And now a word from your customers...

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And now a word from your customers…

February 6th, 2008

All the talk of being transparent with customers—with being exactly what you tell your prospects you are, moles and all—resonates strongly with marketers. At least until it comes to the one area that makes them squirm.

That area is giving your customers a forum to talk about you.

Blogs. Customer forums. Social networks. After decades of being able to “control the message,” it scares the heck out of a lot of CEOs and marketing folk to give up that control to the customer. What sends shivers up their collective spines is the thought that some customer might actually say something negative about the company or the experience he/she had with it.

To this, we generally have two reactions. First, if you’re not confident the bulk of your customers will tell a good story about you, creating a blog is the least of your problems. And secondly, if customers have a bad story to tell, trust us, it’s being told somewhere. (Hopefully, not on a disgruntled former customer-created web site like DellHell.com.)

Monitoring what your customers are saying about you online is one of the best ways to find out how you’re living up to your value proposition.

It is true that when you open the honest lines of communication with customers, you’re bound to get some negative comments. Generally speaking, they tend to fall into one of two camps. Some unhappy customers are what are referred to as “trolls”—people who like to complain for no specific reason. (These are the postings that scare marketers.) While the posts of these customers can be difficult to swallow at times, keep in mind that most people who read them will see them as what they are—the vitriolic rants of some terminally unhappy people who don’t have a legitimate complaint, and as such will be dismissed by most readers as not serious. In fact, unwarranted criticism often causes other customers to spring to your defense. By and large, the best way to deal with trolls is to ignore them.

The other camp of complainers is one you really should pay attention to. They have hit some sort of snag with your product, service or organization and are bringing it to your attention. Often these can be remedied with some follow up, and an unhappy customer can be turned into a satisfied one.

Listening to these posts with an open ear can give you some invaluable information about problems you might have with product design, instructions, pricing, fulfillment, or customer service that, when addressed, will improve the customer experience for all customers. Remember, for every customer that contacts you with a complaint, at least 100 more have the same complaint, but never bother to contact you.

One more thought. Customers don’t expect you to be perfect, but they do expect you to be responsive. By Ignoring what customers are saying about you, you run the risk of running head-long into your own “Dell Hell.” What many companies have found is that once you demonstrate to customers that you are interested in all their comments, not just the pre-edited positive ones, they will be open and honest with you in a productive way, to serve in a sense as “co-creators” and work with you to improve your products, services and experiences.

So what are customers saying about you now? An easy way to get a quick overview would be to go on icerocket.com (or some other blog monitors) and enter your company or product names. Then you’ll get a reference of postings on major blogs that mention you. It’s free, and it will give you the opportunity to see what your customers say when you’re not in the room.