.  FYI, their email was perfect.  I redacted the personal information.

"Hi K Krasnow!

Ack. Through a COMPLETE bumbling on our part, we've accidentally attempted to charge you for the ENTIRE year of 2008 (and probably 2009!) ALREADY (it was all due to a fat finger)!

We're really really realllly embarassed about this, but you have nothing to worry about. Please ignore any confusing billing messages you may have received recently; we've already removed all those bum future charges on your account (#...) and already refunded the $... charge on your credit card.

You should get the money back on almost immediately, within a day or two max, and there's no need to contact your credit card company or bank for the refund.

Thank you very very much for your patience with this.. we PROMISE this won't happen again. There's no need to reply to this message unless of course you have any other questions at all!

Sincerely,
The Foolish DreamHost Billing Team!"

I've got so many nice things to say about jetBlue.

jetBlue Understands "Red-eye"

I've now flown cross-country with Jet Blue on a red-eye (an overnight flight) a few times. I'm not sure if it's company policy, but I've found the same things on each plane:

• no announcements between takeoff and the announcement to put up your seat back and tray table;
• a blanket and pillow on every seat;
• lights out; and
  
• a requirement that all the window shades be closed if we're flying into sunrise.

They advertise the leather seats and the legroom, but to me it's these extras that matter.

jetBlue knows how to apologize

When my flight had to stop for gas due to extreme headwinds, they didn't wait for me to complain. jetBlue sent me an email apologizing and including an e-coupon discounting my next purchase.

jetBlue knows how to show appreciation

jetBlue has a pretty simple rewards program. Each paid flight is worth a certain number of points (based on distance, I think). Earn 100 points, get a free flight. When I had earned 96 points at the end of the year, they didn't call me "gold" or "silver." They sent me an email offering the points to put me into a free flight.

jetBlue's employees are nice

I don't know how they pick or motivate employees, but all the employees I've dealt with are nice. I don't mean fake-y nice, I mean happy nice.

jetBlue is responsive

They've been so nice, I thought I'd mention a small suggestion when I was talking to the rep to book my free flight. I'd had to wait a bit to reach an operator and I suggested they consider giving customers the option of music or silence while on hold (something some other companies have done). She said she'd forward the comment, but that I could also submit the suggestion easily on their website. I did and today -- two days later and a SUNDAY -- I got an email thanking me for the suggestion. The email described my suggestion and responded in a way that made it clear it was a note written by a person.

jetBlue, keep up the good work!

Yesterday, I was doing a little networking over lunch and one of my two companions suggested we meet at Ted's Montana Grill on West 51st Street in New York.  This is part of a chain of restaurants co-owned by Ted Turner.  In fairness, the food was pretty good and he's got a very politically-correct green policy (paper straws, cloth napkins, etc).  But, I'll probably never go back. 

Problem:

My friend said that the place fills up fast at lunch time and suggested we go early.  I arrived at 11:38, seven minutes before our agreed time.  There were only two tables occupied but the hostess refused to seat me because the restaurant's policy is only to seat groups when everyone is present.

Part of this chain's marketing says it creates an "authentic Montana atmosphere" and brings the "spirit" of the West to cities around the country. Having spent two decades as a resident of the West, I've got to say they've missed the mark.

Solution:

Allow your employees to use a little common sense.  The restaurant has 200 seats and 194 of them were empty when I was refused a chair.    Even worse, the waiting area has room for about 15 people... on stairs.  Any employee with a little autonomy could have figured out that, at that moment in time, letting me sit was the better business decision.  From the short-term economic perspective, Ted's would have sold one more beverage -- the highest profit item in a restaurant -- than it did yesterday.  From the long term perspective, of course, they would have had a repeat customer and maybe hosted a group event for me.  So, loosen the reins a little and empower your employees to grow your good brand and your profits!