Few recent articles showcase the gulf between those who get social media and those who don't than this Orlando Sentinel piece by Staff Writer Anika Myers Palm dated today and entitled, "Savvy advice on customer service for the holidays."
On the one hand, she quotes Richard Feinberg, director of the Center for Customer-Driven Quality and a researcher for the Purdue Retail Institute at Purdue University in Indiana, as saying this:
"I'm beginning to see a very cool thing called social media optimization."
Writer Anika Myers Palm explains: That's when a company hires someone whose job is to coordinate and encourage customers to post positive things about the company on their blogs and the YouTube and Flickr video- and photo-sharing Web sites... If you have a bad interaction with a store employee, let someone know.
Well, so far so good other than the troubling notion that Mr. Feinberg is just now beginning to see social media at work and that social media can involve a lot more than hiring a corporate cheerleader to flog the blogs via positive customer comment. But journalism is, after all, just the first rought draft of history and Mr. Feinberg isn't the only one to be just now bringing social media into focus.
But now contrast this with a statement in the same item by Britt Beemer, Orlando-based consultant and chairman of America's Research Group: "When you don't have a good experience with a store, you send them a letter... There's nothing stronger in my mind than writing a letter to the CEO of a company."
Really? How about a letter in the form of a blog post that's seen by a virtually unlimited number of fellow consumers? Never mind there are about six layers of people between the CEO and the person who opens his or her letters. Forget about the common practice that replies from CEOs, if one is ever produced, are written more often than not by wordsmiths like me. You might as well be writing a letter to the North Pole for all the fiction implied by writing a letter to a CEO.
"Dear Santa... This year for Christmas I'd like all CEOs to open their own mail and pen personal replies of condolence and corrective action to disgruntled shoppers... I'd like to be 6'3" tall and look like Brad Pitt..."
Seriously, for a minute just pretend you're a CEO of a big American-based consumer goods store. In your left hand is a scathing private letter from one to person to just you. In your right hand is a copy of a blog post from the Internet detailing for all to see an excruciating experience in one of your stores. Trust me, the palm of the right hand is sweating more profusely than the left. For confirmation of the power of social media over direct communication with a CEO, see this previous post about what happened to CompUSA.
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