You may be wondering who the partner is but I am going to
keep you in suspense for just a little longer until we have dotted the “i"s
and crossed the “t”s. In the meantime, keep an eye on my Twitter feed for
really obvious hints as to who it is.
You will soon be seeing an increase in activity under the
product review section (1 review is actually almost ready to go up but am waiting
for my thoughts after tonight’s long idt ride) and I am busy behind the scenes
in the evening with stuff for them.
In the meantime, I have a little bone to pick with companies
and service… On Saturday night I went to
a well known Douglasdale restaurant and had a stunning pizza which was served
by a non-existent waitress and there was no manager around or anyone asking if
everything was ok. Then came the cherry on the top: being highly allergic to
nuts I scoured the menu looking for a dessert I could safely eat and I settled
with a rather nice sounding coffee meringue. When it came it looked amazing and
I was already working out how many extra kms I would have to ride to work it
off. Then I tasted it and I did not taste the decadent chocolate taste but
rather the poison of almonds. I spat it all out, we called the manager who
quite honestly could not have cared less if he tried. Long story short, I did
not ride on Sunday but rather spent the day sick on the couch watching the
Argus.
Now compare this to another interaction I had recently… my
gps unit decided to give me a bit of issues and I tweeted about it’s issues and
the distributer contacted me on Twitter and helped me out – even after I proved
to be a fussy customer. In fact, they went above and beyond the call of
customer service! So far that I cant stop yapping about how my Bryton kicks
Garmin’s butt with technology and innovation. I mean, my warranty replacement
unit even has a coaching function that beeps loudly when you are slacking off
or are over doing it. LOVE IT!! Just think: this company could have shrugged
their shoulders and just tried to fix software or whatever but they made sure I
was able to ride and have my data. Thank you Jason and BrytonSA.
In a similar vein, I recently needed some training advice
for my upcoming trip and well, who better to ask than someone who wins stuff so
I emailed Andrew McLean of Cycle Lab. Being the owner of Cycle Lab Fourways and
a celeb, he could have passed the buck and told me to google the answer or buy
a book but rather he gave me solid advice and said I must come chat when I am
next at the shop.
Lesson learnt by this interaction? Well, I will never set
foot in Throbbing Strawberry again – even though their pizza is amazing. But, I
will firmly support Ballistic Bike Trading and Bryton because they went above
and beyond in service. As for cycling shops, I think I will definitely be
taking the mountain bikes for their much needed service to Cycle Lab.
What can companies learn? Well: in these hard days of money
being tight, its time to up the service to gain and retain customers or you are
going to loose customers. And if you don’t think loosing 1 customer is too bad?
Well, 1 customer tells 5 customers, those 5 tell another 5…. Then add social
media and you are tickets and your competitors and those giving service will
reap the rewards.
Enough blabbing for one day. Remember to keep an eye out for
the upcoming brand partnership announcement!!!
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