As a result, the helmet was fixed – free of charge – and Phoenix even replaced the cheek pads, which were showing ageing, as well as added a deflector to prevent the same future problems from happening.  Arai, though their representative Phoenix Distribution, also successfully managed to keep me happy as I was about to put the helmet in the bin and fork out about £300 for a new helmet (anything but Arai at the time). This was a really long shot at the start of this 2-month saga. And the Hein Gericke store manager was removed from his functions – not as a result of my specific problem, but it seems that there were problems in this particular store.

I do believe that mistakes happen and that everyone was a victim of some unfortunate circumstances, and lessons have been learnt by everyone.

1. Never underestimate the power of isolated consumers.
2. Never underestimate the power of the internet. Word of mouth can spread very quickly.
3. Do check your contact form that sits on your website. If you haven’t been receiving enquiries over the net, something might be wrong with your website. Never blindly trust technology.
4. A customer is never lost for good, but you do have to go to great length to get them back.
5. If your brand image relies on a chain of representatives, do perform random quality checks. The quality of your service will always prevail over the quality of your products.

I did receive in the end great customer service, and was assured that it wasn’t special treatment (although I feel that it was, otherwise I would have been charged for the elements fixed and replaced, as originally quoted by the store). Now only time will tell if my next lid will be another Arai Helmet. At the end of the day I never experienced such issues with any other helmets before.

I am always surprised that some brands are still alive and strong despite the zero customer communication that seems to be their rule of thumb . A great example of organizations that fail to interact with their customers are telecommunications companies. They are first plagued by their sheer size. Then comes a network of mobile resellers that just want to do the sale (the likes of Carphone Warehouse who represent every single mobile operator in the country), call centres that place you on hold for 40 minutes only to put you through an agent whose British northern accent is so thick you wonder if you haven’t dialled Reykjavik instead (Sky TV), and the only interaction you seem to have with them is in a shopping centre when a nineteen-year-old tries to flog you HDTV.  So how come these companies are still around and making profits? My view is that they are still alive not because they are good, but thanks to their position of monopoly and their aged brand presence (soon to become aging brand presence if they’re not more careful).

In the case of telcos, Sky and BT have been sharing most of the UK market between themselves for a while. However they are losing some of these shares to other, cooler, more engaging brands who try not as hard to sell all their products to everyone at the same time. They instead seem to try to sell the right products to the right people. Think O2 and Virgin. O2 brought the iPhone to the UK (associating themselves with the Apple brand at the same time) and they have been showing us some pretty good time at the O2 Arenas all around Europe, even giving their customers privileged access to concert tickets. It is after all at the O2 Arena in London that Prince established residency for 21 consecutive sold-out nights. Virgin, well, need I say more on a brand whose vision is to take down monopolies and who takes tourists into orbit?!! Clearly we see that companies who truly engage with their customers win market shares while the dinosaurs eventually plateau, or decline.

The bottom line is to talk to your customers, acknowledge their existence and recognise the fact that if your organisation is still around it is thanks to them. By speaking to your customers they will respond, and if you can listen to them just a bit, then you will be able to feed back products and services that they will want and will buy from you. As technologies have gone beyond entering our houses and now live in our pockets, do Tweet, do Blog, do Podcast. Simply interact with your customers at their level and never ever ignore them or underestimate their intelligence and the ultimate power of referral. In return, your customers  will reward you with the most prized success any organization can hope for: their long-term loyalty.

Transports For London decided to stick to their old fashioned written and verbal platform announcements, however their website is regularly updated with live travel news. However having updates posted on a website does lack instantaneity, much needed when one is standing on a platform wondering whether one’s train will be on time at a connection for later in the journey. Unfortunately for them, TFL being, well, TFL, they have been beaten to it and instant Tube updates are now available via Twitter thanks to a thoughtful man called Simon Whitaker who has found a way to post automated London Tube Twitter updates sourced directly from the BBC (@tubeupdates). To this date this Twitter feed only has 830 followers, which is surprising considering that there are 3 or 4 million users of the London Underground every day (this alone is a good reason to re-tweet this blog post). I remember being on a bus past Green Park station and reading one the Tube updates saying that there were delays due to fire at Green Park station. At this very moment I was seeing firemen making their way into the station. Not bad!

Which brings me to the use of Twitter that some savvy organizations use to communicate with their customers. So far we’ve seen Twitter being used for commercial purposes (vouchers and specials from Pizza Hut or Starbucks), but last week winter snowfalls highlighted in my house the very useful way Easyjet are using Twitter.

Easyjet managed their flight updates very well through the use of 2 web channels. Their website and Twitter. The website displayed a list of flights that were being cancelled for the day and the following one. It also clearly stated at the top when the list had been updated. Sometimes small details make a difference, and the simple fact that the “last update” info was displayed re-assured me, as a customer. It demonstrated to me that EasyJet actually cared about me, which is rare (as previously demonstrated in an earlier post). But to top it up, they advertised, on their website, a Twitter feed where a real human being was posting updates and personally responding to requests from customers. A real human being, in real time was posting updates and links to information areas on the Easyjet website! Simple, cheap and efficient way, in line with EasyJet’s brand image. As a result they have boosted my confidence in their brand and I am now even more likely to fly with them.

They showed that they cared and in my world empathy goes a long way, especially when the elements are against you.