Dell Spot

At the YourSpace conference a few weeks back I learned about Dell’s experience with “the conversation economy”. Nearly three years ago blogger Jeff Jarvis at Buzz Machine wrote his "Dell Sucks" entry (with apologies to Dell for linking it again - this time it's meant well).

Jarvis had purchased a lemon and received poor customer service which he carefully documented. His post touched a nerve in the Internet population and was so highly referenced and linked by others that, for two years, when you searched "Dell" on Google, it returned the "Dell Sucks" post.

I’m sure they explored all their options first (probably including a number of calls to lawyers, search result gurus, and professional "cleaners”). In the end, though, Dell responded with a rational and focused improvement on customer service, launched the "Studio Dell" community and the "Ideastorm" innovation conversation. Three years after that post, customer satisfaction is up from 58% to 84% and negative blog posts down from 49% to 22%.

Enter Facebook. Dell has created their own "fan" page, called "Dell Spot".

There are only three conversations, with some 40 posts. 37 of those posts are in the conversation "Why Dell sucks".

Consumers who have had poor product and customer service experiences are venting loudly (as they would have any way) and arguments are being advanced in Dell’s defense. The dialogue seems to be resolving in to two camps. One group is portrayed as apologists for “poor customer service” but present a position that "cheap technology is just that: cheap. Pay more and expect more". The other is being portrayed as “whiners who want quality at no cost” but their shoddy customer service experiences cannot so easily be discounted.

All this is happening on the Dell page - it's quite amazing. There is a blast of criticism right there under their ads, but there are also Dell employees, happy Dell customers, and even tech support from other companies making cases quite often consumers are rude and entitled boneheads. Ironically, it was one of Dell's employees' responses that impressed me the least. Post #33 in reply to a good natured jab at Dell was met with the response "it was sony battery...fyi...dont talk with little knowledge duh!! LOL." Fortunately the two involved in the exchange were adept in not engaging in flame wars and resolved things amicably. Still, I would hope that people at my company would not insult a customer, but would rather meet a criticism from someone who is not an enemy – only re-stating headlines about known product problems – with something a little more balanced, and invite the person to join Studio Dell.

This is another example of how companies like Dell, who are playing in the conversation economy, need to invite these dialogues internally as well so their employees become well-informed, rational, articulate brand ambassadors.