Engage or go away

March 23, 2010

twitterOver the past 15 months I’ve been on Twitter, I have contacted dozens of businesses for a variety of reasons.

In some cases I’ve had feedback on a product or service. In other cases I was interested in buying a product or service. A majority of the time, however, I was simply trying to engage.

The accounts I contacted varied from restaurant chains and coffee and wine retailers, to independent authors and consultants. When providing feedback on an experience I had with a product or service, whether positive or critical, I seldom received a response.

On one occasion, I ordered three pounds of coffee from a Washington-based retailer I met on Twitter. After the coffee was three days late in arriving, I sent an @reply to the account. The coffee arrived the next day but I never heard back regarding my comment. That was the last time I ordered coffee from that retailer.

Another time, my family and I had a negative experience at an area location of an Italian restaurant chain. After blogging about it, I forwarded the blog link to the chain’s Twitter account in an @reply. Instead of following up, they ignored the message. We haven’t returned to that restaurant chain.

And since posting this blog regarding obtaining signed books from two well-known Twitter personalities, I have had another request for ten signed books ignored by another Twitter celebrity. That’s okay, there’s no shortage of competing books for me to buy.

And before anyone attempts to rationalize this lack of engagement and poor customer service due to these organizations or people being busy, understand that we’re all busy.

If you and I are too busy to clean our homes, we hire a maid. If we don’t have time to cook, we eat out. And if we’re too busy to follow up on customer feedback and sales inquiries, we hire an assistant. No one is above responding to customers or making a sale.

Speaking of busy people, two who took the time to respond to me and to ensure that I received ten signed copies of their latest books were bestselling authors John Miller (@QBQGuy) and Gary Vaynerchuk (@garyvee).

These guys are not too busy to respond—or make a sale. They are busy professionals with a lot on their plates who not only preach about the importance of customer service, they deliver it.

In summary, here’s a list of Do’s and Don’ts:

Do:

  • Engage
  • Respond to others
  • Capitalize on opportunities

Don’t:

  • Be indifferent
  • Ignore others
  • Miss opportunities

Bottom line: If you don’t like to engage, you’ll like irrelevance even less.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 23rd, 2010 at 2:25 pm and is filed under Customer Service, Employee Engagement, Enthusiasm at Work!. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

  • http://drinkwiththewench.com The Beer Wench

    Being the “Social Media Maven” that I am, I feel that I am more than qualified to respond to this post.

    And I am in TOTAL agreement.

    There are so many brands out there that are “blowing it” on Twitter.

    Some are freaking good, though.

    Take Frontier Airlines for example. I was REALLY pissed at their customer service and voiced my opinions STRONGLY on Twitter. They found my comment, started following me, engaged me and fixed my problem at their cost — not at my cost.

    BRAND #WIN.

    I have had other dreadful experiences … but now is not the time or place to call others out.

    Engage or Go Home. Totally agree.

    The Wench

  • jessica

    I’m not sure you picked the best examples, unless I’m the only reader who can’t afford to hire a maid or eat out whenever I feel like it. If I don’t have time to clean my house, it stays messy.

    Your message is good, though.

  • http://www.stevecurtin.com Steve

    Jessica, let me qualify those examples at the Curtin household: By maid service, I’m referring to whatever my mother-in-law finds time to do when visiting. By dining out, I’m referring to Papa Murphy’s take ‘n’ bake pizzas. Thanks for your comment. ; )

  • http://www.stevecurtin.com Steve

    Ashley, the Frontier example is refreshing in that the brands we usually hear about delivering extraordinary service on Twitter are (predictably) Zappos, Comcast, and Southwest Airlines. It’s nice to hear that others are being assertive in the way you’ve described. Thanks for sharing your Frontier example. I’ll go look for them on Twitter now – and may even fly them sometime soon (in part due to your testimonial).

  • http://RestaurantWorx.com Jeffrey Summers

    Agree 100% Steve, as I usually do with you. Which is why I’ve decided to purge 10-15k followers because they add no value to my stream or engagement with me. It’s that simple. Enough with the noise already.

    Last point though, is we need to remember to give praise for better engagement by brands when they execute it. Honey attracts better than anything.

  • http://insidehospitality.com Gary Tripp

    Steve- great post. It’s all about engagement. Keep up the great work !

  • http://www.LauraWynn.com Laura Wynn

    Bravo. I have very public tweets to some brands that consider themselves major players in our social media game regarding this exact topic. I even ran a customer service test and watched our #1 coffee chain ignore two requests for service. They finally replied when I announced my new coffee house. What businesses fail to understand about social media is that they must be even more protective of customer service policies than previously necessary. We all know that the loudest shouters require the quickest reply or they just keep shouting. Wow; not a great way to increase rankings, huh? Again, Steve; nicely defined. I plan to snag this for my blog. Find it under “stolen from my friends”. Thanks in advance. Mwuah.

  • http://www.stevecurtin.com Steve

    Jeffrey, thanks for your comments. Since meeting you on Twitter a year ago, I have known you to be someone who truly “gets it.” BTW, here’s some of that honey you mentioned… http://www.stevecurtin.com/blog/2009/03/05/comcast-customer-service-is-all-a-twitter/

  • http://www.stevecurtin.com Steve

    Gary, thanks. I still remember, after connecting on Twitter last year, when you called me out of the blue to compare notes on mystery shopping services. Talk about engagement!

  • http://www.rochelleveturis.com Rochelle Veturis

    Oooooh, great post Steve. I wholeheartedly support this rant.

    And I am so not surprised to see @garyvee on the list of responsive, kind Twinfluencers. At SXSW, his Secret Wine Party got so packed that he was personally on the street corner, sending tweeps out to find a new location. He went out of his way to make sure everyone got to enjoy his party, and wasn’t waiting in some crazy line. It was amazing seeing him in action … most would have been kicking back, enjoy their successful shin dig. He is incredible and he’s the real deal. Much like yourself Steve.

  • Christopher Huber

    Steve, again you hit the mark. Engagement, emotional engagement is the name of the game and is (is not)experienced in many ways. We’ve been really focused on following up with our customers who express disatisfaction on our “Thank You for Visiting Survey,” and my team is convinced it’s powerful and very helpful to us. Talk to our customers, what a concept! Typcially, they’re pretty blown away that we actually followed up with them.

    Recent kudos to United for responding better than they ever have to a service shortcoming (yes, Steve, re: our trip home); it’s impact on me, very positive!

  • http://www.stevecurtin.com Steve

    Laura, thanks for considering me for your “stolen from my friends” section of your site – clever title… I agree that businesses have a sense of urgency in the social media age that didn’t exist when they relied on comment cards for “real time” customer feedback. As w/ any change, there’s a learning curve – and many businesses are still getting their bearings. But most of us expect that businesses will figure it out sooner than later – esp. when we make it easy for them via @replies and DMs on Twitter.

  • http://www.stevecurtin.com Steve

    Rochelle, thanks for sharing your experience w/ @garyvee. I agree that successful entrepreneurs like Gary Vaynerchuk rarely compartmentalize the quality of their personal service, meaning that how they respond to others’ needs in situations like the one you described is reflective of the quality of their personal service overall. In chapter 9 of CRUSH IT!, @garyvee presents “the best marketing strategy ever: Care.” Great story Rochelle. Thanks for taking the time to share…

  • http://www.stevecurtin.com Steve

    Christopher, so true re: emotional engagement. And emotions are a moving target during the course of an experience (e.g., first impressions, sensory impressions throughout, fulfillment of expectations, etc.). I imagine that managing the sensory experience for your guests at Cakebread Cellars is critical. Memories, imagination, and associations are more readily reached through the sense of smell than through any other channel. I’ve read that in humans there are four genes for vision, whereas there are 1,000 allocated to scent, which means we have the ability to differentiate more than 10,000 odors. According to the Sense of Smell Institute (there really is such a place), 75 percent of all emotions we generate are due to what we smell! No pressure… ; )

  • Kevin Boulas

    Great post, Steve – I totally agree. For those who purport to be listening, but fail to engage, I would recommend either taking Steve’s advice, or follow AT&T’s example.

    With all the criticism of AT&T service, the only thing they are doing better than the bad examples you refer to above is this: they aren’t even pretending that they’re listening.

    Keep up the good work, Steve.

    Kevin

  • http://www.stevecurtin.com Steve

    Kevin, thanks for your comments. Yes, AT&T and Nestle are taking a beating right now due to their lack of responsiveness/engagement. I can’t help but wonder if some organizations are drawn to social media channels for the wrong reasons (e.g., they’re popular, current, relevant, cheap, etc.) and miss the obvious (e.g., increase accessibility to organization, create opportunities to connect with customers/prospective customers/community, foster loyalty, etc.). Most of us are still learning the nuances of social media and, while there’s a legitimate learning curve associated with that, there should be no learning curve required to respond to a customer…

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