Podcast Expo: Amazing Job

I am back from the Podcast Expo, where I had the chance to meet Tim Bourquin, the founder. I bumped into Tim on Thursday morning, and again right after the Expo came to a close. He was as calm, cool, polite and unflappable at the end just as he was at the beginning. There appeared to be no customer service issues throughout, and everyone seemed to have had a danged good time on top of it. Tim and his team get a big-time thanks from me for all their hard work.

tags: podcast expo, podcast and portable media expo, tim bourquin

Personal Political Attacks on Sen. Lieberman

Sen. Joe Lieberman's blog was inundated with unbelievably nasty personal attacks, forcing the campaign to turn off the function. The comments came from supporters of Ned Lamont, who is running against Lieberman in Connecticut, but disavows any involvement. Nonetheless, I somehow think less of Lamont for it. You can see a representative sample of the comments here.

I think it's time for candidates to be pro-active about this (after all, this happens regularly, whether it's blogs or other type of media). Sending out Rules of Engagement to their supporters would be a good start.

Wikipedia vs. Britannica

At a meeting last month of Wikipedia contributors, founder Jimmy Wales emphasized quality over quantity, and the Wall Street Journal follows up by asking, Will Wikipedia Mean the End Of Traditional Encyclopedias? This is a 12 Sept. interview between Mr. Wales and Dale Hoiberg, editor-in-chief of Britannica.

I swear this isn't a blog about Wikipedia, but I just find this discussion on quality fascinating. And yes, it is directly tied to consumer-think: Wikipedia will thrive only so long as non-posting users believe in the quality and value of Wikipedia.

Wikipedia Banned from Class Papers

In November last year I wrote about Wikipedia's desire to burn its entire website to CD and make it available to schools in the developing world. I didn't like this idea, only because I feared that since there is no official checking of the facts, Wikipedia could (and would) spew bad information. Isn't that a great way to keep the poor down?

Anyway, Frank Ahrens at the Washington Post writes that "many teachers and professors have forbidden their students to use, or at least cite, information found on Wikipedia and similar user-generated sites."

Reviews Come to Real Estate

It was bound to happen: now you can post your review of that over-priced bungalow you looked at in the Bay Area or wherever you currently lay your head. Check out ZipRealty and Reply (beta).

Maybe owners will be brought to their knees (or at least their senses).

Consumer Reviews Giving Small Business Big Internet Space

Sometimes small retail businesses (pilates studios, designer t-shirt shops and the like) find it hard to find elbow room on the internet. But online reviews at a growing number of consumer review sites are giving them new space - whether they like it or not.

Small Gestures Create Big Rewards

A few weeks ago, I talked about my horrid experience with the Comfort Inn near JFK airport. On that same trip, I also stayed at the Ramada Inn New Yorker. When I arrived,the King bed I had reserved 2 months ago was not available, nor were 2 doubles. When lightly pressed, the counter person fetched the manager, who worked her magic and "found" a King: I felt appreciative of the extra effort, but a bit jaded as I figured I'd gotten an upgrade, or a downgrade to get that bed. The Front Desk man was so irritated (why, I wondered) that he all but threw the key at me and shooed me on my way.

The room was cramped, and on a floor that had not yet been renovated. (The hotel is slowly renovating, and on a reconnaisance mission, I found many other floors were in the same level of shodiness.) Indeed, the place was so run-down I had decided to take photos and post them on Yahoo, suggesting that travelers wait until Ramada had completed its renovations before staying there. every time I looked at the room, I felt a lingering sense of irritation with the Front Desk man, not understanding why he was so put out. I was only there for the late evening and much of the next day, which would be spent running around SOHO and Midtown, so I was ambivalent about wasting time putting up a post.

In the end, I decided to give Ramada a break based on one, small, unrelated incident.

I ran out for coffee and doughnuts, and juice to give me sustenance for the long trek up to MoMA. As I approached the bank of elevators, both hands full, a cleaning woman sweeping the rug for bits of flotsam saw me coming, stopped what she was doing, and walked over to hold an elevator door open for me, which had just disgorged passengers. It was a good 7 seconds for me to traverse the space between us, and I was grateful to be able to slip into the elevator, with her having pushed my floor button for me. That small rush of gratefulness was enough to tip me into not bothering to write my initial traveler's post, but this one instead.

What did I learn from this? Good customer service comes from small gestures; maybe great customer service can come from accumulated small gestures. It was not the grand, sweeping gesture of finding a King bed (which clearly they had anyway), but rather the tiniest of courtesies - and discourtesy - that had the biggest impact on me.

The manager should take note that it wasn't her finding a King bed, but rather, the courtesy of a cleaning woman that made a customer happy. I wonder if that manager knows the name of everyone on her staff.

Tags: customer service

Homemade Cafe: Really Hot Food

I've just had breakfast at the Homemade Cafe in Berkeley, California, for the thousandth time.

The Homemade Cafe's food is rock-solid good, but lots of cafes have good food. What makes their food fabulous is that their unusual set-up means that your food arrives at your table hot - with curls of steam rising from it, as if you - or someone - made it in your own kitchen.

How do they do this? They do not have waiters assigned to tables. Everyone serves everyone - seating patrons, taking orders, refilling water glasses, serving food as it comes right out of the kitchen, and issuing checks.

The result? An all-for-one atmosphere amongst the staff, fast service, and - best of all - really hot food delivered to your table!

First TIVO Mention?

I'm not sure, but I think I've just heard the first time a show announcer has mentioned their schedule and TIVO in the same breath:

Scott Budman, the host of NBC's Tech Now! ended the show Sunday saying,

That’s going to wrap things up for this show. We are back next week at the same time, 8:30 PM on Sunday, so set your TIVO accordingly.

Tech Now! probably knows from Nielsen data that a lot of its viewers have TIVO (me being one) and that they watch the show time-shifted (me being one).

This is Blingin' Bad Buzz for TIVO!

Comfort Inn Misnamed

Consumer service is such a delicate thing, so easily ruined. I've just come back from a trip to Canada. The travel part involved flying out of Oakland airport to New York city, staying overnight, then hoping Amtrak to Montreal.

For reasons beyond my control, I missed my original plane reservation, which would have had me landing in New York at 6 in the evening and staying at the Comfort Inn near JF Kennedy airport. While sitting in the airport waiting for my new flight, which would get me into JFK airport just 2 hours before the train departed for Canada, I realized I needed to cancel my Comfort Inn reservation. I quickly dialed the toll-free number and got a nice lady who told me I needed to call the hotel directly to cancel by talking to the General Manager.

While making the call and looking at the email from Comfort Inn confirming my reservation, I saw that reservations needed to be cancelled 24 hours in advance. As Michelle answered the hotel's phone, I realized why I needed to speak with the GM.

The ensuing conversation made my blood boil! I now knew that I was in the wrong, but since the original customer service rep I spoke to - and who had given me the direct number to the hotel - had told me I needed to speak with the GM to cancel my reservation, I thought I might have a chance of not being charged.

Ha! It was a downhill situation from the beginning. I explained I was stuck in an airport, it was out of my control, and that I wouldn't even be in New York to stay in a hotel, that I wasn't trying to stay at a competitors' hotel, etc.

Michelle answered the phone, and was rude and obstreperous from the beginning, She showed no empathy for a traveler's plight, said that I would not be speaking to the GM because he wasn't in and she didn't know when he would be (implying maybe never), and generally telling me to pay up and go away. When I pressed to find out when the GM would return, she proceeded to lie, saying she didn't know. When I asked her if she was willing to be held accountable for saying she didn't know when the GM would be in, she started waffling and wiffling, trying to back-pedal on her statement. I told her I understood that she did not have any control over this, and that I was simply asking to speak to her manager.

I got nowhere.

In the end, I asked that the GM call me, but figuring that she would not bother to pass the message onwards.

If Michelle had showed empathy (e.g., "I'm sorry, I hope the rest of your trip goes better") I would have been perfectly amenable and understood. (I am a former government employee and have respect for the place rules play in human getting along.) She could have had me off the phone in two minutes. But her rude behavior put my hackles up, and I dug my heels in, deciding I really wanted to try to get out of my reservation.

Did I get a call back? Nope: instead, in my mail box when I returned from a wonderful trip, I found a form letter - photocopied, with my first name written in ink in the appropriate space - that was a travesty of professionalism. All in all, a horrid experience - Comfort Inn at Jamaica Station near JFK Airport is missing a "dis" in their name.

Tags: customer service