Border7 Studios

It is extremely hard to sit patiently by and watch someone do something incorrectly. I don’t know if this is some sort of strange personal issue like my being a little anal-retentive, but it drives me nuts none the less.

My issue is aimed at those companies out there who are in the tech field or market and then mess up in that community. Originally I was going to just rant a little about one issue, but I know people prefer lists. So here is my list of things to never do when you’re a company on the internet.

1. Do not embarrass your company by creating an account on a social network and then (pardon my language) half ass your efforts on that network. If you want to be on twitter, USE IT! If you want to have a Myspace or Facebook then you NEED to give your friends and customers a reason to add you, follow you, or interact with you. Dead accounts are like giant signs saying, “Uh…we really don’t know what we are doing.” You’d look better not being there than being there and being dead.
2. For the love of all that is in existence do not spam the crap out of people. Doing this takes your companies face and attaches it permanently to those emails I get from the prince of Nigeria offering me a boat load of money, a smaller waist and a bigger wang and all for just my bank account number. Everyone please take a moment to take a good look at the following companies on twitter as an example of HOW to run your business:
   1) GoDaddy
   2) JetBlue
   3) Sun And Ski Sports
   4) Mosso
   5) 37 Signals
   6) Less Accounting
   What do these companies all have in common you ask? A) They are not posting constant ads asking people to try their product, visit a site, use a coupon, or following a thousand people and not having anyone follow them back. And they interact with the community. They are active members in their own right with their own unique posts, but it’s not just 100% “Hey check this out” or “Look, a sale”
3. If you are going to have your company take up residence on the internet for heavens sake invest some money in your design. Free templates with sites are awesome, but they’re not unique to your store. Give your customers something nice to look at that serves a purpose. If you’re going to have a blog with Blogger or Wordpress do you leave the default blog template? Remember that thing your parents told you about first impressions? Make one.
4. Don’t be a jerk. Honestly, I’ve spent years working in customer service. Yes, on occasion you find that one customer that is able to get under your skin and make your blood boil. (In my opinion these are the people that live under rocks and have no idea what reasonable means. Every person reading this just thought of that one customer right now) Regardless of how badly this customer gets under your skin, do not give them more firepower than they already have. The internet is a community. Customers talk, and most of the time they can spot these crazy people a mile away. This does not mean in any way that your customers will not side with you if you take one step out side of the professional bounds. So, to avoid getting flamed on your own blog, forums, or Google reviews do not do the following:
   1) Call your customer names. This includes “Crazy, psycho, nutbag, or delirious”
   2) Forget that your customers can record calls and chats just like you can!
   3) Shut down and refuse to work with them.
   The last point folks is the most important. The moment you shut down and refuse to negotiate with “that” customer you let them win. No one will blame you for refusing an outrageous request, but customers will raise alarm if they feel you just stonewalled anyone.
5. Treat your customers like GOLD. Everyone has their bad days, but we are much more willing to forgive and forget a bad experience if it is surrounded by mounds of good. For example, I recommended Mosso to someone on twitter and they (Mosso) immediately responded to it. Sun And Ski sports had been following me for several days before I began following them. When I did I received a direct thank you from them. I received a thank you for following us tweet from JetBlue before I had time to return to my own homepage.

These companies know their customers are on the internet and they treat the consumer nation with the respect its buying power deserves. They do things right.
While I would love to provide everyone with examples of who’s doing it wrong I have two big reasons for not doing so.

First, not worth someone swearing they’re not spamming anyone foolish enough to add/ follow/ or friend them and then suing us for saying something about their bad behavior.

Secondly. I would be sad to see someone be inspired by the sheer numbers some of these poor examples generate in followers/ friends/ and buddies.

So really, I’m saving some of you from your selves. With all of these things in mind I encourage you to get out there and join the social web. Be interactive, smart, and courteous. Then see how much you grow from your social interactions to your business interactions.

Tags: customer care, internet, social media

This entry was posted on Monday, September 22nd, 2008 at 12:30 pm and is filed under Running a Business | . 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.