Yesterday, I wrote about a bad experience I had recently with customer service people. By no means was I complaining about everyone in that industry.
I’m sensitive to customer service issues because my daughter is on the support team for a B2B tech company and helps clients solve problems all day long.
When someone I engage with does a good job assisting me, I make it a point to tell them so. As I wrote in another piece four years ago, if they’ve gone above and beyond, I will also make an effort to let their boss know how good they are at their job.
As I wrote then:
Most people do exactly the opposite. They only contact a company when they have a complaint. Even if they know their message won’t affect anything, they just have to spout off to someone. Whether it’s a one-star online review or a loud whining sound you can hear from the next county, they won’t be happy until everyone knows that the ranch dressing they purchased was a little bit tart.
But I won’t offer feedback about everyday interactions I have with companies, despite their constant entreaties to tell them how they’re doing — as if I, as the customer, have to service them.
Here’s an example:
I just bought new sneakers online and before I even closed that browser tab, the site had emailed to ask if I’d enjoyed the experience. No, I hadn’t enjoyed it — shopping doesn’t bring me joy. They sold something I wanted, I bought it, end of relationship. No emotions involved.
The feedback the site wanted involved asking me to rate things on a scale of one to five — and made it a point to tell me that five is the highest rating. Really? In a world where ride share services, food delivery services, and every Google search result has been asking us to rate them for years and years, are there people who still need to be reminded how it works?
Apparently, those corporate questionnaires believe there are, since they keep explaining the concept — as if we’re all idiots.
Which makes me wonder why they want feedback from people who can’t comprehend that five is better than four and one is worse than two.