Lately more and more companies have launched websites asking their customers to give them ideas on how they can improve. Asking for feedback is nothing new as companies have done this with feedback cards for decades. What is new is creating specialized websites or using social media websites to accomplish the task.
I threw away comment cards in the past as I always envisioned them ending up in the shredder, maybe it was because no matter what I said on them I never heard back from the company. Then on February 16 of 2007, while trolling the web for articles on technology, I stumbled across one about how Dell was reaching out to customers by asking them to submit ideas on how they could improve. I knew Dell had been declining for a few years due to customer service issues so it seemed like a logical move to try and turn things around. Seeing how I had been buying Dell computers for years I typed in the website address http://www.dellideastorm.com/ to check it out.
I spend about an hour on the site that day looking through the ideas and comments but was afraid to post something (I can be a bit shy at times). The next day I decided to post something since nobody would really know who I was anyway. Creating an account was easy enough, email address and create a user name and password. I'm not all that great with making creative user names so I used my last name, year I was married and topped it off with the number 1. My first post was a bit of a feeling out process so I kept it simple, Show the Vista performance rating during system configuration. It wasn't a ground breaking idea but it was something I thought would be useful when buying a system. I felt a bit more confident after someone voted for my idea and decided to be more bold and posted a second idea that day. I figured why not tackle Dell's problems head on and posted 6 major issues to be fixed by Dell. I voted on several ideas that day and left some comments on other people's ideas as well. Watching my ideas get voted on and conversing with my new acquaintances was fun but Dell was silent on the site.
A lack of responses from Dell was frustrating to users and led to many rebellions in the form of joke posts and ideas complaining about the lack of interaction on the site. Dell slowly began to participate more but for some it was too little too late as they left the site to move on to something else. Another problem with the site was the software running the site. In Dell's haste to get the site put together they chose to use a beta program from a business partner (SalesForce) which amounted to the site users becoming test subjects for the software. Many ideas were posted complaining about the lack of common features found on normal forum software such as spell check, site navigation and HTML editing tools. Unfortunately Dell couldn't fix the problems and some of them still exist today. Even though the issues are out of Dell's control the frustrations are still towards Dell as most people do not realize it is not their fault or feel they should change vendors if they really care.
Another problem from the combination of beta software and lack of early moderation is that the site was and still is being flooded with duplicate ideas. Dell tries to remedy the issue by merging the ideas together and combining the votes and comments into one location. Unfortunately this process does not notify the duplicate idea poster of the merge, makes the comments confusing to read and results in complaints from the idea poster as well as the other users who care about the idea. This has led to many discussions on how to properly merge duplicates, who should be awarded credit for an idea and other issues. Unfortunately no matter what Dell does to improve the site people end up complaining about it.
While IdeaStorm had and still has its issues they have made improvements in the software and participation they seem to learning from their mistakes. Dell has gotten more employees to participate but SalesForce is still taking far too long to fix the software. I have also checked out similar sites from Starbucks (run with SalesForce software) and Cisco (using software from Brightidea) find that they are facing similar issues to Dell's early problems. It seems no matter how many times they are warned companies seem surprised that so many people submit ideas and expect some form of feedback. Will companies ever learn how to make the customers happy or will these feedback sites just become an online version of the feedback card?
Sunday, June 8, 2008
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6 comments:
Sorry jervis old son but DELL lost me a long time ago. There really is nothing special about their computers or anything else they produce that could over ride their terrible customer service and attitude when dealing with customers.
Case in point. http://www.informationweek.com/news/hardware/desktop/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=208400410
Hmmm. Program chops off URLs instead of word wrap. Oh well. Here's what it should have been.
http://www.informationweek.com/news/
hardware/desktop/
showArticle.jhtml?articleID=208400410
Like I said they lost some along the way. :)
Strange how the address got chopped off here is a working link.
http://tinyurl.com/65j43j
I thought you might comment like you did but the article was more of a question. Do you think they will ever learn?
I don't think DELL will ever learn but I do believe others will. I think DELL is too big and much too self absorbed to respond well to the "single" customer or potential customer. Most companies that reach a certain size fall into that kind of mind set. They forget how they got to be that big and lose site of the idea that a single customer is important. They usually "talk" as if they do, but don't "act" as if they really believe it. Fortunately, not all big companies are run by the same people and so wont all treat customers the same. So as to will "they" ever learn. Some will, some will not.
Hey jervis - nice blog! Great to see you out here keeping the conversation alive - on and off IdeaStorm.
My thought on your question of whether companies "will ever learn" is yes, but change takes time... and a lot of listening.
You might even say that IdeaStorm is a case in point. For example, you and I (and gmat too) were around for the early days on IdeaStorm, and we all know they weren't smooth. But although it took Dell a while to organize ourselves to really do the site justice, we eventually did change the way we engage on IdeaStorm over time. And that continues to evolve, as Dawn and Kara and Jackie will attest.
I think Dell, and other companies that have the courage to invite customers to provide direct feedback in an open forum, do learn. But they do so through the guidance and insight from dedicated customers who care.
It will be interesting to see how IdeaStorm continues to evolve, and how Starbucks and Cisco use their sites as well.
To invoke a mixed metaphor and a funny image, I'll just say that the genie's out of the bottle... and there's no where to go but up. :)
Thanks for the comment Caroline. I was starting to think the aliens really did take you. :)
My hope was that other companies would learn from IdeaStorm and have a smoother road to travel. My experience on the other sites proved to me that I set too high of an expectation. They lost the community aspect that makes IdeaStorm a habit I find so hard to break. Even when I was frustrated with Dell I had to return because of the friends I made there and did not want to leave. Case in point is gmat who doesn't participate anymore but still checks in with me more than my own brother.
I still think IdeaStorm needs some improvement but will admit that things are getting better. I see that SalesForce is advertising more improvements so hopefully we will get some of those soon. I am still waiting for the results on the environmental contest you promised moths ago.
Try to stop by IdeaStorm and make a few comments once in a while I'm sure the old crowd would be glad to hear from you. Some of them have started to return as well.
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