a thousand cuts :: adam cohen's blog

What an incredible cautionary tale Adam. This isn't as much a social media issue as it is the complete and utter disregard of customer loyalty. All one has to do is see that that is not your normal usage pattern…Appalling..

Interesting though Chuck. I'm not so sure social media will fix operational deficiencies ever – rather, operations will infuse the voice of the customer throughout, so that feedback through social channels is a fundamental part of a functioning business process. That requires operations to be rebuilt with social in mind (inside and outside the enterprise) – it's a big change. I'm already facing that at one client where business processes have been in place for 20+ years.

I think I spoke those exact words on the phone Marc. We debated my usage pattern over the prior 3 months and came up with an average daily rate. Even factoring out weekends, it was nowhere near what was somehow recorded those two days. The social media part of it was that social made it easier to communicate with customer service – that is leaps and bounds better than waiting on hold for minutes if not hours. But if it can't change the outcome it just isn't enough. Thanks for the commiserating!

[...] Shared No Amount of Social Media Overcomes Bad Customer Experience | a thousand cuts :: adam cohen’s…. [...]

Adam, thanks for sharing that horrible experience. What's most interesting to me is that this happened to a social media professional. It shouldn't make a difference…meaning, treat all customers right and focus on retention…but what a difference it makes as the story gets out.

I wouldn't expect businesses are savvy enough yet with CRM (as Craig points out) to on-the-fly be able to identify the level of influence someone has online. I also thing that can be misleading. Rather, I would think creating a positive, “wow” experience for each customer through a rational approach to resolving service issues would prevail. In this case it didn't, and they lost a long time customer and previous fan as a result. One day I'd love to pull the “Don't you know who I am?” card, but despite working in this industry that's way off

Thanks Craig, you make some great points. The roaming fees were international, do doubt. And I was willing to pay for upgraded plans (you can buy packages of 100MB-200MB at a time, around $100 for 100MB). But in this case, it was way over.

In terms of the recorded conversations – at no time was it disputed that I called in advance to change my voice, Blackberry data and broadband data plans. It was clear those were added to my account., but the safeguard wasn't anywhere close enough to cover what transpired.

Great thoughts on the future of social and tying to CRM. I have already started working with clients to infuse social in the CRM strategy, but the hardest part (so far) seems to be adjusting approaches with new inputs rather than a just a one-way communication plan. The level of influence is key, and most companies who run a help desk do have “elite” teams who handle the most sensitive customer situations. Not sure this qualified, or that AT&T's social media support team is structured as such yet. We'll see. Thanks again for the thoughts.

[...] No Amount of Social Media Overcomes Bad Customer Experience (a thousand cuts) [...]

I have been thinking about Social Marketing and Social tools for a while. Particularly as the use of these tools skyrockets. Does Social Marketing really make a company social, and by social, I mean, is the company taking advantage of interactions and communications beyond traditional hierarchical communications? I think marketers are pushing social communication and social design beyond the traditional marketing walls but we still have a long way to go before many companies can actually call themselves social. While this social corporation concept isn't new, the prolific use of it is and I believe we have a few years before many companies completely understand and embrace the value of being truly social.

I completely agree… and actually I think companies like AT&T are abusing my “expectations – really = satisfaction” rule. By getting into social innocuously by starting a Twitter account, a Facebook page, etc… they are creating the expectation that they are listening and they care. But if the operational processes have not kept up, they end up hitting a brick wall with customers even faster than they otherwise would and Adam's example of this is a great one.

The funny thing to watch is so many companies are jumping on the social bandwagon… which is sort of committing themselves to a path that leads to major disruption… and they don't even often realize it. I think there will be a lot of friction over the next 5-10 years as companies realize what they've gotten themselves into.

I like your point about the social bandwagon and unmanaged expectations. I think this could be the topic of another post – once companies start down the path it's hard to turn back. Customer expectations rise, employee expectations rise, and communities are connected and enabled in ways they weren't before and can't be ignored.

I completely agree… and actually I think companies like AT&T are abusing my “expectations – really = satisfaction” rule. By getting into social innocuously by starting a Twitter account, a Facebook page, etc… they are creating the expectation that they are listening and they care. But if the operational processes have not kept up, they end up hitting a brick wall with customers even faster than they otherwise would and Adam's example of this is a great one.

The funny thing to watch is so many companies are jumping on the social bandwagon… which is sort of committing themselves to a path that leads to major disruption… and they don't even often realize it. I think there will be a lot of friction over the next 5-10 years as companies realize what they've gotten themselves into.

I like your point about the social bandwagon and unmanaged expectations. I think this could be the topic of another post – once companies start down the path it's hard to turn back. Customer expectations rise, employee expectations rise, and communities are connected and enabled in ways they weren't before and can't be ignored.