The BV Blog

Want to make your customers happy when things go wrong? Add more mea culpas to your conversations. Software developer Joel Spolsky has this advice for remarkable customer service — admit that it’s your fault. Spolsky admits that’s not easy for many of us:

 It’s completely natural to have trouble saying “It’s my fault.” That’s human. But those three words are going to make your angry customers much happier. So you’re going to have to say them. And you’re going to have to sound like you mean it. So start practicing.

Say “It’s my fault” a hundred times one morning in the shower, until it starts to sound like syllabic nonsense. Then you’ll be able to say it on demand.

 
In fact, Spolsky recommends that you memorize a number of phrases, including, “I’m sorry, it’s my fault,” and “That’s terrible, please tell me what happened so I can make sure it never happens again.”

In this age of generally awful customer service, you’ll be amazed at how fast this can defuse a tense situation, providing an opportunity to solve a problem and prove that you’re better than the competition.

We’re mighty proud to have won three top prizes at last night’s Crystal Awards ceremony. The event is presented each year by the Toledo chapter of the Association for Women In Communication.

Our in-house web division, WebArt, won the coveted “glass egg” in the following categories:

     1) Corporate Website / Business-To-Consumer / Over $5,000 - Tuffy Auto Service Centers

     2) Non-Profit Website / Over $5,000 - Office of Vocations-Catholic Diocese of Toledo

We also won a Merit Award for our own new website, BusinessVoice.com.

Steve Timofeev and Melanie Allen from WebArt did some fine work on all these projects. We couldn’t be happier to have those two on our side.

We won our third Crystal of the night for a humorous On Hold Messaging production we produced for ourselves. Among others, it features this message about Farmer Brown and his On Hold Messaging farm.  

Our congratulations to all the 2007 Crystal Award winners.

Sorry. I can’t help but evoke the emotions of Oscar winner Sally Field each time we win an award ourselves! At least I haven’t played a flying nun on TV…yet.

Our thanks to the MarCom Awards for presenting BusinessVoice with a 2007 MarCom Gold Award for our On Hold Messaging production called “The Ball Game.” (Listen to it here.)

The MarCom Awards is “an international creative competition that recognizes outstanding achievement by marketing and communication professionals.” There were more than 5,000 entries this year.

Using humor on hold is one of our specialties, so let us know if we can entertain your callers and shorten their perceived hold times while differentiating your company.

Is it just me or does the audio from a typical TV commercial pod sound more like what’s on my iPod?  Armed recently with an old school pad of paper and pen, I was able to jot down - from memory - 10 current TV spots that rely heavily on a famous tune, but hardly at all on the spoken word. 

I’ll need another 10 or 12 years before I can separate the sound of Led Zeppelin’s “Rock and Roll” from my mind’s eye image of a Cadillac kicking up desert dust.  But that’s the point.  You may not ordinarily think of Cadillac on any given day, but now, if you hear “Rock and Roll” on the local classic rock station during the drive home, I’ll bet you a cheese danish that an image of an Escalade pops into your head.  That connection can be so strong that Zeppelin’s “Rock and Roll” isn’t just “Rock and Roll” anymore–it’s “that Cadillac song.”

More proof.  What products do you think of when you think of these songs?  “Like A Rock” by Bob Seger; “I’m Free” by the Rolling Stones; “Don’t You Want Me” by Human League.  All of these tunes have a positive connection with Chevy Trucks, Chase Visa, and those chunky Chips Ahoy, respectively.  Some companies have even elected to use lesser-known music to form an almost mutually exclusive relationship between the piece and the product.  Most folks wouldn’t know Aaron Copeland’s “Rodeo:  Hoe-Down” by name, but when it’s set to the sweeping images of families enjoying hunks of meat and paired with the tagline “Beef:  It’s What’s for Dinner!” it becomes instantly recognizable.

Tapping into the powerful alignment of music and a famous spokesperson, American Express rolled several slices of sounds into one commerical.  During the famous “Ellen’s Dance” spot, dog-dealer Ellen DeGeneres dances her way through the day to such tunes as “Car Wash,” “Respect,” and “Gonna Make You Sweat (Everybody Dance Now).”  Clever, American Express, clever - conveying energy by capitalizing on just seconds of famous songs.

Aligning your business with music, whether through advertisements or in your environment, affects how your customers and prospects perceive your company.  Do it right, and you can achieve top-of-mind awareness every time “your” song hits the airwaves.