Consumer Passion

Your Telecom Provider Feels Your Pain

Interesting article in the Washington Post today, "An Outbreak of Caring" (subtitle:  Stung By Complaints, Telecoms Stress Customer Service).  It spotlights Tom Maguire, Verizon's new Customer Care 'Czar', hired last November to tackle the ever present irritant that everyone who lives and breathes in this great country experiences:  crappy telecom customer service.

The article leads with a blurb about Maguire being "one tough customer" himself:

When served chicken tacos without the chicken recently, he first complained to his waitress, then went online to the restaurant's Web site to fill out a survey with scathing remarks about his experience.  That accept-no-excuses attitude serves Maguire well when dealing with his own customers.  The straight-talking Long Island native knows how enraging poor service can be.  He understands that perfect service is difficult to achieve.  And he grasps how important it is that companies hear about it when they fall short.

OK, so he feels our pain, and has a no-excuses attitude, following up on his in-person complaints with a visit to offending business's websites.  Good for him.  But how does he feel about automated voice prompts?  And call center reps in India who you have to ask to repeat themselves several times?   Does he ever have to navigate the customer service maze telecom consumers endure? 

The article points to service bundling as part of the problem.  It saves consumers a little money (I'm a Verizon bundler), but complicates the heck out of billing, and heaven forbid you have an issue or question with more than one service at a time, because each separate service has a separate customer service team, which means you'll be transferred from person to person - across continents - adding time and frustration to an already frustrating situation. 

According to the article, Maguire oversees 131 call centers from Laurel, Maryland to Bangalore, India,  (I'd love to know how many are in India) some 46,000 employees handling customer service issues.  In addition, there's an elite 'escalation team' of 90 that engages customers that've either blown a gasket or figured out how to get through to top executives via phone or e-mail.   No doubt the Consumerist blog is responsible for many of the tips on bypassing automated prompts and foreign call centers.

I'm not writing this to rip on Verizon.  The whole industry is built on a philosphy that strives to eliminate customer service costs, as opposed to elevate customer service itself.  Creating Passionate Consumers seems like the furthest thing from telecom minds.  But the Post article says execs like Maguire are trying to change things.  Maguire has created a "tiered system" at Verizon, where his call centers act like "medical triage" to handle normal issues.  Complaints from Triple Play customers (Fios TV, Internet and phone ... big bucks consumers) go to a team of "personal account handlers in Florida".  Ahh ... Florida, where I assume the reps can speak English clearly.  So the average customer is sent to Bangalore, while the Fios customer gets someone in Ft Lauderdale.  Customers frothing at the mouth get sent to the escalation team, because as Maguire says ... "what you don't want them to do is leave or write up a blog or something."  Translation:  please don't rip us on the Consumerist (or perhaps Consumer Passion ... if only my readership were as large). 

If only the consumer was priority number one with telecoms, then those wonderful and innovative smart phones (iPhones, Nokia N95s, Blackberry Pearls) would be attached to service providers that are equally committed to to the task of creating Passionate Consumers.  I hope Mr. Maguire is committed to just that. 

Nokia and Spike Lee want Your CGC

USA Today has the story (from Monday's edition).  The launch part was last Thursday, in New York, spotlighting a new collaboration between moviemaker Spike Lee and Nokia, fueled by the creative passion of consumers.  In an effort to "connect with consumers" according to Craig Coffey, Nokia VP Marketing, N. America, would-be collaborators can upload original text, images, music or video at Nokiaproductions.com.

I went to the site, and here are the basics:

Spike Lee has been given the greenlight on his latest project, a collaborative film where the content you create with your mobile phone determines his final cut. He needs your work to make it happen.   Here’s the assignment:

Humanity is our central theme. Think about its meaning and how music tells our story. Over the course of production, there will be three Acts for you to interpret.

Shoot a photo or video that reflects the Act.

Produce a soundtrack to enhance someone’s Act.

Text in ideas for others to go out and film.

Upload your work and if you want, edit in other people’s submissions to create a full Act.

Vote for your favorite Acts. The winners will appear in the next Spike Lee Joint.

The whole thing is centered around the mobile phone.  Lee in his blog at NokiaProductions.com talks about how he thinks within five years, we'll be buying a ticket to see a feature length film that was created on a mobile device.  Probably something like my Nokia N95, which can stream live video to the web (via Qik.com, Kyte.tv and other platforms).  This first effort will accept consumer generated content through August 21st.  Lee will then produce a 9-12 minute film from the CGC (consumer generated content), to be shown this fall at the yet-to-open Club Nokia Auditorium in Los Angeles.  It's a cutting edge and creative idea and endeavor.  Only 200 people have signed up on the site so far, and the content I've checked out is minimally impressive so far.  I'll be checking back to see how this progresses. 

Note to Marvel: Relationship with Techcrunch Readers on Fire ... Here's How to Put it Out

It's a fast-moving blogosphere fire... a case of Old Media vs New Media ... with former lawyer and uber blogger Michael Arrington and his horde of Techcrunch readers (I'm an avid reader) pitted against Marvel Entertainment, guardian of the hotly anticipated "make it a large tub of popcorn" Iron Man movie.

Arrington invited his readers to join him for a pre-release screening of the movie, tomorrow, at the AMC Metreon in San Francisco.  He purchased all 600 seats - bascially a big giveaway -instructing those interested to reserve a seat by getting tickets at Eventbrite for a dollar, with the goal of minimizing no-shows.  Understandably, interest was immediate and fierce, and tickets were snapped up in a flash. 

Fast-forward a few hours, and Arrington receives a cease and desist order from a Marvel lawyer - a lawyer who I doubt was ready for the tar and feathering he's receiving in the blog comment thread.  Marvel claims the showing is unauthorized, even though Arrington contacted the group sales phone number on the official Iron Man movie site.  So it looks like Arrington tried to play by the rules.  Perhaps his 're-sell' of tickets for a dollar (no profit motive save for publicity) broke some 'small print' rules.  But Marvel is making a classic PR blunder.  It can be fixed ... but this is 2008.  Techcrunch is not your average blog, and its readers are not average consumers.  Rather, they are, on average, Innovators and Early Adopters ... the leading edge of the Rogers Adopter Curve.  So when a piece of hot news breaks, it doesn't just break on Techcrunch, with its 700,000-plus RSS subscribers ... it also fans out like a wind-aided forest fire via aggregators like Techmeme (this story is moving up the Tememe leaderboard fast as I type), and microblogging sites like Twitter and Friendfeed.  And when you have people like Robert Scoble, who with one simple Tweet can let 20,000 people know that something is amiss in Techcrunch land, then if you're in the PR department at Marvel, you better have your A game ready, 24/7.   

So what do you do if you're Marvel?  Well, hopefully you're well aware of the firestorm that's out there, and whether you think it's justified or not doesn't matter.  It's there, and you have to react to it.  A PR disaster can be turned into a PR victory if handled creatively, quickly, and with the focus on creating Passionate Consumers.

So even if the Techcrunch pre-screen Iron Man movie bash somehow broke the letter of some law in someone's opinion ... there are 600 extremely disappointed fans - potential movie fans - who are wondering what you (Marvel) are going to do to make this right.  And there are thousands and thousands more beyond the ticket holders who planned on seeing this anticipated movie, who are wondering what your next move will be.  And there are tens of thousands of bloggers, blog readers, Tweeter, geeks and fanboys and girls who are wondering if you (Marvel) are going to simply send out stupid cease and desist letters, via some young lawyer, on the eve of an event that bazillions of people are and will be talking about on the blogosphere. 

If you handle this correctly, and 'wow' Techcrunch and its readers and the blogosphere that spreads out like a spider web from it ... then you will turn a PR debacle into a lesson on how to turn fire breathing consumers into evangelists for your company and its products.  So do whatever it takes.  Send a second letter, apologizing for the misunderstanding.  Send some Marvel people to the event, with freebies to give to all the readers who show up.  Heck, send Robert Downey Jr. to the showing, and have him wear a Techcrunch T-shirt that says "hey, we've all screwed up" on the back.  Have a sense of humor, humility, creative marketing ... and understand that as fast as negative publicity can spread in this New Media age ... positive vibes can spread just (well, almost) as fast.

----- UPDATE 4/30 -------

Green light for tonight's show.  Arrington says Marvel has backed off its strong-arm tactics, claiming the ballyhoo was started by Oracle, the movie's promoter.  Something about a possible conflict with another screening, blah blah blah.  Arrington says he's accepted an apology from Ira Rubenstein, who's been behind the Executive VP desk of Marvel's brand new Global Digital Media Group for all of one week now.  Good test for Mr. Rubenstein, to put out a fairly major blogosphere fire.  Looks like Arrington's ire is now directed at Oracle, but I say Marvel still needs to go one step further.  Free schwag at tonight's event, some free tickets (1000 maybe?) to give away to Techcrunch readers in the next couple of weeks ... something to show he understands and 'gets' new media, and the new consumer.  Time to turn them into Passionate Consumers Mr. Rubenstein ... it's a drop in the bucket for your company, and you'll get scads of free - and positive - PR. 

Chick-fil-A founder honored at White House

From Tuesday's press release:

Chick-fil-A founder and long-time philanthropist S. Truett Cathy was honored for his commitment to serving others during a visit to Washington, D.C., earlier today. Cathy's full day of activities in Washington, D.C., was highlighted by his receipt of a special President's Volunteer Service Award, called the President's Call to Service Award, presented to those who have dedicated more than 4,000 hours of volunteer service over a lifetime.

The occasion today marked the first time that a President's Volunteer Service Award has been presented to a recipient in the Oval Office.  Cathy received his award this afternoon in the Oval Office after a brief meeting with President Bush and Jay Hein, Deputy Assistant to the President and Director of the Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives.

Cathy has spent 62 years in the restaurant industry and recently celebrated the 40th anniversary of the Atlanta-based Chick-fil-A chain he started in 1967.  His desire to serve others extends beyond the customers of his 1,380 restaurants throughout the U.S. For nearly half a century, he has taught Sunday school to 13-year-old boys, and in 1984 he founded the WinShape Foundation, dedicated to shaping individuals to be winners through nurturing and encouragement of young people.  He has logged countless hours of volunteer time for a host of endeavors, and the 6,900 hours logged between his Sunday school class, speaking engagements and WinShape were more than enough to merit the President's Call to Service Award.

What's Cathy and Chick-fil-A's 'secret sauce'?  Read my previous post titled The Chick-fil-A Way.

Cheerios Kicks off next Spoonful of Stories Children's Book Contest

The second Spoonful of Stories contest is officially underway, and Cheerios is inviting would-be authors to submit children's book manuscripts from now until July 15th.  Book entries should aim for the 4-8 year old market.  Cash prizes will go to up to three winners, with the top writer getting his/her book evaluated by  Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing for a potential book deal.

Last year, Cheerios received close to 1,000 entries, with Nashville's Shellie Braeuner named the grand prize winner.  In addition to her $5,000 prize, Braeuner snagged a book deal.  Her winning story, The Great Dog Wash, will be printed and available in Cheerios boxes in the spring of 2009.  A hardcover version will hit bookshelves in the summer of 2009.  If you're interested, go to Spoonfulofstoriescontest.com for full details and contest rules.

43rd Pillsbury Bake-Off Contest Grand Prize Winner Nets Cool Million

Carolyn Gurtz of Gaithersburg, Maryland apparently bakes a mean batch of cookies.  Double Delight Peanut Butter cookies to be exact, crisp on the outside, soft in the center ... and tasty enough to put Gurtz atop the other 99 finalists in Pillsbury's 43rd Bake-Off contest (first was in 1949). 

Gurtz was crowned the grand prize winner Tuesday in a ceremony at the Fairmont Hotel in Dallas, Texas.  Judges sampled various baked goods whipped up by the 100 finalists on Monday, and final judging took place yesterday.  Gurtz's total take:  $1,005,000 plus a GE Profile Double Oven.  The additional five grand came from a Jif Peanut Butter Award.

According to a Style article in today's Washington Post, Gurtz has submitted entires in the Pillsbury contest for 15 years.  Her Fiesta Pie, Devil Delight Bites and Very Berry Muffins paved the way for this year's peanut butter cookie smash hit.  The Post attributes the big win to Gurtz, a homemaker, "thinking like a marketer" as well as a chef.  In addition to "reliability" (every time you make them, claims Gurtz, they come out the same), the cookies were chock full of products made by sponsors of the contest:  Pillsbury cookie dough, Jif peanut butter, FIsher peanuts, and both Domino and C&H sugar.  Smart cookie, that Mrs. Gurtz.