I was pretty intrigued by the zune issue that popped up today, so I thought I'd go look at the posts from the people who actually had the problem. One thing I discovered right away was that the overwhelming majority of them said something to the effect of 'I've never had a problem with my Zune before' - this is fantastic! I've never seen such a thing. Normally when something catastrophic happens to hardware, readers are rewarded with a litany of every issue the user has ever had with their device.
My opinion? This is the best advertising Microsoft could get (for weirdos like me who read help forums).
I'm seriously thinking of getting one of these. Think about it - it's the 2006 model that had the issue, and here it is 2009 and most of the people are saying they've NEVER had an issue with it - nice
B
Thursday, January 1, 2009
Friday, July 4, 2008
Customer Service - When Have You Created "Quality"
I often struggle with what the heck customer service really is. I've seen so many forms and flavors and I don't really feel that any of them left me feeling all that "serviced". Over the years I've tried many different philosophies on this and I'm starting to think I knew the answer all along.
In my early years I worked for my dad quite a bit. He owned a locksmithing business here in town and it was a great gig going through college because he would let me tailor my hours around school. Of course we had the regular dad/son fights and what-not, but overall I think it was a pretty sweet deal (for me anyway). One thing I used to laugh about was my dad's abuse of the customers. He truly had no compunctions about telling a customer to stop 'hanging over his shoulder' while he was working, or to "stop whining" when they complained about a price. He was basically an old hard-ass. But all that not withstanding, my dad TRULY believed in customer service - well, his brand of (old school) customer service anyway.
My dad believed in the following 3 anchors of customer service:
Fast Service
Affordable Prices
Quality Work
He never articulated this, but it was VERY clear that these were the three things he valued most - because if you violated any of these three core tenets, you could expect a vitriolic tongue-lashing in your next encounter. I've been on the receiving end of a few of these and I've spectated a few directed at the other guys that worked for him at the shop.
Notice that nowhere in that list is "the customer is always right" or "always be kind to the customer". Don't misunderstand - he was not abusive to customers, he was just very no-nonsense when dealing with them. He took complaints very seriously, was courteous on the phone, and tried his best to be professional. He just didn't believe that you could replace fast, affordable, quality work with lip service.
I'm starting to gain a new respect for his philosophy as I deal with many of the companies that I depend on for my business. I find the following to be their strategy:
Be Kind
Paraphrase the problem to the customer so they know you understand
Empathise ("I know this is frustrating, and we will take care of it")
Promise resolution ("we will take care of this for you today")
Be Kind
Notice nowhere in that list do we see any indication that the problem will actually be corrected, or that that they truly have an understanding of the underlying cause of the problem. This is the 'new deal' warm and fuzzy customer service. They have replaced qualified support folks with people who can 'be nice' at all costs.
I think I've come to understand that there must be a mix somewhere in between these two disparate philosophies. I think the old man had it esentially right though - his customers didn't always consider him their best friend, but they kept coming back because he kept true to "real" quality.
Remembering Norman 'Norm' Sterzenbach 9/14/1922 - 2/23/2007
In my early years I worked for my dad quite a bit. He owned a locksmithing business here in town and it was a great gig going through college because he would let me tailor my hours around school. Of course we had the regular dad/son fights and what-not, but overall I think it was a pretty sweet deal (for me anyway). One thing I used to laugh about was my dad's abuse of the customers. He truly had no compunctions about telling a customer to stop 'hanging over his shoulder' while he was working, or to "stop whining" when they complained about a price. He was basically an old hard-ass. But all that not withstanding, my dad TRULY believed in customer service - well, his brand of (old school) customer service anyway.
My dad believed in the following 3 anchors of customer service:
Fast Service
Affordable Prices
Quality Work
He never articulated this, but it was VERY clear that these were the three things he valued most - because if you violated any of these three core tenets, you could expect a vitriolic tongue-lashing in your next encounter. I've been on the receiving end of a few of these and I've spectated a few directed at the other guys that worked for him at the shop.
Notice that nowhere in that list is "the customer is always right" or "always be kind to the customer". Don't misunderstand - he was not abusive to customers, he was just very no-nonsense when dealing with them. He took complaints very seriously, was courteous on the phone, and tried his best to be professional. He just didn't believe that you could replace fast, affordable, quality work with lip service.
I'm starting to gain a new respect for his philosophy as I deal with many of the companies that I depend on for my business. I find the following to be their strategy:
Be Kind
Paraphrase the problem to the customer so they know you understand
Empathise ("I know this is frustrating, and we will take care of it")
Promise resolution ("we will take care of this for you today")
Be Kind
Notice nowhere in that list do we see any indication that the problem will actually be corrected, or that that they truly have an understanding of the underlying cause of the problem. This is the 'new deal' warm and fuzzy customer service. They have replaced qualified support folks with people who can 'be nice' at all costs.
I think I've come to understand that there must be a mix somewhere in between these two disparate philosophies. I think the old man had it esentially right though - his customers didn't always consider him their best friend, but they kept coming back because he kept true to "real" quality.
Remembering Norman 'Norm' Sterzenbach 9/14/1922 - 2/23/2007
Saturday, March 29, 2008
It's Not Easy to Ask Why..Why is That?
One of the principles I try to encourage my folks here at Oxiem to adopt is the concept of 'the persistent why'. It's easy to ask why once. For example, I was working with an SEO client and he informed me that he needed to be ranking for 3 specific keywords. I asked why. He said - they are the most important to my industry. It would have been very easy to stop there and say 'OK, makes sense' but it was more important to discover how he arrived at his conclusion. This is the second why.
Bill: WHY are these keywords important to your industry?
Client: Because this is what my customers search on when looking for my service.
Bill: How do you know that?
Client: Experience
Bill: Excellent - this may save us some learning - what data did you use to arrive at this? We can simply leverage this data instead of going through the exercize all over again.
Client: My gut, and in talking to customers.
Bill: Oh.
This began a long conversation about the importance of real data. I told the client that our research may in fact bear out his assumptions, but without data, we'd be opening ourselves up to much potential wheel-spinning. He did not like this, but in the end it turned out to be VERY beneficial for his success.
The point is, asking the second, third, and beyond whys are what makes us valuable to our clients. Many of them are not accustomed to being asked why, and some even bristle, but ultimately, this is why they hire us.
Bill: WHY are these keywords important to your industry?
Client: Because this is what my customers search on when looking for my service.
Bill: How do you know that?
Client: Experience
Bill: Excellent - this may save us some learning - what data did you use to arrive at this? We can simply leverage this data instead of going through the exercize all over again.
Client: My gut, and in talking to customers.
Bill: Oh.
This began a long conversation about the importance of real data. I told the client that our research may in fact bear out his assumptions, but without data, we'd be opening ourselves up to much potential wheel-spinning. He did not like this, but in the end it turned out to be VERY beneficial for his success.
The point is, asking the second, third, and beyond whys are what makes us valuable to our clients. Many of them are not accustomed to being asked why, and some even bristle, but ultimately, this is why they hire us.
Sunday, March 16, 2008
Lack of Scope - Common Responses
Lack of Scope - a project killer for sure..projects with no finite definition of 'are we there yet?' and clients with little patience for being 'pinned down' to a set of deliverables. You WILL have these clients from time to time, and they are most certainly manageable - in fact they can be quite profitable clients in many cases, they just take a different style of management. In my years of managing technology projects, I've discovered that there are some fairly classifiable reactions to lack of scope.
The responses to lack of scope run a wild arc from doing surprising little for the money to packing so much into a project it becomes unusable. Many experienced firms will see lack of scope as a great money-maker as they will promise little and give even less. The client doesn't know what they need, so they never know if they received any value. If they dare complain to the development firm, they will be met with 'We gave you what we promised'. Note this is a far toss from 'We gave you what you needed'. Inexperienced architects tend to 'overgive' - they feel that if they 'just do more' the client will love the end result. The problem with this thinking is that it's usually NEVER enough of the right stuff and WAY too much of the wrong stuff. The client wants a shopping cart with 'all the bells and whistles' so the provider creates a shopping cart with 30 different kinds of discounting methods, but no wishlist or forward-to-friend functionality, so in the end it's discovered that the client really meant that he wanted more 'social' functionality and less 'pricing' functionality and the client is disappointed. Here it's a case of 'we did our very best' - but we all know that this is a slipperly benchmark at best. The client creates these situations as it's sort of a 'I'll tell you when you guess it' approach to project management, and it can be tricky. These clients aren't evil and they aren't stupid, the're just busy. The good news is that I've discovered something..if you know what you're doing you can usually strike a really nice balance for the client with very little input.
The reason an experienced (and introspective) manager can find the sweet spot so easily is because they have done so damn many of these types of projects (whatever type it is) and they 'just know' what needs to be in there. Also, you learn to read a client, their culture, and past projects they have commissioned and you get a feel for what rings their bell. With the understanding of 'what just works', some knowledge of the clients psyche, and a little patience, you can give the client something that is in their budget, satifies their wish to get some value out of their investment, and most importantly, actually creates a positive result for the client.
The responses to lack of scope run a wild arc from doing surprising little for the money to packing so much into a project it becomes unusable. Many experienced firms will see lack of scope as a great money-maker as they will promise little and give even less. The client doesn't know what they need, so they never know if they received any value. If they dare complain to the development firm, they will be met with 'We gave you what we promised'. Note this is a far toss from 'We gave you what you needed'. Inexperienced architects tend to 'overgive' - they feel that if they 'just do more' the client will love the end result. The problem with this thinking is that it's usually NEVER enough of the right stuff and WAY too much of the wrong stuff. The client wants a shopping cart with 'all the bells and whistles' so the provider creates a shopping cart with 30 different kinds of discounting methods, but no wishlist or forward-to-friend functionality, so in the end it's discovered that the client really meant that he wanted more 'social' functionality and less 'pricing' functionality and the client is disappointed. Here it's a case of 'we did our very best' - but we all know that this is a slipperly benchmark at best. The client creates these situations as it's sort of a 'I'll tell you when you guess it' approach to project management, and it can be tricky. These clients aren't evil and they aren't stupid, the're just busy. The good news is that I've discovered something..if you know what you're doing you can usually strike a really nice balance for the client with very little input.
The reason an experienced (and introspective) manager can find the sweet spot so easily is because they have done so damn many of these types of projects (whatever type it is) and they 'just know' what needs to be in there. Also, you learn to read a client, their culture, and past projects they have commissioned and you get a feel for what rings their bell. With the understanding of 'what just works', some knowledge of the clients psyche, and a little patience, you can give the client something that is in their budget, satifies their wish to get some value out of their investment, and most importantly, actually creates a positive result for the client.
Sunday, February 17, 2008
Pull Handles on Push Doors
Crazy thing happened to me last week. I was giving one our our associates a 20 minute diatribe on usability, mentioning that people don't need options, they need clear, simple objectives on pages and on and on. At the end of my brilliant monologue, I needed to take a bathroom break (the same coffee that inspired my brilliance inspired the need to break). As I approached the bathroom door, I noticed a guy going in before me. He approached the door and pulled on the handle - but it's a push door. The problem was that they put a 'universal' handle on the door, and this confused the man. It's not that the guy was stupid, it's just that he didn't want to take the time to figure out the door - he assumed the interface would make it clear as to what was expected of him. This is what I was explaining to my work associate - I was telling him that you must police the development of systems to obey Einsteins basic rule:
"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler."
This seems like a cute and clever saying, but it truly has great meaning. The application to webpage design is critical because it's so easy to try and be everything to everybody. Many clients want lots of shortcuts, lots of options and many many features. This is a noble goal, but the problem is many users will be confused by too many options. Equally dangerous is the desire to make an interface ridiculously simple, thus shutting out savvy users who would be insulted by an overly simplified interface.
Einstein had it right, and little has emerged to refute this.
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Crazy People Sure Write Small
Have you ever seen a crazy dude with a sign? Have you ever seen some nutty rant on the side of some farmhouse about the evils of a fiat financial system or some other such nutcase blather? Did you notice something they have in common?
They always use really tiny writing.
It's infuriating! I mean, HONESTLY - if you're going to stand on the corner and 'expose' some hidden evil, shouldn't I be able to ACTUALLY READ IT?? Seriously, what's the point?
I've given this much thought and it finally came to me. These people are nuts. They write tiny because they are nuts. But more importantly they are zealous. No, more importantly they are nuts, but as a semi-interesting side-note they are zealots. The reason these fruitcakes write so tiny is because they have SO MUCH TO SAY. They couldn't possibly imagine putting a large 4 sentence statement out there and building on it over time. They fail to comprehend the value of the understated.
This reminds me of a very common type of marketing client. The small-business client. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE marketing for small business folks - they are fast on their feet, unfettered by organizational nonsense, and generally appreciative of good work. It's just that they are so very INTENSE about their products and services..
Here is what I'm saying..the small business person LOVES what they do. They feel that they do it best, they feel that they offer a level of quality and service that is unparalleled, and they are generally right. How this becomes a problem is that they want to CONVEY this to the customer in every piece of marketing they do. This goes back to the small writing thing..invariably, when we create ad copy, there is always a request to 'add' copy. It's because they believe in their service and want the customer to know about it. The thing is, a good marketer can do this in 12 words of copy.
One example - from a friend of mine who was doing some marketing for a local technology company - he was just spitballing when he said 'Instant Support from Someone Whose Name Really Is 'Bob'". This headline was never used, and clearly would need some tweaking, but the concept really fits this discussion. The headline replaces the following paragraph of text:
All of that summed up in one cute headline. Most importantly though, it strikes to the heart of the issue - people are frustrated at being relegated to a third-party tech support person reading a script on another contintent. They want to speak with someone who is from their hemisphere that speaks their language. Not that there is anything wrong with using a third-party to provide support - it's just that this model has been so poorly deployed and abused that it carries with it the perception of complete frustration and pointlessness.
They always use really tiny writing.
It's infuriating! I mean, HONESTLY - if you're going to stand on the corner and 'expose' some hidden evil, shouldn't I be able to ACTUALLY READ IT?? Seriously, what's the point?
I've given this much thought and it finally came to me. These people are nuts. They write tiny because they are nuts. But more importantly they are zealous. No, more importantly they are nuts, but as a semi-interesting side-note they are zealots. The reason these fruitcakes write so tiny is because they have SO MUCH TO SAY. They couldn't possibly imagine putting a large 4 sentence statement out there and building on it over time. They fail to comprehend the value of the understated.
This reminds me of a very common type of marketing client. The small-business client. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE marketing for small business folks - they are fast on their feet, unfettered by organizational nonsense, and generally appreciative of good work. It's just that they are so very INTENSE about their products and services..
Here is what I'm saying..the small business person LOVES what they do. They feel that they do it best, they feel that they offer a level of quality and service that is unparalleled, and they are generally right. How this becomes a problem is that they want to CONVEY this to the customer in every piece of marketing they do. This goes back to the small writing thing..invariably, when we create ad copy, there is always a request to 'add' copy. It's because they believe in their service and want the customer to know about it. The thing is, a good marketer can do this in 12 words of copy.
One example - from a friend of mine who was doing some marketing for a local technology company - he was just spitballing when he said 'Instant Support from Someone Whose Name Really Is 'Bob'". This headline was never used, and clearly would need some tweaking, but the concept really fits this discussion. The headline replaces the following paragraph of text:
We provide support for all of our products and services. Our company offers
technical support that is fast and local. When you call our office, you will
reach a native english speaking tech support person.
All of that summed up in one cute headline. Most importantly though, it strikes to the heart of the issue - people are frustrated at being relegated to a third-party tech support person reading a script on another contintent. They want to speak with someone who is from their hemisphere that speaks their language. Not that there is anything wrong with using a third-party to provide support - it's just that this model has been so poorly deployed and abused that it carries with it the perception of complete frustration and pointlessness.
Thursday, January 3, 2008
India - How COULD you??!!....!!
Well..here we have it folks. India's tourism folks have decided to stop accepting the dollar.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,319807,00.html
My question is, why did they EVER accept the dollar? We don't take THEIR currency at our great tourism spots. I understand that many countries take our currency because we are such a financing force for their tourism markets, but it's OK if we have to exchange to trade. For example, I don't recall the heritage museum in Springfield offering rupees as an accepted currency for the non-compulsory donation box..
I think this is just an example of the media say Nyeah Nyeah Oh how the mighty have fallen..etc. etc. ad nauseum..
My take? Who CARES if India's tourism attractions don't take the dollar?
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,319807,00.html
My question is, why did they EVER accept the dollar? We don't take THEIR currency at our great tourism spots. I understand that many countries take our currency because we are such a financing force for their tourism markets, but it's OK if we have to exchange to trade. For example, I don't recall the heritage museum in Springfield offering rupees as an accepted currency for the non-compulsory donation box..
I think this is just an example of the media say Nyeah Nyeah Oh how the mighty have fallen..etc. etc. ad nauseum..
My take? Who CARES if India's tourism attractions don't take the dollar?
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