“Love the Customers Who Hate You.” That’s the title of the lead article in the new issue of BusinessWeek, as part of their “Customer Service Champs” special section.
We can definitely get behind that idea. I always chuckle when I hear Thor express something similar around the Get Satisfaction office: “Start a love affair with your customers.” It’s an award-winning idea, and one that people like, perhaps because it feels as if there’s a very big paradox buried somewhere in that phrase.
After reading the section, I have to say, “Great job, Jena McGregor,” management editor at BusinessWeek. We were happy to be one of the sources for this feature section. They bent our ear about emerging customer service trends, and it turned out to be a very good read. As we saw during our recent Customer Service is the New Marketing convention, there’s a major trend going on that’s reshaping customer service, and we’re definitely excited to see a magazine put together a high-caliber focus to the subject.
The theme behind this feature section is consumer vigilantism. Like the recent story about Get Satisfaction in the New York Times, the editors of BusinessWeek start with an idea that will draw readers in — customers complaining — and then provide some more depth.
There are a few highlights that caught my attention.
First, there’s an interesting story about customer vigilantes that calls out the Comcast Must Die blog (which we also wrote about previously) as an extreme example of customers using the Internet as a channel to demand better customer service from corporations.
There’s also an article about GetHuman.com and the dwindling prospects of their site becoming an ongoing resource for customers looking to get around phone trees.
Then, there’s my favorite article: the one where we’re mentioned. That one is a story about the plight of the Better Business Bureau and how it’s trying to leverage its brand and reputation — while at the same time trying to become a place where people go to get product reviews. That sounds like a very tall order.
And, who doesn’t love a good list? Readers definitely do. BusinessWeek put together a list of the top 50 companies in their customer satisfaction survey.
You can read the whole thing online here.
[BusinessWeek is on Get Satisfaction.]
