As I’ve been laying out a plan for discussing how social networks and the new realities of customer service are playing out, I’m quite encouraged. This certainly doesn’t need to be a mostly negative, ranting diatribe that constantly says “you’re doing it wrong”. On the contrary, there are a lot of companies and individuals that are leading the way and providing excellent examples of how to deal with people well. This brings me hope and joy in this new era of hope (amidst dire financial turmoil), or whatever we are calling it.
One company that I personally have been pleasantly surprised by is Amazon. While my experience didn’t quite rise to the level of this hilarious email on the consumerist, when I got in touch with Amazon about a fairly routine shipping problem that was my fault they responded like human beings. Helpful human beings even. It seems like my positive experience is not an isolated incident. Now, it’s not that there isn’t room for improvement. I despise web forms that call themselves email. I’ll explain my feelings about that in a separate post.
In some ways the bar is pretty low here. All it really takes is responding as a real human, and treating people with some respect to provide customer service that is noteworthy. This is especially true for a company that operates primarily on the internet, and it seems that Amazon has a good grasp of the need for trust and communication with customers that you are never going to be able to directly talk to.
So, Amazon, thanks for putting in the effort and making things a little less stressful for me when I needed you to. I won’t forget it.
photo credit: quinet
Unraveling Obfuscation 