PR Squared: Bad Customer Service is Bad PR

Here's a challenge: visit SBC's website. Try to figure out how to email the tech support group. Or better yet, try to figure out how to do something simple, like "How do I forward calls?" If your experience is like mine, you'll soon see that it's an outrageously bad example of website design. Ruined our weekend, because we were expecting an important call and thus were tethered to the house since we couldn't forward the phone. And for the record, it was a beautiful, sunny weekend. It's not like you get those types of weekends all year long, in Boston, y'know? (It'll either be sweltering - or snowing - next weekend!) The only legit email addresses I could find on the website led to the PR team! Yes, I flamed them - PR guy to PR guys. Corporate America is running out of excuses when it comes to customer service. Both in terms of web-based and automated phone support, there are now numerous examples of excellence amongst this prestigious peer group. The Web-savvy generation that's growing up today will not tolerate bad customer support. We're too impatient, because we know the power and goodness that can result from good technical design + broadband speed. Ten years from now (probably less), a website as crappy as SBC's will be completely unacceptable. Frankly, it is unacceptable today. Meanwhile, Vonage is lookin' better and better...

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