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AggieMike88

AggieMike88

Touchdown! Greaser!
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Jan 13, 2010
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20,804
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Denton, TX
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The original "I don't know it all" of aviation.
I pick up the phone to help the sales team during a busy period...

"Thanks for calling, how can I help you?"

"I need to come get a part I called about, how to I get to where you are?"​

"Okay, do you have a smart phone such as Android or iPhone?"

"I think so, it's a Samsung."​

"Good, that has the Google App. If you look up the name of the business, Google will provide a map and your phone's GPS..."

"(interrupts) Oh, I did use Google... that's how I got your phone number. But how do I get to your place?"​

"Go back to Google, look us up, find the map, and it will give you directio..."

"I don't know how to do that, can you just tell me your address? Then I'll put it in my car's GPS."​

-- = sigh = --​

I keep expecting them to respond, "... but it's got electrolytes, that's what plants crave"
 
AggieMike88 said:
I pick up the phone to help the sales team during a busy period...

I keep expecting them to respond, "... but it's got electrolytes, that's what plants crave"
Click to expand...

I love that movie, sadly it's coming more true here
 
Bahh, they are paying money for your services, sometimes you have to take it with a grain of salt. That is why you pay people to deal with them, nicely.
 
AggieMike88 said:
"I think so, it's a Samsung."

"Good, that has the Google App. If you look up the name of the business, Google will provide a map and your phone's GPS..."
Click to expand...

Maybe the caller's Samsung was one of these:

samsung-sh-100-cnet.png
 
It's sad what society has become. Most have adopted the "Don't bother me unless you're giving me money and not talking after that" type of attitude, and service is completely gone. Few people hold a door for anyone, almost no one says, "Thank you," for anything, and patience has become extinct. That whole evolution of the modern outlook gives me hope that old rag-and-tube two-seaters will get really cheap because they're slow and don't impress anyone, and everyone wants a Cirrus instead. :D
 
Tell him the part is under that car over there......then you go and kick the blocks out that are holding it up when they dive in.
 
Have to say, if I called your business asking for directions and you told me to do my own homework, I'd have hung up on you. If you obviously don't need my business, I'll take it somewhere else.


JKG
 
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AggieMike88 said:
I pick up the phone to help the sales team during a busy period...

"Thanks for calling, how can I help you?"

"I need to come get a part I called about, how to I get to where you are?"​

"Okay, do you have a smart phone such as Android or iPhone?"

"I think so, it's a Samsung."​

"Good, that has the Google App. If you look up the name of the business, Google will provide a map and your phone's GPS..."

"(interrupts) Oh, I did use Google... that's how I got your phone number. But how do I get to your place?"​

"Go back to Google, look us up, find the map, and it will give you directio..."

"I don't know how to do that, can you just tell me your address? Then I'll put it in my car's GPS."​

-- = sigh = --​

I keep expecting them to respond, "... but it's got electrolytes, that's what plants crave"
Click to expand...

When the customer is ASKING FOR AN ADDRESS, You GIVE THEM AN ADDRESS.

Keep it simple. Give them exactly what they are asking for unless you cannot.
 
Still waiting for your follow-up to our communication on the 14th ref the head rests, Mike....

No offense meant....just sayin' 'stuff' works both ways. :)

Jim
 
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Probably not quite the reaction you were expecting.

Not everyone lives and dies by their apps and people who are satisfied with older technology are not wrong. Always remember that the voice on the phone (and the words on the screen) represent a person and not some ambigious piece of technology that you can mess with.

It has taken me 25 years on the internets to figure that out. I'm slow.

Respect.
 
Kinda amazing how brain dead and outright oblivious some people are. If the caller had simply paid attention to Mike's website for more than 5 seconds, his address is under the title "ADDRESS", less than 1/2" below all three of his phone numbers. If he would have looked about another 1/2" lower, there is a nice heading that says"Click Here For Directions to our location" Click on it and brings up a nice sized map with the facility tagged already.

I can understand asking for an address if it's not visible or within a reasonable space from a phone number on a contact page, but jeez, should Mike have to hold someone's hand to find the information that is prominently displayed on his webpage?

When you deal with people that are that informationally challenged, sometimes beating your head against the desk isn't enough.
 
Yeah the inability to use basic functionality kind of drives me nuts. Google and apple have made things like this idiot proof. If I google joes widget store+ location it will pull up a "card" with address, phone, streetview, reviews and 1 click buttons for all those things. You hit directions it will automatically open maps, if gps isn't on it will ask if you want it on, and it will take you there navigating around detours and traffic in real time.

Its like when family ask me for tech support and are amazed when I fix it. "how do you know all this stuff?" I googled the error code you were getting and followed the steps in the first link to fix the problem. IDK what it is that makes people not want to figure things out for themselves. Especially when it requires less effort than even asking someone on the phone.
 
I have a nice collection of road atlas I keep in my car, those are rose maps if you are under thirty, I was getting ready to drive from Tennessee to Montana and was going to spend some time going through Colorado and Wyoming along the way. So I whipped them out and started going through them, my ex step daughter who was fifteen at the time couldn't fathom how I could get across the country without a gps. She could not get it into her head how a map would work when driving!


Just for the record, maps are better than gps when driving. Gps is good for finding restaurants though.
 
In South Africa if you phone up a business and ask for an address to put into your GPS, they'll give you their latitude & longitude.

That hasn't caught on here - not sure why not. It's more accurate - you actually get the front door location of the business instead of just some generic office park.

And it's most of the time easier to read out over a phone vs. having to spell an address, and pretty much always easier to enter - often fewer characters and you can use a numeric keypad instead of a full keyword:

e.g.
1145 W 20th Ave, Oshkosh
vs.
43.995939 -88.565770
 
Craig said:
I can understand asking for an address if it's not visible or within a reasonable space from a phone number on a contact page, but jeez, should Mike have to hold someone's hand to find the information that is prominently displayed on his webpage?
Click to expand...

Kind of a choice of whether you want the sale or to complain. There's a reason for the old saying that "it never pays to argue with the customer"
 
You guys are assuming he can do more with a computer than look up a phone number.

I get that sometimes customers generate ID-10-T errors. I used to have one that could not remember to turn her printer on. That on/off interlock will get you every time.

Everyone brings different things, different goals and different aspirations to life. Clearly this guy's aspiration was not to master either Google or your website navigation. If you think you don't need those customers then there is a special chapter for you in the bankruptcy laws.
 
Craig said:
Kinda amazing how brain dead and outright oblivious some people are. If the caller had simply paid attention to Mike's website for more than 5 seconds, his address is under the title "ADDRESS", less than 1/2" below all three of his phone numbers. If he would have looked about another 1/2" lower, there is a nice heading that says"Click Here For Directions to our location" Click on it and brings up a nice sized map with the facility tagged already.

I can understand asking for an address if it's not visible or within a reasonable space from a phone number on a contact page, but jeez, should Mike have to hold someone's hand to find the information that is prominently displayed on his webpage?

When you deal with people that are that informationally challenged, sometimes beating your head against the desk isn't enough.
Click to expand...

Great point.

Here's mine. Stupid people still pay with green money. Businesses survive on cashflow. If you intentionally limit your customer base to exclude technophobes, thats your call. But it might be the wrong one, from a cashflow standpoint. Do you need their money? or not?

Choose wisely.
 
deonb said:
In South Africa if you phone up a business and ask for an address to put into your GPS, they'll give you their latitude & longitude.

That hasn't caught on here - not sure why not. It's more accurate - you actually get the front door location of the business instead of just some generic office park.

And it's most of the time easier to read out over a phone vs. having to spell an address, and pretty much always easier to enter - often fewer characters and you can use a numeric keypad instead of a full keyword:

e.g.
1145 W 20th Ave, Oshkosh
vs.
43.995939 -88.565770
Click to expand...
I am a techno geek, but I just don't see that catching on here. I always figured if I got bit by a rattler out on a trail run I would give that to the 911 operator, but I don't think memorizing a set of numbers like that is easier than an address.
 
Some customers you do blow off - they cost too much to service, and the return is too small for the time ($$$) they take to deal with.
 
I have had to explain to more than one customer that dryers do not come with a cord/plug and some swear up and down that I'm trying to upsell them. Walking them over to the dryer cord selection in store tends to help a most visualize why if my explanation doesn't but still.
 
John221us said:
I am a techno geek, but I just don't see that catching on here. I always figured if I got bit by a rattler out on a trail run I would give that to the 911 operator, but I don't think memorizing a set of numbers like that is easier than an address.
Click to expand...

Not sure in what circumstances you need to memorize it (except your own maybe to give it out), but it's less than 2 phone numbers.
 
Doggtyred said:
Great point.

Here's mine. Stupid people still pay with green money. Businesses survive on cashflow. If you intentionally limit your customer base to exclude technophobes, thats your call. But it might be the wrong one, from a cashflow standpoint. Do you need their money? or not?

Choose wisely.
Click to expand...


Choosing wisely sometimes means not dealing with someone. I've dealt with people that are at least this clueless and the time and effort required to complete the transaction are not worth it. Sometimes sacrificing the one customer is better in the long run for the business.
 
deonb said:
Not sure in what circumstances you need to memorize it (except your own maybe to give it out), but it's less than 2 phone numbers.
Click to expand...
Because a stream of numbers like that is prone to transcription errors and poor precision control.

The last thing I'd want is an ambulance going to 38.29145, -122.35732 instead of 38.92145, -122.35732. That's a 40 mile error.
 
Most of my elderly and disabled clients would be unable to navigate with anything other than verbal directions, repeated slowly, sometimes 3X over a 10 minute call, sometimes with follow-up phone calls too.
And I understand that some businesses do way too much volume or is so shorted staffed, they cannot accommodate that, but in mine I feel I have to. And I have the luxury of being able to - plus I get something (other than income) out of it; it's nice to help people.
 
Craig said:
Choosing wisely sometimes means not dealing with someone. I've dealt with people that are at least this clueless and the time and effort required to complete the transaction are not worth it. Sometimes sacrificing the one customer is better in the long run for the business.
Click to expand...
And sometimes you miss out. We have had customers you would probably deem "not worth your time" but we didn't blow themoff, showed some patience and interest and years later they are a substantial part of our business. You never know what customer is going to be the next big player.
 
EdFred said:
And sometimes you miss out. We have had customers you would probably deem "not worth your time" but we didn't blow themoff, showed some patience and interest and years later they are a substantial part of our business. You never know what customer is going to be the next big player.
Click to expand...

Had one of those recently. Got an HVAC guy out to look at a noisy fan on my furnace. He refused to even open it because it had rat droppings on it (it's in a crawlspace). Called me unreasonable for even asking him to work on it like that, and that it's not worth his time anyway for a fan.

Got someone else in - who had no problem working on it like that. And a week later they left with a $10'000 check after replacing the entire furnace and installing a new heat pump for me.

Funny, when I went to left a Yelp review to the original guy - there were a lot of comments about people about how this guy likes to select his customers. Which is fine... but every now and again you're going to reject a $100 job that would have turned into a $10k job, and you never know which time it's going to be.
 
Craig said:
Choosing wisely sometimes means not dealing with someone. I've dealt with people that are at least this clueless and the time and effort required to complete the transaction are not worth it. Sometimes sacrificing the one customer is better in the long run for the business.
Click to expand...

The interesting thing about the decision to "sacrifice" a prospective customer is that you have no idea how many other prospective customers you've lost as a result. It should only be done after much consideration, and rarely, and certainly not as a result of entirely justifiable requests (such as your business address). People talk, and listen, especially in smaller towns. If you think someone is too stupid to do business with, be careful--that someone could be you.


JKG
 
Craig said:
Kinda amazing how brain dead and outright oblivious some people are. If the caller had simply paid attention to Mike's website for more than 5 seconds, his address is under the title "ADDRESS", less than 1/2" below all three of his phone numbers. If he would have looked about another 1/2" lower, there is a nice heading that says"Click Here For Directions to our location" Click on it and brings up a nice sized map with the facility tagged already.

I can understand asking for an address if it's not visible or within a reasonable space from a phone number on a contact page, but jeez, should Mike have to hold someone's hand to find the information that is prominently displayed on his webpage?

When you deal with people that are that informationally challenged, sometimes beating your head against the desk isn't enough.
Click to expand...
Exactly. We have the same sort of problem in my business. We make information extremely available to people and yet people get mad at us because we haven't held their hand in some special way for them.
 
Tough to make calls based on anecdotes - you might be blowing off a bigger sell later. Or maybe not. I was cold blooded about it - how much was I spending to get and retain the customer? How much time was a problem child taking away from "better" and more lucrative customers?
 
Sometimes when I'm dealing with someone on the phone I might give a small lie to avoid a much longer explanation of why I don't want to be lead down the path they're trying to lead me down. I can see "I don't know how" as a shortcut to explaining that it's raining and my internet access isn't working(I have no cell signal at home and my home internet is wireless... when it rains it saturates leaves in the trees between me and the tower and I lose my connection for a while). See? See how long that took? And you wouldn't want to hear about it and I wouldn't want to explain it.

I am kind of a technology nerd and I do know exactly what sort of phone I have, how to use it, and dozens of irrelevant details on how it works. Not everyone is like that, for some people it's just this useful thing they carry around and hope does what they need it to. I can't comprehend how you wouldn't find it interesting but I don't know why people still insist on making huge bowls of cole slaw either.
 
I'm sorry but the person on the phone managed to Google auto salvage, got the telephone number to call, and as far as I can tell, even IF they never leave the Google window, I see several links that have addresses very prominent in them. Even a technosavvyless person who can use Google had to have the info in front of them. I did from both desktop and mobile.
On the other hand, either just hand them the address,, put them on hold while you wander outside to get it, or just google the damned thing yourself. Who knows who is answering the phone at any business. They might not have that info.
 
silver-eagle said:
...even IF they never leave the Google window, I see several links that have addresses very prominent in them. Even a technosavvyless person who can use Google had to have the info in front of them. ...
Click to expand...

I beg to differ. I know people who cannot do what you described and nor do they want to. They just don't care.

Classic error in business is assuming everyone else has the same goals you do.
 
My wife recently had a trainee in at her workplace who didn't last long, super nice gal by the sounds of it but had been out of the workforce for some time. While she was learning the computer system she was told to click on something.....she actually lifted the mouse and poked it against the monitor. She might not have been able to figure out a website.
 
deonb said:
In South Africa if you phone up a business and ask for an address to put into your GPS, they'll give you their latitude & longitude.

That hasn't caught on here - not sure why not. It's more accurate - you actually get the front door location of the business instead of just some generic office park.

And it's most of the time easier to read out over a phone vs. having to spell an address, and pretty much always easier to enter - often fewer characters and you can use a numeric keypad instead of a full keyword:

e.g.
1145 W 20th Ave, Oshkosh
vs.
43.995939 -88.565770
Click to expand...

I recently returned from Europe, where I saw just what you're talking about - GPS coordinates on hotel websites, signs, rental car returns, etc. I liked it.

Example:
http://www.goldentulipbrusselsairport.be/en
 
I can remember 1234 main street much easier than
32.4567485, 147.2665477
 
If you are in a business that requires customer service then you give them what they need with a smile or you shouldn't deal with customers. I know a guy that worked with my dad who is my age (41) that is literally a rocket scientist that carries a flip phone because he doesn't need or want anything fancy.

Everyone is different and not everybody likes gadgets. Some of the posters on this thread seem to think that people that don't use tech in the same way that they do are stupid. I bet those same technology challanged people would think that the guy that couldn't rebuild a transmission or weld a sub or rocket quality part were somewhat lacking in their brain power.

Sent from my SM-N920P using Tapatalk
 
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