The Ritz-Carlton has understood this for a long time.  They know that any nice hotel room is pretty much the same.  It’s a bed and four walls.  What matters is what happens outside the room.  That’s the service.

They also know that service is easy when things are going well.  It’s not that hard to check you in and out, valet the car and deliver your luggage.  What makes the difference is how things are handled when things aren’t going well.

It doesn’t matter if you need a reservation to a restaurant, a special delivery or have an issue with a noisy neighbor.  What ever the problem is, The Ritz has realized they can distinguish themselves as one of the best hotel chains by fixing it and fixing it well.

The Ritz has a customer service policy that borders on amazing.  If a customer has a request, the employee they tell about it must see that it is closed.  They own that interaction beginning to end.  No one gets to say “that isn’t my job” or “here’s the person to call.” They do it.  They have to.

Any business can learn from this.  Your customers want their problem fixed, what ever it is.  They don’t care who does it for them.  When they get shuffled around they lose faith that the issue will be solve.  Empower people to make it right, and it will get better.

There’s the famous Nordstrom story about the woman who returned a tire there even though they don’t sell tires.  Charlie Trotter has told a story about ordering a steak from a nearby restaurant to serve to a customer who wanted one, even though he didn’t have one on hand.  Fix a problem and you can build a loyal customer.  How would you have liked to have your business mentioned as one of these service leaders?  It’s a viral marketing buzz that’s hard to beat.   Anyone care to share a comment on a great experience?

While it’s hard for anyone to change a culture like that, it’s pretty clear that’s its wrong from the get go.  Marketing on the Internet isn’t merely digital, it’s interactive.  It’s a conversation, not a soapbox.  It’s not just a marketing channel, it’s a completely different medium.

However, it’s awfully hard to get people to understand the power of a medium they barely know how to use.  CEOs are just to busy worrying about other things to “surf” and learn to adopt a new behavior.

What would I do in this situation?  I’d bring up case studies both good and bad.  If it’s a competitive threat, it tends to get a response.  Take a look a blogs like the consumerist and see how often you’ve been listed.  It’s important to make people aware that people on the Internet will talk about your brand regardless, so it’s better to be involved than try to ignore it.

As I was writing this, I found this great interview about how ad agencies are changing their approach to interactive.  It’s a great read, especially for those that would call internet marketing “digital.” 

By implying that babies are a fashion accessory, J&J insulted the bond between a mother and a child.  This video on youtube shows a number of people’s feelings about the insult. Advertising Age provides an excellent overview of the time line here as well.

To my way of thinking the failure was in not actually having anything to say.  Any pain reliever could have said the same thing.  If all you have to say is that you understand your target, you’d better make sure that you actually do.  In this case J&J and Taxi clearly did not.

Pulling the campaign was the right move in this case, not because of the critics, but because it was very unlikely to be effective.  I would actually say they were fortunate that people were as vocal as they were so they could avoid wasting hundred of thousands in wasted media buys.

There’s a lesson here about “common interest” campaigns and social media.  The buzz will say one of a few things.  “Wow this brand really gets me” or “I hate it”  With the instant communication options open today, it would be very smart to monitor the buzz and react quickly.  If you get the Wow, ramp up.  If you get the latter kill it and listen to the reasons why.

After seeing the success of these efforts, Circuit City launched their FANALYSTS’s Channel.  The sponsored channel encourages users to upload fantasy football analysts to upload videos which are hand selected for inclusion on the channel.  There is no hard sell for Circuit City, but there’s lots of their logo everywhere.  Much in the tradition of Kige, the videos frequently diverge from football to broader pop culture like Heroes and politics.

I’ll give credit to Circuit City for being a part of a “movment” instead of trying to invent thier own.  By demonstrating their understanding and providing a launching pad for content generators, they are trying to get ahead of their rival.   The traction isn’t great thus far, but I think it’s a nice use of user generated content.

The secret is: there was no prior world record for software downloads.  Firefox invented it.  The strategy was amazing.  The press and bloggers wanted to cover it, and users had an incentive to download it as quickly as possible.  They were able to multiply the visiblity of the launch many times over traditional marketing.

They also involved the existing community quite well.  As far as grassroots efforts go, they made it easy by having toolkits for the “faithful” to spread the word.

Firefox also added an element of pride.  Downloaders could print certificates for their particpation in the occasion.

From every aspect, the launch was an amazing use of publicty and community involvment.  I applaud them for setting the record they created…  and acheiving a very critical strategic goal with their innovative marketing.  They got beyond the functional improvements of the browser and made it an event to get a new piece of software.

A recent cartoon of his impressively illustrates exactly one of my key messages.  Marketer’s can’t oversell their products anymore.  If it doesn’t deliver, consumers can spread the word as fast as they can make a blog post, or web review.  They decide if your product meets their expectations. The marketing message may help shape those expectations, but in the end, they are the ones in control.

The classic 4P’s of marketing have to work in concert to deliver an experience.  If the price is to high, or the place is undesirable, the consumer will think less favorably.  Now more than ever, to succeed we need to think about far more than how to promote and capture the big picture of marketing fundamentals.

No one is going to love everything about every brand, but trying to stop the expression of frustration isn’t going after the root cause.  The better way is to find your fans and facilitate their efforts.

Look at this offering that one could buy if they liked BMW.  It’s a unique design, but incorporates brand icons in a positive manner.  Searching for walmart on the same site delivers no positive messages.  Coke has chosen to use the site to promote attractive official goods that fit with the rest of the site.  They’ve started the conversation in a positive manner, and are using their icon and brand in the proper way.  Maybe they never sell a single product there, but by having a good selection, their presence can help encourage others to be positive, and discourage negative messages.

I first learned this lesson when I was launching a local paper in Dallas.  During the launch we conducted community meetings to explain the product, which was unique in the access that consumers would have to getting articles published. We thought consumers would embrace it since they actually controlled the conversation in the newspaper, rather than the other way around.

For one of our first meetings, we went to a place that was cheap and convenient for us, on our schedule.  We sent out invitations to the busy community leaders.  When the time came for the meeting, few attended, and those that did weren’t all that excited.  They were more concerned with a perception that they would be losing professional coverage rather than gaining a paper of their own.

The next meeting was quite a bit different.  We went to them on their schedule.  We held it in their community in a place that was easy to attend.  Our message was about the additional coverage, and access to get the items they were proud of printed in the paper.  We respected the consumer and understood their concerns.  The meeting was strongly attended, and most of the people that had anything negative to say were concerned they wouldn’t be getting the product.

The first meeting was all about what we were going to do, on our terms.

The second was about listening and becoming a new voice for the community.  It was about THEM.