Don't let them leave empty handed

Recently I was in the wedding party for a friends wedding. We had arranged to get suits using a new company named Indochino that has you size yourself, enter the numbers on their website and three weeks later you get a custom suit delivered to your door. Now there were some problems with the initial suits as one could have predicted but the company has addressed this by offering a free remake if a tailor you take it to recommends they remake it. They also offer and alteration credit if only minor tweaks are required. So after getting sized up properly and receiving my new suit I needed to return the original suit to the company.

Indochino happens to have their head office in Vancouver so I decided to just walk down and drop it off. I was greeted at the door by one of their employees who then decided he could not let me leave the office empty handed. He proceeded to give me one of their newly designed "Suit Utility Kits" which included a black tie, cuff links, tie clip, and handkerchief.

I was a little frustrated with the suit process initially but when they gave me this small gift I turned into an advocate. I am now happy with a great looking suit and perfect accessories to go with it. It can be pretty easy to diffuse a customers anger with something this small. Isn't it better to invest the small amount of money instead of losing a potential repeat customer? Well done Indochino.

Manners when you have a monopoly

Here's the situation: In a north american city (let's call it Vancouver), the taxi cab companies essentially have a deal with each other that means specific companies rule over areas of the city. For example, if you need a cab in North Vancouver you have to go through North Shore Taxi. So they drop you off downtown and now you want a ride home from this same cab company that offered good service to get you downtown. Not possible. The only way for them to pick you up downtown is if one of their cabs happens to be driving by and someone flags it down while its empty. An odd system which leads to a sort of monopoly mentality amongst the cab companies.

Here's the main problem that comes with all this, the customer service is downright embarassing and the majority of that can probably be attributed to the monopolistic way of this business.

So if you have a monopoly should you really treat your customers any different than if there is fierce competition in your business area???

No, you shouldn't. Especially not in this day and age. Consumers will find a way to call you out and eventually something will enter the market that removes the need for your service. 2 such things entering the market in this fictional city of Vancouver are Zip Car and Keys Please.

Zip Car allows people without cars a way to basically rent a car for an hourly rate. The gas, insurance and kilometers are included in the hourly price which comes in at a reasonable $9.75 during the week and $10.25 on weekends. Compare that to a taxi which can cost someone upwards of $30 for a 20 minute ride. It sells itself really.

Another common reason for needing a cab is if you have driven your car to a friends place and one Zima soon turns into 12. Now you need to get home without endangering yourself or others on the road. Well, you can call Keys Please and have your car driven home right behind you as you get a ride. So instead of having to deal with a cab company and then somehow reaquire your car in the morning, your car is waiting for you in your driveway the next morning. Now you just have to remember how it got there.

So, these alternatives may have arrived on the scene whether the taxi companies' customer service was exceptional or not, but I guarantee you they will have more success due to customers frustration in dealing with the monopolistic cab companies. We'll see how this plays out but if the cab companies had the attitude of building customer loyalty instead of providing the bare minimum level of service then they might have more success in the future.

Using your blog for good or evil

Let me preface this post by saying I understand writing your own personal blog is about building your brand and promoting yourself. But if you have developed a loyal following of people reading your entries when does too much selling yourself lead to a drop off.

I have followed the Pow! Andy Nulman blog for 7 or 8 months now and there was often some very interesting entries. He would talk about recent marketing campaigns that had used the Power of surprise to catch peoples attention and thus land themselves a good return. It was thoroughly interesting and I always looked forward to his newest post until.......

He got a book deal.

Now pretty much every single post is selling his book. Now he does mask it with promotions he is offering with the book, and contests he is running, and how he is trying to Pow! sell his book. But it all feeds back to being about his book, and in reality trying to sell more copies of his book.

Fair enough. You built your blog up, you built the brand of it, you got a book deal out of it so why not use your blog readers to sell copies. But what's going to happen when those loyal readers start to tire of seemingly the same thing every day. I know I am.

It's just like an overused advertisement. Wassssssupppp!!!!

Too early for greediness

These days on television it is rare to find a commercial not touting some way to bust the recession through pricing or financing that they have. One of these such offers was observed and taken up by yours truly.....it was for Quizno's. Quizno's typically offers a higher priced sandwich than Subway because they have the ever sneaky oven to toast your sandwich along with probably using higher grade ingredients. Well, Quizno's saw what was going on with the economy (and i'm sure their sales department also took note of it as people started eating less there) and decided to offer our fair population of Canada a stellar deal. Their Real Deal sandwiches would be $5 for a large one. Wow! Great deal, and especially for an above average sandwich. Now granted the Real Deal sandwiches only offer 5 different selections but it is still a great deal for someone looking for a tasty lunch at a great price. I partook in this deal multiple times, they had won at least one customer.

Then the other day I went back for another $5 sub.......

The price had been raised to $6.49 for a large!

Wait a minute does that mean we are out of the recession????? Hooray.....wait no we aren't. So they weren't really willing to help us then? First off this seems a little like a bait and switch tactic and i'm sure I wasn't the only customer a little chagrined by the 30% increase in price all of a sudden. But the worst part is that you say you are there to help out people when they need it, and then all of a sudden your greedy again. Now maybe the $5 price point didn't leave enough margin, okay I can understand raising it slightly, but 30%!!!!! Come on. We aren't out of this economic trouble yet and if you have found a promotion that works and helps bring customers into your store during these tough times, then it is a good way to build loyalty as we work our way out of these tough days.