So Disney just bought Marvel Comics for $4 billion in cash and shares, and I’ve spent the last five hours reading variations on “My Childhood, It’s Ruined” on every social network site I visit. People. This may not be as bad as it looks. Think about some of the recent mergers you’ve heard of. I [...]
Choose Your Audience
August 31, 2009 By Leave a Comment
People who work in interface make some of the dumbest mistakes possible. This goes for anyone from customer service to high-profile public relations. Here’s an example. t’s a cautionary tale for anyone in any kind of public interface. A couple of years ago, when I had just recieved my first upward-movement in the company I [...]
Mind The Gap
August 20, 2009 By Leave a Comment
We lay a lot of trust in our news sites, just as we do/did with newspapers before them expecting that when something appears in their space, it’s worth viewing and provides meaningful,concise information. Then you get articles like the one @modernsusan dropped me today, “Time to drop the Netbook label.” It blew me away, so [...]
The Difference Between Pre-sale support and Post-sale support
August 19, 2009 By Leave a Comment
So you’ve done some research. You’re looking for something specific, and you head to whichever shop you’ve chosen to consult someone who theoretically knows what they’re doing. You hit the store, talk to your salesperson… And get met with scorn, denial of much of your research and a pitch for a product you don’t want. [...]
The Difference Between a Customer and a Client
August 17, 2009 By Leave a Comment
One of the problems we run into all the time as salespeople is the difference between a customer and a client. Let me clarify this because for a lot of people it’s a distinction without a difference. A customer is what people in convenience stores see. It’s the people who, no matter how often they’re [...]
Proof of Concept
August 13, 2009 By Leave a Comment
Yesterday I saw an ad on TV, where someone got on a yellow podium and spoke, loud-speaker, to a crowd. She asked a question, and the crowd answered. The ad was for Best Buy, and touted their efforts through Twitter through their @twelpforce initiative. This is brilliant. I just spent half an hour digging through [...]
We're Not Those Guys!
August 12, 2009 By Leave a Comment
I came across an interesting thing today in my ambling over the internet. It’s a service called Plurk, and it claims to be the unTwitter. Now, most of you probably know what Twitter is. Lots of you likely have Twitter accounts. I do, you can feel free to follow it, it’s @WhyRTM – simple, right? [...]
The Commission Problem
August 11, 2009 By Leave a Comment
Best Buy has a long-running ad campaign taking advantage of the fact that their employees aren’t on commission. This is just about the most desparate, jerk-driven campaign I’m aware of for a number of reasons. If it doesn’t pay me, why should I learn about it? On the flip side of this pressure problem, there [...]
Too Zune To Make Assumptions?
August 8, 2009 By Leave a Comment
Ian’s Note: Hann is a web developer and designer I’ve worked with for a few years, who’s spent time both behind, and in front of the counter. In short, he’s a geek with his eye on gadgets, the know-how to get the best stuff on the market, and the patience and persistence to collect information [...]
Customer Service and Consistency
How many times have you had problems with a thing you’ve purchased? Probably lots. The average person buys enough things in a month for the law of averages to kick in quite often and have something mysteriously break. So what do we do? We get it fixed; everything has a warrantee. And while many companies’ [...]