Social design: from customer service to innovation

Boston.com has a nice story on the growing trend of companies keeping real-time tabs on what their customers say on the Web:

Hurry up, the customer has a complaint

By using services like Twitter and Google blogsearch, companies can quickly respond to people who vent their frustrations. In some cases, they can actually provide real customer service.

I would point out that these technologies aren’t just for finding out what’s wrong, but they can also help companies know what they’re doing right, what is resonating with their audience.

For example, in the last two weeks on my twitterstream I’ve heard probably 20-25 people say that they enjoyed the movie Wall-E. In the same time period not one person complained…that signals to me that the movie is definitely worth watching. Some people even used the term “classic”. By following real-time trends you can see what is gaining word-of-mouth and what isn’t.

I’m also happy that the article serves as a tidy follow-up to Chapter 3 in my book Designing for the Social Web, a chapter I called Authentic Conversations. When I wrote that chapter back in the winter time it wasn’t clear if the big companies (Dell, Comcast, etc) were going to come around to this approach of monitoring in real-time what their customers say…and more importantly responding and having authentic conversations. As much as I’m used to being treated poorly by big companies, I’m somewhat optimistic about the stories in this article being signs that perhaps there is real change going on.

And the article makes another point that I made in the book, which is that having authentic conversations in this way isn’t just about customer service….it’s also about innovation and product evolution…that by listening to customers over time we can actually build better products by reacting to what is happening on the ground.

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Comments ( 4 Responses so far )

1. Anittah Patrick on July 8th, 2008 (Comment) #

I suspect that companies whose optimization calculus is focused on consumer happiness will naturally adopt strategies such as listening to consumer feedback in as real time as possible.

Companies that are more focused on maxing executive compensation, internal navigation of politics, and/or obeisance to process will have a much harder time incorporating the actual listening to customers into their everyday equations.

The question is: how can organizations be encouraged to behave in such a way that they actually give a rat’s a$$ about their customers?

The answer is: over time, the market will correct for companies who ignore their customers, as ignored customers will go elsewhere; namely: they’ll go to the responsive companies that listen to what they’re kvetching about on the interwebz.

Thanks for posting this.

2. Josh on July 9th, 2008 (Comment) #

@Anittah - thanks for the great comment. I like your optimism about market correction…and LOVE the term “optimization calculus”. I’m going to steal that one…what are you optimizing for?

3. GetSmartGal on July 13th, 2008 (Comment) #

Great post….I actually had Lijit contact me after a twit frustration burst with their system. They have also commented on blog posts. Windows live writer reps have found blog posts through twitter. It is all so connected isn’t it? Best customer service I have ever had thanks to Twitter!