Saturday's Apple: Do Businesses Want Only One-Way Conversations?

[Magnus]

Some time ago I read this piece by Max Barry and it really got me thinking:

[Companies] spend billions of dollars to get their names on our lips and their logos in our eyes, but letting us talk about them is dangerous: we might say something they don’t like. They want what Naomi Klein calls the “one-way conversation:” to be able to speak to us—endlessly so, through billboards and television and radio and product placement in your movies and the back of your bus ticket—without allowing us to speak back. Unless, that is, we’re saying positive things about them; unless we’re “on message.” And so they seek complete control over their names, to ban us from uttering them unless it is to speak praise.

And that’s how I feel the situation is here in our region. To criticize a company in public on a web site, like this one for example, is not very well received by many businesses here, and they don’t really seem to know how to deal with it. My view is, that if a business is being criticized on a site, then they need to be a part of the discussion that is going on, the conversation if you like. If they’re not, they’re on the outside; being silent, not being heard, and they have little right to complain then about what is being said.

It happens that a user on our site has posted about a particular store, about their service not being up to par, for example. Usually I then try to get in touch with that company to see what their side of the story is and pretty much all the time they tell me what’s going on but I can’t tell anyone else, and certainly not post on the site. The problem from the business’ point of view with that is it is all well and good that I know something, but if that’s not shared with others, it’s of very limited use.

And it also happens that companies ask me to sensor what a user has posted on the site because they felt they were unfairly treated or something. We continually discuss what standards to apply here and in situations like these we draw the line at personal attacks and foul language. If a user has a genuine complaint or view, they have the right to put it across, but they should do it in a nice way and don’t attack individuals. So in the words of the quote above, these companies seem to want to talk to us one way, without us, the market, the customers, talking back to them. That I don’t think is a very good idea.

Instead I would like to see businesses be active on this site and others and engage with users and customers just like you. You have an important voice and for most of you it’s just waiting to be heard. The question is what businesses will listen and engage with you in a conversation? So far they seem to be very few.

[fangpyre]

A healthy discussion is always good.
But I think companies are like people.
Nobody like to be bad mouthed, and many times they take it personal.
Also, many customers are used to being serviced by yelling and bad mouthing.

For example, a customer of ours came in shouting and yelling that our product was faulty.
To service this customer, they ended opening another box and replacing the "faulty" piece.
When they sent me the "faulty" piece I tested it, and there was nothing wrong with it.
It was all the customer's mistake (or what I call a CUE, Change User Error)
So not only did they replace a piece that wasn't defective, the rendered the second box unsell-able just because they panicked under the customer's yelling.

Generally, service is NOT good in the Middle East.
And the customer should have the right to express himself.
But where does neutrality stand?
Does the site have to be?
Does anybody else have to?

But a good discussion is good.
And it helps if you, as a retailer, is known within the community.
After all, you wouldn't understand the community's inside jokes.
You might even take offense to the occasional "lynch mob"

[Magnus]

Thanks fangpyre, some very good points. I guess one thing I was trying to say, but probably didn't, was that there are always two sides to any story and very often the business' side doesn't come out. But it is not easy for a company to open up to the conversation, it takes a lot of hard work, soul-searching, and honesty which can be hurtful. Some companies completely clam up, like Apple, others try and struggle hard with these issues, like Microsoft I would argue, believe it or not. And different companies have to approach this in different ways, there is no magic bullet suit all solution.