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One morning, about 6 or 7 years ago, we received an inquiry to our online customer support system.  It was from a very sincere and frustrated person who was having trouble with his car.  He probably clicked the wrong button somewhere along the line and ended up reaching an office full of geeks instead of the car enthusiast forum he was looking for.  However, the specific geek who was manning the support system at that time knew a lot about cars, so he answered the guy's question (also explaining that we are a software company, not a car forum).

 

That's the sort of weird behavior our customers have come to expect from us, and we like it that way.  There's a lot of talk out there right now about "amazing customer service" and expensive CRM systems, which is all well and good, but sometimes you just need to do something weird.

 

In case you have problems thinking of weird things to do, here are some more ideas:

  1. Pardon the Turkey: We have an unofficial tradition of answering support inquiries on major holidays; how about taking 5 minutes on New Years Eve to help someone? Those 5 minutes pay dividends for years.
  2. Share personal tidbits (but not too personal) with your online community.  Several of us have public blogs, where you can find out that Lori loves penguins and Ted & I once had a swarm of bees removed from our house.
  3. Play: Invite your customers to play softball with you   Yes, we actually had someone who visited Seattle and got to play on our softball team for one game (Hi Ron!)softball
  4. Give presents: We like to send swag unexpectedly.  It doesn't need to be anything fancy; in this day of virtual goods, everyone loves to receive a package in the mail.  Even if it's only an old Infopop gluestick.
  5. Honor your customers: Over the years, we've named features and documents after customers, including the immortalized Graemlins (our emoticons) and the Buffy Guide, which was our original user guide (although Buffy was the customer's dog, not the customer herself).  We also have numerous code "easter eggs" that date way back ("someday Dave will cut his hair").
  6. Hire your customers: One of the best weird traditions we have is hiring our customers. Over time, they have proven to be some of our best colleagues because they have a wonderful perspective (not to mention empathy for other customers).

So go do something unexpected today.

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I'd love to hear your thoughts here in the comments, or connect with me on Twitter.

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  • softball: The "Pop Flies" softball team

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