Marketing Begins At Home

Consider these two scenarios:

One – An older woman, let’s call her Mom, is having problems with her computer. She calls the 800 number, waits on hold, gets someone in an off-shore call center who’s only authorized to read off of a script, waits on hold some more, hangs up in frustration. Wash, rinse, repeat.

Two – You or me have the same problem. We go on Twitter and moan and bitch about the problem, the computer manufacturer, the manufacturers’ mother, etc. Within a few minutes, an eager beaver in the marketing department sees the tweet and elevates it to Defcon IV. Corporate helicopters land in my backyard and the problem is solved before it can turn into the latest version of Dell Hell.

I wonder if in our rush to embrace the new we are leaving some people behind. I wonder if some of the problems we are trying to solve using social media can be better addressed with traditional common sense and attention to our customers.