Buzz Builder

Snapfish Drives One Customer to the Snapping Point

My wife is a demanding, yet fair, customer. She’s willing to give service providers the benefit of the doubt—unless the service provider in question makes it virtually impossible to engage in a dialogue.

At issue is an order that my wife placed with Snapfish, the online photo sharing and printing service that is owned by Hewlett-Packard. She has been a loyal customer for years; indeed, she regularly receives special offers via email as a “special thank you for being such a loyal customer.”

The problem is that on the last two occasions, Snapfish’s “special offer codes” were not recognized by its order entry system. The error was not registered until the credit card was already billed. The first time my wife just let it go—the dollar amount was small and the customer service process onerous. When it happened a second time, however, she was irritated. Again, the dollar amount was small (at issue is a $2.99 credit toward an 8x10 print) but no longer did she feel like such a “special customer.”  It got worse when she tried to send an email to customer support.

The company makes users choose from 12 pre-determined customer service categories. None of them apply directly to my wife’s question, i.e., “Why don’t your special offer codes work?”, yet she had to choose a category in order to proceed. Next, she was forced to choose from one of 5 pre-determined customer service questions. Again, none matched directly but she tried to pick the closest one. After typing a lengthy explanation of the problem at hand, she hit “enter” and a big red message appeared: “Please limit your text to 240 characters.”

At this point, she had already invested 30 minutes of her time. Now she spent another 10 minutes trying to edit her question down to 240 characters. Once the email was sent, she received an auto-response saying that someone would be in touch within 48 hours. Well, 48 hours came and went and she didn’t hear anything back from Snapfish’s customer support team—although she did receive yet another offer as a “special thank you for being such a loyal customer.” Instead, she’s thinking about moving three years worth of digital photos over to another online service.

What are the lessons? First, customer support should be for the convenience of the customer—not the convenience of the company. Snapfish’s email support system is the online equivalent of getting trapped in voice mail purgatory. Second, you don’t win customer loyalty with a $2.99 coupon. You win it through good products and great customer service. Third, a $2.99 coupon will cost you a lot more money in terms of lost revenue if you cannot execute it properly, so make sure your systems can keep the promises you make.

Our Boxer Bella Creates Buzz in The New York Times for Our Word of Mouth Marketing & PR Firm

Thanks to our boxer Bella, this has been a banner week of buzz for Galvin Communications, our word of mouth marketing and PR firm. Marci Alboher, who writes the Shifting Careers Blog for The New York Times, blogged on 4/30/08 about how Bella is earning her keep as our Director of Goodwill  (D.O.G.). Marci's post has already generated  over a thousand visits to Bella's Boxer Shorts Blog and our company website.

Since February 2006, Bella has been a diligent blogger. She has built a loyal audience with her great sense of humor and joie de vivre. Bella and I often compete to see whose blog generates more traffic and she beats me many days.

Read the brilliant comments of my wife and business partner Ellen in The New York Times explaining how Bella's blog has made us smarter marketers.

Red Bull Gets Wings & Buzz with Flugtag Publicity Stunt Since 1991

Kudos to Red Bull for creating Flugtag, an annual publicity stunt that has taken place in numerous locations around the world since 1991. Each year, it generates tremendous buzz for the company  reinforcing its advertising slogan: "Red Bull gives you wings." Flugtag is a tongue-in-cheek flying event judged on three criteria: distance, creativity and showmanship. What constitutes a craft is purely up to the imagination of the participating teams.

The first Red Bull Flugtag took place in Vienna, Austria, in 1991. Since then, more than 35 Flugtags have been held around the world -- from Ireland to San Francisco -- attracting up to 300,000 spectators. The record for the farthest flight-to-date currently stands at 195 feet set in 2000 at Flugtag Austria. The U.S. record stands at 155 feet set in Nashville, TN in 2007 (see video below from Red Bull which documents this flight).

I was impressed to see Red Bull's Flugtag event featured on the front page of The Oregonian, my daily newspaper, this past Saturday with a photo of a contestant getting ready to jump off a ramp. Clearly, a great photo was the clincher to secure such prime coverage since the article didn't cover the contest rather it merely noted the deadline to apply for the event in August is less than two weeks away.

Yes, Red Bull and other companies have discovered that publicity stunts can still break through the commercial clutter and generate tremendous media and public attention provided they meet some basic as I explained in this post.

Simple is Good Marketing Lessons from Twitter, Common Craft, and the Portland Baroque Orchestra

"Perfection is not when there is no more to add, but no more to take away."
Antione de Saint Exupery, author of The Little Prince and a pioneer in aviation

In a world in which the typical urbanite is exposed to 5,000 marketing messages daily, simple is good. Too many companies get lost in the commercial clutter communicating in a confused way. Today I noticed a public bus with a a sign on the back for the Portland Baroque Orchestra. There was a picture of a violinist, the orchestra's name, and three words: fresh, intimate, and alive.

It seems that more companies are entranced with stating their core values using three words. There is nothing inherently wrong about this. In fact, if you could tell folks what makes your organization, service or product different and interesting in three words, I'm all for it. However, if there is cognitive dissonance between the words you choose and what you offer, you're not helping your brand. Rather, you're merely confusing your possible customers. I can't imagine that there are many people in the world who are drawn to seeing an orchestra that is fresh, intimate and alive. Those words just don't evoke a quality orchestra rather they sound more appropriate for one of those newfangled automatic air fresheners.

But, simple words can be used very effectively. I recently stumbled across a small company in Seattle called Common Craft that does clever videos utilizing paper cutouts to illustrate complex products and services. Make sure to check out the below video that they did for Twitter since it provides an excellent explanation of rapidly growing social media and shows how much can be communicated using simple words and graphics.

Travel Oregon Website Builds State's Buzz Creatively

I'm proud to be an Oregonian and I get a lump in my throat every time I return from a trip outside the state. Recently, my wife and I enjoyed a fantastic trip to Oaxaca, Mexico where we loved the people, delicious food (I still dream about the amazing mole sauces), amazing ruins (don't miss Monte Alban just outside Oaxaca), and beautiful arts & crafts (check out our visit to one of the most famous local rug merchants). Yet, when our Mexicana flight dipped below the cloud cover and we saw the tree-lined streets and parks of Portland, we felt incredibly lucky to live in such a green and friendly place.

Our neighbor, a Wieden+Kennedy employee, has been working on an an elaborate web project for the Oregon Tourism Commission. The Travel Oregon website is nearly complete and it has a lot of cool free features such as the ability to create a personal journal to plan and save trips as well as as a signup for a free electronic newsletter and interesting Travel Oregon Magazine which comes out twice a year. Of course, I'm incredibly biased but the most interesting feature of all is the 365 Days in Oregon calendar which features our dog Bella the Boxer. Just click on April 16 to see Bella and her boyfriend, the chocolate lab Norm from across the street, in action on the beach. Even before appearing on the calendar, Bella's blog generated more traffic than this one. Now, she will pull into an even larger lead that will be hard to overcome.

If you want to see why Oregon has been generating such great media buzz, check out the Travel Oregon website and I bet you'll be making plans to visit our state soon.

Toro Bravo in Portland - Great Tapas But Waiting Policy Needs a Buzz Makeover

Usually, my wife and I avoid trendy restaurants on Friday and Saturday nights since waiting and crowds are just not our thing. However, last Saturday night, we wanted to treat some friends to a special dinner so we proposed uber-popular Toro Bravo in Portland. Unfortunately, the restaurant has a no reservations policy and we knew that we would be in for a wait. Much to our chagrin, when we arrived at 6 PM, the hostess told us that the wait would be about 1-1/2 hours. Lesson #1, never try to "out-early" Portlanders - I'm convinced this town could give retirement communities in Florida a run for the money when it comes to people who dine early. Usually, we don't wait anywhere for more than an hour but our friends were excited about trying Toro Bravo and they had trekked over from the food wasteland of Vancouver, Washington.

We put our name on the reservation list and the hostess told us to check back in 30 minutes to see "where things stood." I asked whether they had a pager that they could give us to let us know when our table would be ready since Toro Bravo has no bar and the waiting area is miniscule for weekend crowds. While there are a couple of nice bars nearby, it's hard to enjoy them when you feel that you might miss being called for a table. When I asked if they could call my cell, the hostess sniffed and said, "We don't usually do that. But, if your wait lasts more than an hour we might take your number." Gee, thank you very much.

After more than an hour, the hostess didn't take my number and we kept having to send somebody in our party rushing out the bar up the street from Toro Bravo to inquire about our reservation status. Ultimately, after nearly two hours, we were seated. We proceeded to have a fantastic meal. You really can't go wrong with any of the creative tapas at Toro Bravo. Even a Spanish friend says that it has some of the best tapas he has had in the U.S.

Yet, leaving Toro Bravo, I wondered whether it or any restaurant with an extremely inconvenient waiting system will sustain its devout following. With technology prices dropping, it would be fairly inexpensive to implement a buzzer system. Surely, Toro Bravo could make up the cost for such a system with the increased goodwill and repeat visits that it would generate. Or, for no expensive, Toro Bravo could train its hostesses to always offer to call patrons on their cell phones when tables become available.

It's alway worth making the lives of your customers easier to keep your buzz growing.

How Professional Service Providers Benefit from Blogging

My friend Hermes Aleman, a business banker at Affinity Bank in San Mateo, California started a blog in February 2008 that provides interesting information to business owners and to people thinking about becoming entrepreneurs. I especially enjoyed his excellent post on why PR is much more powerful than advertising at a fraction of the cost. He also included a plug for my free buzz marketing seminar in Berkeley, California on April 10.

I've met a lot of business bankers and Hermes is the first one I know who is blogging regularly. Hermes' blog makes business sense for many reasons but here are the top three:

1. It show his existing clients and prospects that he offers a lot of added value.
2. It will keep him on the cutting edge of knowledge as he generates content for his blog.
3. Over time, his posts will make him appear in top search engine listings since blogs are much more "Googlelicious" than websites. This will surely drive new business his way.

If Hermes gets so busy that he can only blog once a week, he will still enjoy the three aforementioned advantages. That said, why aren't there more business bankers and other professional blogging when it costs nothing to set up a blog?

No Recession in Word of Mouth Marketing Spending

Thanks to the outstanding free newsletter that I receive from the Word of Mouth Marketing Association, I learned that according to a new study  from PQ Media, spending on alternative media, which word of mouth marketing is a part of, is expected to continue to grow in 2008, in spite of a slowing economy. Alternative media spending grew 22.0% to $73.43 billion in 2007, according to PQ Media's research. Spending is projected to grow 20.2% to $88.24 billion in 2008.

Free Buzz Marketing Seminar in Berkeley, CA on 4/10

All Buzz Builder Blog readers are invited to attend my free seminar "Galvanize Your Business with Buzz" on Thursday, April 10 from 8 am to 10 am in Berkeley, California.

The seminar will teach your how to:

• Ensure that your best customers keep coming back
• Inspire satisfied customers to refer their friends and colleagues
• Grow sales through e-newsletters, blogs, viral videos and search engine optimization
• Command free media coverage that is far more powerful than advertising Leverage media exposure for maximum advantage

The free seminar will be held in OCSC Sailing's Club Room at One Spinnaker Way in the Berkeley Marina. OCSC Sailing has been a client of Galvin Communications, my word of mouth marketing and PR firm, for four years.Check out the outstanding press we've helped OCSC Sailing land since they've been our client.

To reserve a space for the seminar, please RSVP to info@galvincomm.com or call 503-249-8800 by Tuesday, 4/8. If you know people who might be interested in attending, please invite them. To learn more about my speaking programs, visit my speaking page.

 

Isaac Vasquez - A Rug and Buzz Master in Oaxaca, Mexico

On a recent trip to Oaxaca, Mexico, I had the chance to see a natural buzz marketing expert. In Teotitlan del Valle, about 15 miles outside Oaxaca, Isaac Vasquez is recognized as one of Mexico's leading rug designers. His works have been displayed at museums around the world, sold in galleries in Santa Fe, New Mexico and other international locations, and written about in magazines and newspapers in many different countries. His handmade rugs are famous for their intricate designs, historical representations of Zapotec culture and vibrant colors.

When my wife and arrived at Isaac's studio, I remember saying "We will not buy a rug." However, Isaac's charm along with a fascinating explanation of how the rugs are made made it impossible not to buy. Isaac showed us a cactus leaf with cochineal larvae which are harvested and mixed with calcium, carbon and other natural elements to create vibrant reds. Other natural materials are used to make a rainbow of other colors. Then, natural wools are dyed and woven on huge looms into beautiful rugs like the one picture on the left.

After using interesting props to explain how rugs are made, Isaac showed us a wide range of books and magazines that had featured his work over the past 25 years. Then, he introduced us to some female members of his extended family who are also  rug makers. These women showed us Isaac's rugs for sale along with some of theirs. After getting such a thorough look at Isaac's artistry, my wife and I quickly agreed that we had to leave with a rug even if it stretched our budget. When I returned home, I found reviews of Isaac's business on TripAdvisor and discovered that I was not alone in being converted from a reluctant shopper into an enthusiastic buyer thanks to Isaac's masterful demonstration and high quality products.

As we drove away, I thought about how unusual it was for me to purchase an expensive piece of art. Then again, I can't recall an artist ever taking so much time to explain his work. Many artists and entrepreneurs could take lessons from Isaac on the importance of taking the time to explain how their products are created and how they are valued. Too many assume that people can just figure out this information on their own. Sadly, they fail to realize that education not selling is the best way to get people to put down their guard and make large purchases.