Wednesday, July 08, 2009

customer service in the electronic age

Never piss off really creative people.

It's hilariously ironic that I was watching that youtube video when a guy in the customer service department at GoDaddy.com called me. He just wanted to make sure I was a happy customer.

He went over the domains and urls I have with GoDaddy and ended up refunding the cost of a website I'd forgotten about and changing my renewal plan to save me money. His call COST his company money, but you can bet I'll never switch providers and I'll recommend them to every client and friend looking for website hosting. Short term loss, long term gain. Smart thinking.

United could learn a thing or two from GoDaddy!

28 comments:

Melanie Hooyenga said...

Thanks for sharing this!

Rick Daley said...

It's even more important with today's economy. Customer churn is a killer...spending the few dollars it takes to field a call in order to retain a customer's longer-term revenue is in the best interest of most organizations. There is a rapid and quantifiable ROI on enabling technologies for contact centers, which yield higher levels of quality at lower operating costs.

Can you tell that I sell solutions for contact centers for my day job?

Mira said...

Oh cool. A new post from Janet.

Wow. The guy from GoDaddy hit the jackpot. Bet he didn't realize his wonderful customer service would show up on your widely read blog!

I hope they see this and give him a promotion.

I hope United sees this too!

Delta Dupree said...

I had the same experience with GoDaddy. I'm very happy with them as a website host. Yup, a bunch of company's need to take heed.

Pamela DuMond, D.C. said...

That's hysterical! Good for them for turning something awful into something funny. They'll probably sell more songs than they ever did before.

Laurel said...

Yay, Janet!

Great link...I am fascinated with this because of the multiple and extremely unfortunate experiences me and mine have had on airlines. Blech.

If you check their YouTube stats, this has something like 150K hits in one day and nothing else they have out there comes even close. They seem to have struck a nerve and some PR Gold with this. Ahhh. Karma.

BG said...

I was also contacted by GoDaddy customer service shortly after starting my website. It turned out I was paying for features that I didn't need. The rep re-arranged everything, refunded some money, and set me up with only what I needed at a lower cost per month than what I bought.

Mame said...

Oh man. That video is a riot.

Richard Lewis said...

Apparently the song worked...a couple websites say that United responded with "This has struck a chord with us. We're going to contact him directly."

Kitty said...

Along those same lines of appreciating good service...

From William Kent Krueger: IN PRAISE OF MY PUBLISHER
Not long ago, Pocket Books, the division of Simon and Schuster that has always published my work in mass market paperback, made the decision not to do so anymore. Though sales of my paperback editions always number in the tens of thousands, for Pocket Books, apparently, this isn't enough. So I was faced with the very real possibility of having no backlist to offer.

I have two wonderful editors at Atria Books, the Simon and Schuster division responsible for my hardcover publication: Sarah Branham and Emily Bestler. When this situation developed, these two fine editors went to bat for me. They arranged for Atria Books to begin publishing the entire backlist of the Cork O'Connor series in fine trade editions with stunning new covers.


Question: Has the publishing business gotten so bad, Janet, that "tens of thousands" of sales is not enough?

...

Pepper Smith said...

Yikes! A $3500 guitar should be treated with more care than that. I can't wait to see what the second and third video will have to say, considering the story posted on the artist's website.

Deb Vlock said...

That song was wonderful. Unfortunately, no airline horror stories surprise me anymore.

Margaret Yang said...

We writers always say, "everything is material." If you read the long version of the story via the link on youtube, you see that at the end, Dave Carroll actually thanks United for giving him such great material.

Have you seen the t-shirt that says, "Be careful or you'll end up in my novel?" Yeah. That's not really a joke.

I ordered a Sons of Maxwell CD today. Their revenge is complete.

Anonymous said...

Oh, too funny...I just wrote an article about this guy for Matador Travel! His revenge is certainly working, the first video is getting tons of play.

Mira said...

Omg - I couldn't watch the video at work, so I watched it now. That is the funniest thing. Good for him. He's my new hero!

I heard it's in the news. I wonder what United will do...? I wonder if they'll ever pay for his guitar...

Lol. Thanks for sharing this Janet. Hilarious.

Loretta Ross said...

Margaret Yang, I haven't seen those shirts, but now that you've told about them, I want one!

And maybe one that says, "mystery writers: killing people for fun and profit!" With a smiley face.

Margaret Yang said...

@Loretta, I think cafe press has both of those shirts.

Jeff said...

I had a similar experience with Kindle recently. I called and told them my screen had been damaged and they asked me for my address and sent me a new one with no questions asked. The damage could have been my fault, but they sent me a brand new one, worth $350 without even asking. The call cost the company some serious money (I probably would've eventually bought another one) but now I'm telling everyone who will listen about their great customer service.

Sha'el, Princess of Pixies said...

I put this on my blog too. A similar experience with United drove me nuts. I'll never fly United again.

What a wonderful way of respondng!

Visit me: Wardancingpixie.blogspot.com

Haste yee back ;-) said...

I'm so happy when the plane lands and I have all my body parts intact!

Haste yee back ;-)

The Pea Picker said...

I just had to post here that my mom heard about this on tv and came out and asked my husband, "Do you watch youtube?"

Debra L Martin said...

I have one of those T-shirts and believe me people do a double take and then they laugh nervously as I give them my evil smile. The upside is that I get through the checkout line very fast....

Deb

Daisy Bateman said...

Funny that GoDaddy should have such incredibly obnoxious commercials (basic message: buy our services and naked women will come hit on you!) and yet be such an apparently decent company. I may have to revise my opinion of them.

Lynne Kelly said...

I've had a similar experience with GoDaddy's customer service, like when I accidentally bought the web design service for people who know HTML instead of the click 'n type program for pinheads like I needed. With one very short phone call I was able to make the switch, and everyone I've talked to there has been super-friendly, even when faced with pinheadedness.

Caroline said...

Great video. I watched it a couple times and saw new little details each time.

It was also on CNN. They said that United called the guy to discuss the situation. I'm guessing he gets the money he wanted, plus a couple of free tickets.

Like Janet said, don't piss off really creative people.

Steve Stubbs said...

Well, I saw your post, watched the ovie, and started to post a comment about how I did not know Dave Carroll was making training videos for United. Then I decided, nahhhhh. That's a lame joke. Besides, nobody would read it anyway. Now I discover it's not a joke. United REALLY IS using Dave Carroll's movie for a training video:

http://www.nbcchicago.com/news/local/United-Breaks-Guitars-a-Smash-Hit-on-YouTube.html?yhp=1

The next one I want to see is Dave Carroll's training video for stewardesses who waltz down the aisle to some tune nobody else can hear, ignoring desperate pleas from passengers for water.

Or how about a training video on ticket counter personnel and their Three Mile Island lines which take you so long to get to the ticket counter that they tell you the plane flew away an hour ago without you.

Go, Dave. You've got it, son.

laughingwolf said...

it was a custom-built one-of-a-kind guitar, valued at more than $7,500!

he was likely ignored cuz he's a canuck...

after this was posted on youtube, they got in touch with him to 'work something out'...

embarrassed you did it, united airlines?

Karl said...

As a testament to the power of YouTube, United caves...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T_X-Qoh__mw