Series of Tubes

IT Expo: At least the steak was good ...

People have referred jokingly to Florida as God's Waiting Room. I was just there, and I'm not convinced that the office visit we're waiting on is upstairs.

Miami was a humid, foggy swamp for my day's sojourn at IT Expo, but it's not the weather that had me down. It was my hotel room. It wasn't even the hotel room itself; it was the fact it was provided to me by another hotel, one that doesn't care what I think of it.

I had booked a room for one night at the Newport Beachside Hotel and Resort, a lovely little spot with parakeets and very nice ceiling fans in the lobby. Quite lovely, really; I felt as though I was in luxury's palm from the moment I arrived. Of course, it wasn't to last. They told me, upon my arrival, that "unforeseen difficulties" meant I couldn't have the room I booked, or indeed any room at the place whatsoever. The concierge was nice enough to provide a letter of introduction (and $10 car fare) to the Ramada Marco Polo, further down the road. I was already rather far from the Miami Beach Convention Center and the new hotel would be even farther, but I saw no point in arguing. After all, the guy said they had no room, and the Ramada was "very nice, just like this place" in his words.

Note to travelers: "very nice" means in hotel-speak just what it means in dating, dining, or any other human endeavor where you don't know what you're getting ahead of time. It means "I am lying to you; the (person, place, thing) sucks, but once you're gone it's no longer my problem."

The Ramada was to  Miami Beach resort hotels what boy bands are to modern music. While it qualified as such a place—it was in Miami Beach, within a reasonable distance of the ocean, and had rooms to stay in—it felt more like a retirement home. I always thought the elderly who lived in Miami owned homes there, but it seems I've been wrong all these years; they hang out in crappy hotels and play bridge. Yes, there was a bridge tournament being played in the basement when I arrived. The elevators had old-person smell.

(Please note that I have nothing against the elderly, and in fact I managed a few nice conversations while I was confined to this little corner of purgatory. It's just creepy when I go on a business trip and see, in great profusion, what time and gravity have in store for me.)

The hallways smelled less like old people, but only because they smelled more like an old dog that had been left outside in the rain. The room was clean, technically, but it felt old, used, second-hand. Kind of like me, actually. The air conditioner was largely non-functional (in Florida, yet) and thrummed like a farm tractor on idle. There was not enough light. There wasn't even a desk. The wireless Internet barely had enough signal to get me connected—and I couldn't without calling tech support. That was complicated by the fact that my phone couldn't call outside the building until I had it fixed. No room service. A view of the pool. Plumbing fixtures that were only minimally attached.

Now, everybody's had bad hotel experiences, myself included, so this wasn't actually the low point of my life or anything. And I know that not all accommodations are created equal (Ramada Inns being somewhat lower down in the rankings), so I can't say I resented what they provided me per se; if I'd booked the Ramada, I'd have expected less than the best. But I booked the Newport, and they smiled and apologized and sent me to the ass end of hotelry. I will not be angry with Ramada; I will save my ire for the Newport, because their backup option absolutely sucked and I have no way to set things right except by writing them this poison pen blog post.

That said, the food at the Ramada was surprisingly good, though I admit I only had one meal there. The menu was fairly limited, and the restaurant was more like a tremendous Elk Lodge with tables, but I had a perfectly-cooked 12-oz. sirloin strip, juicy, tender, lightly seasoned with cumin (possibly chili powder with an excess of cumin) and very well trimmed. It was better than some I've had at honest-to-goodness steak houses. The vegetable (broccoli, since they'd run out of mixed veg) was steamed perfectly and very tasty. That dinner surprised me so much that I regretted not being able to get my free breakfast the next morning. Alas.

IT Expo, or what I saw of it
My reason for being in Florida was to moderate a panel discussion at the aforementioned conference. I can't say for sure why I was chosen, since my topic—"Leveraging VoIP in the Contact Center"—is not one with which I have a lot of experience. Fortunately, I didn't have to have much beyond my normal level of business technology competence, as my panel was a gifted bunch. We had never laid eyes on one another until 10 minutes before the session (which was at 8 a.m., incidentally, further proof that the coordinators didn't know who they were dealing with), but the discussion went off smoothly. Thanks to panelists Brian Spraetz of NICE Systems, Rachel Wentink of Interactive Intelligence, and especially to Srinivas Mantripragada of RedShift Networks, whose slide deck got things off on the right foot and also ate up a good 15 minutes.

The big question seemed to be data security. While voice conversations have never been truly secure, what with the old-school Phone Phreaks and anybody who can get hold of a technician's butt set, they're even worse now that voice is just another kind of data. In the end, the consensus seemed to be that the war between hackers and security vendors will remain more or less at parity, and the most important places to tighten up gaps are in business processes and social exploits. Most security breaches are inside jobs, or are perpetrated by people who know how to take advantage of another person's natural inclination to be helpful.

I think I'm done venting for the moment, and I thank you for humoring me. My next post will probably back to the usual CRM goodness; I'm trying to work out a message on that topic that fits my outlook and isn't just repeating what other, smarter people have said before me, and you fine folks will be the first witnesses. My previous post was the start of that; now that this gripe-fest is out of the way, perhaps I can get back on track.

Doing a 180 on the 360-degree view

One of the pillars of CRM thought is that businesses want to have a 360-degree view of the customer. Every vendor says so, and so do most (if not all) analysts. Clearly, we're not a very creative bunch. The idea is that, by knowing your customer's demographics, purchasing history, interests, and preferences, you can better engage and delight your customers, anticipate their needs, and all that rot.

I don't deny the value of the old way, but it's not enough. The 360-degree view of the customer is good to have, but it’s not what you need. Think about the nature of relationships if you doubt me -- could you be really comfy in a relationship with somebody if they knew a lot more about you than you did about them? There's a reason most folks don't go out of their way to hug FBI agents, security camera watchers, and known voyeurs.

Today, the customer must have a 360-degree view of you, whether you’re comfy with that or not. You don’t own them; they own you. Is this me going all turnabout-is-fair-play, affirmative-action for customers? Not really. It's more about equalizing the relationship. Businesses already have all the customer info they need, and often more than they can use. If they can't hold up their end with all that, screw 'em. Customers, on the other hand, get most of their corporate information from news reports and from other customers' rumors.

I don't know about you, but I don't somebody basing their dealings with me on rumors and hearsay over which I have no control. Hell no -- I want them based on rumors and hearsay I started. (I'm not advocating companies lie to their prospects, unless it's tongue-in-cheek Joe Isuzu stuff. (Wiki link for the young or forgetful.)

Customers want to be faithful to a company, despite all the research that says they aren't. We choose brands and stick with them because it reduces the complications of everyday life, especially purchasing decisions. Nobody really wants to carefully evaluate every choice, and brands are a shorthand way to associate certain qualities. (One of the clever folks I spoke to recently said as much, and I'd cite or link it if I could remember who it was. My mad search skillz are totally failing me.)

Businesses can earn loyalty with honesty and openness. Would you rather find out about a product recall through an investigative news report, from a federal agency that orders the recall, or from the company that is recalling its products voluntarily "just in case"? Stupid question -- you'd rather hear about it immediately, from any source -- but the company should know first, be able to tell you first, and you'll feel a lot better about that company than if the nasty truth had to be forced out.

There's more to building trust and loyalty than  merely owning up to mistakes, of course. But trumpeting your virtues to anybody who listens is a great way to turn them off. This is as true in business as it is in high school. If you can get people to want to know how awesome you are, however, that's gold. A business that creates a portal (or has a supportive customer create a fan site) where it can post everything -- the good and the bad -- is well on the way to having a real relationship with its customers. A relationship where they can grow old together.

More on this topic soonish.

It's not my fault -- blame Warner Bros.

It's starting to seem like I spend all my time apologizing to you for not posting more often. This time, it had more to do with persistent lack of home Internet service than anything else. It was out for about 4.5 days recently, and I wasn't about to break into my office building over the New Year respite in order to add content. I like you folks, but c'mon.

It's because of my ongoing connectivity woes (and the fact I'm currently able to get online) that I dedicate this post to Time Warner Cable of New York or, as I think of them, the Goniffs. For those of you not in the know, goniff is Yiddish for thief. I'd prefer shyster (one who deals unethically or unscrupulously), but that term is so associated with lawyers that I might confuse people.

I've had three, possibly four, service appointments with Time Warner since signing up for RoadRunner and cable TV, and all of them have been Internet-related. This doesn't even count the tech-support calls that were handled by phone. Each time I was told a different story about what wasn't working. First, the cable was too long and the signal was degrading over the extra distance. Then it was a splitter that was installed for no reason outside the apartment -- with nothing connected to it, so I can't even say somebody was stealing my cable. Next, my modem was bad.

This last time, I got two different stories on the same call. When I'd had enough of no Internet, I called and explained my situation. I was told, despite massive evidence to the contrary, that my router was conflicting with RoadRunner, causing some sort of mystical IP loop that left me unable to connect. I was worn down at this point, and agreed to let them bring me their own hardware which I would rent the same way I do the cable box. That was before they got to the apartment. This time, they told me (actually, they told Meaghan's sister Emily, who arrived today from North Carolina and was immediately put to work waiting for the repair truck) that I had a weak signal and I'd have to move my book cases before they could fix it.

Weak signal. AFTER cutting out 10m of extra cable. AFTER removing a pointless splitter. AFTER telling me their hardware and whatnot wasn't compatible with my Linksys router -- probably the most popular brand in the United States if not the world. AFTER walking into the apartment and discovering that the connection was, in fact, working. (It came back to life shortly after I called for service. Convenient, no?)

Can you feel the waves of heat and hate radiating off my head right now? I'm convinced Time Warner Cable trains its technicians and CSRs as completely as Friendly's restaurants train their wait staff, which is to say not at all. Except perhaps they get a course in toying with customers. Oh, they're good at that. It feels like RoadRunner is operated by Wile E. Coyote, and I'm sick of them. They get one more chance, and then it's off to DSL land. I'm not even going to play my "I'm a CRM journalist, appease me or I will crucify you in print" trump card. I will just walk away. And then crucify them in print.