Are You Putting Technology Before Your Customers?

Which is more important the technology or the customer?

The one thing about the online world you can be sure of is change.It seems like every day there is a new technology being addedwhich will make the internet more accessible.As online marketers, we strive to keep up with all these trendsand incorporate them into our marketing arsenals.

Going back to when the internet started, it was a bit of a nerdyplace to be, with lots of people communicating in text only.Some savvy individuals saw how this growing community could be exploited and used to advertise their wares, and with all the hyperlinking joining them to other sites they could be easilyfound.

Then the world wide web evolved from the basic internet adding pictures and multimedia and eventually adding videos too, and it became even more useful to marketing. Added in with emailwhich made it possible to reach a large audience at low costthe web became irresistable to businesses.

Each step forward brings with it even more opportunities for us online entrepreneurs to get our messages seen.

But as it marches on into new technologies are we all missing the point somewhat?

We all need our ads to be seen, but often we seem to be spendingmore time wrestling with new technology than actually working.Everyone is jumping on the blogging bandwagon at the momentand offering xml and rss feeds to get their messages out.

Flash video, along with audio, and video streams is also being used extensively, and often unneccessarily to market products.

But even more alarming is the reliance some people are placingon this new technology, to the point of abandoning traditionalemail and websites.

Let me relate this recent story which actually happened.

I received a newsletter which I read regularly, andlike many others the owner was having problems with gettinghis email newsletter through spam filters. Like many newsletterpublishers he had decided to publish his newsletter as a webpage.He started sending out regular emails when the newsletter was available, and including the link to read it. All ok so far.

It was shortly afterwards I received an update from this newslettertelling me that it would no longer be available as a web page, butwould now be an rss feed only. And telling me if I wanted to carryon reading I should download some software to do so.

Whoa, backtrack there.

Your subscribers can only read your newsletter if they downloadsome extra software and learn how to use it?

I emailed the owner to point out that I thought it was a bad idea.You want your subscribers to stick with you, make it easy for them,the reply I got was that I should join the 21st century, if I wantedto read his newsletter he would tell me how I should do it.

No I don't want to read it that bad thanks anyway.

So before you go running headlong into the latest technologicalmarvels of the internet, think about what your customers need.Do they have the latest greatest browser to view your latest greatestmultimedia masterpiece?Will they need to download some extra software just to view yournewsletter?

Subscribers are humans too you know, and as humans they are ficklecreatures. They will stick with you while the goings good and easybut make them work to stay with your newsletter and you're historyas there are plenty more good newsletters they can get free.

Flashy animations, and new technology can be impressive, butput your customers first, and use the technology only if it helpsthem.

Doug Titchmarsh

Doug Titchmarsh runs several sites including http://www.cashinonline.info and http://www.titchmarsh.com and publishesan e-zine for marketers online and offwhich you can get by sending an email to douglastitchmarsh@getresponse.com

More Resources

Unable to open RSS Feed $XMLfilename with error HTTP ERROR: 404, exiting

More Customer Service Information:

Related Articles

You Bever Know Who Youre Serving
You Never Know Who You're Serving when customers turn irate.I think of myself as a reasonable person.
What Do Your Clients REALLY Think of You?
*********************************************Know Thyself - Socrates*********************************************I'd like to start this article with a test ?What do you get when you cross a Northern Canadian male, a 4x4 truck and heavy rain?You guessed it! ? Mud Bogging!!!!That is how I spent my morning. My husband's new truck was too shinny, so he felt he had to get it dirty again just so he could wash it for the fourth time this week.
Client Service as a Competitive Advantage
As someone who has been heavily involved facilitating strategic planning processes with organizations during the last 15+ years, I often find it somewhat amusing how people answer the questions I pose.For example, if I ask people, "What is your unique differentiation in the marketplace?" or "What does your organization really excel at?" They will almost always reply, "It has to be our client service.
The Logic of Emotion!
Homebuyers are an interesting study. Watching people make their home buying decisions has brought me to the conclusion that every decision that every one of us makes is based in emotion.
Whatever Happened To Customer Service?
Do you remember the last time you went into a shop and the person 'serving' raced over to you, greeted you with a lovely smile, heaps of enthusiasm and said, "Welcome to our store, what can I help you with today?" And then listened attentively to what you had to say?Doesn't happen very often does it? In fact, while I was writing this, I couldn't recall when I had experienced it. I'm sure I must have yet it would have been so long ago, I can't remember.
One Critical Question to Ask Yourself Every Day
What happened to the old saying, the customer is always right? I'll bet every one of you reading this article has a "customer service nightmare" story to tell. My most recent nightmare experience took place recently when my business partner and I went in to a wireless phone store to purchase two new pda wireless phones.
Complaining Consumers
The salesman's job is to be well informed; extremely well informed. For this information is how he earns his bread.
The Number 1 Rule for Businesses - Be Professional
Have you ever walked into a store and things looked sloppy? Stores should have nice neat displays, right? Normally, yes, but sometimes they get a bit messy on busy days and we all understand how that can happen.But what if you were to walk into a store as soon as it opened in the morning and the place looked liked it had been ransacked? What would you think?You'd probably think it wasn't very professional-looking.
Add Value - And Kill Mediocrity in Customer Service
There are two kinds of customer service we all experience occasionally, outstanding customer service, and bad customer service. What we experience most of the time is mediocre customer service.
Can Three Words In Websters Dictionary Be The Key To Customer Loyalty?
Are you concerned about customer loyalty? Are your customers so loyal that they will stick with you through hell and high water? And if not, you really need to question how you can create a customer relationship that's so gluey, that you never go bluey in the face. Funnily you don't have to go far.
How to Easily Increase Your Profits
Do you remember the last time you went into a shop and the person 'serving' raced over to you, greeted you with a lovely smile, heaps of enthusiasm and said, "Welcome to our store, what can I help you with today?" And then listened attentively to what you had to say?Doesn't happen very often does it? In fact, while I was writing this, I couldn't recall when I had experienced it. I'm sure I must have yet it would have been so long ago, I can't remember.
Accountability
The Call Center world is an intense pressure-driven environment continually being shaped by pressure to ensure steady profitability and a secure competitive advantage.Accountability and a basic fundamental understanding of Performance Management serve as two of the most power tools a Call Center manager has at his/her disposal.
4 Myths about Customer Value
The purpose of business is to create and retain a customer.Much has been written about customer orientation, customer relationship management (CRM), Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) metrics, Customer Centric organization models, customer retention, customer care-add any high sounding word with -customer- preceding or succeeding that word and you have a new model, a new theory.
All of the World of Business Is a Stage
One of the basics of acting taught to me in grade school was the important principle of "staying in character." Staying in character means holding the image and personality of the character you are assigned to portray without letting your own personality leak through.
Putting The Serve Back Into Customer Service
Good service is easy to spot and hard-to-find. Mediocre serviceoccasionally stands out but only because it's the cream-of-the-crap.
Customer First Customer Service
The world of customer service is rapidly changing. Thirty years ago, telephones and mail services were the norm for most companies.
Basic Levels of Consumer Integrity that Presently Permeates Society
Reality is not always pretty. But here is a tad bit of it for you today.
Customer Service and Marketing that Works
Go into many businesses today and try and get service, its sometimes impossible! The customer service officer is on the phone talking about personal issues, there is not enough staff, and they are disinterested and distracted.The old days of customer service is where you the customer were viewed as valuable and important and you received service from a person and not a machine.
What Every Manager Should Know About How to Learn from the Complaints of Customers and Employees
Listening to complaints, whether they're reasonable or not, is a part of every manager's job. Sometimes complaints can be overwhelming.
Automating Your Help Desk Workflow
Do you know you can open, answer, close and report help desk information without human intervention?Automation is a powerful feature provided by most enterprise level help desk products; however, most organizations rarely take advantage of these features. Based on a survey conducted by RightStar Systems, only 5% of the help desk managers interviewed were using automation to its fullest capacity.