About a month ago, a friend posted a deal on Google Reader from Dell: an XBox 360 Elite sold, after rebate, at about a $90 discount from any other outlet online. As somebody that got addicted to a friend's Netflix streaming account (which you can interface through XBox Live), I had been shopping for an XBox and jumped at the deal. A month later, I still haven't received my XBox.
Essentially, Dell shipped the XBox without requiring a signature via FedEx, without allowing me to request that option. As I live in the heart of Washington D.C., leaving a big box that says "Dell" somewhere on it at my front door isn't a great idea. Long story short: FedEx claimed to deliver the package, and I never received it. So I called Dell, who told me that there was nothing they could do, that they couldn't ship me another XBox Elite (with the customer service representative claiming they no longer manufactured them - ha!) and refunded my money (after offering to upsell me to a Playstation 3 or another product...).
This left a bitter taste in my mouth for a few reasons. One, had I been able to request a signature upon delivery, it wouldn't have happened. Two, I was still without my product. Three, I now have to miss out on the $90 discount - $50 of which was due to a manufacturer's rebate that is no longer being offered as I've missed the purchase window. I felt Dell owed me more than an attempt to sell me another product or a simple "hey, sorry, here's your money back, see ya later." At the very least, I hoped they would offer to find a replacement product for the same price, or offer store credit to make up the difference and for my inconvenience in being out almost $300 for a few weeks. I made no headway in calling their service line - so I took my case to Twitter.
Dell has had some of the greatest success in selling products via Twitter using their @DellOutlet handle. As such, I knew that they were active and responsive to customers online - so I started sending messages to the @DellOutlet handle detailing my dissatisfaction with the way Dell had handled the incident, tagging my posts with the hashtag #fail - a known internet meme. I did this knowing a few things. One, Twitter is a public forum, so anybody searching for "#fail," "DellOutlet" or "Dell" would come across my posts detailing my issues with the company. Two, Twitter has amazing potential to organize groups of people - so my complaint could quickly find other complaints, creating a bigger problem for the company if we were able to organize. Three, I had nothing to lose, and it didn't cost me anything to do.
Within hours, two representatives from Dell had contacted me via Twitter, encouraged me to follow them so we could move to direct messages, and finally, requested that I email them details of my order and my complaint so that they could look into it in greater detail. This all occurred on Friday - so I'm still waiting to see what the final outcome of this experiment will be. But I've already learned a very important lesson: Twitter worked like a charm to get to a person with authority and capability to help me with my problem. The public nature of the medium pushed a quicker response. No longer was Dell simply dealing with somebody on a closed phone line, but a customer voicing discontent in public for everybody to see. That gives them a much greater incentive to help me resolve my issues as soon as possible.
The reason for bringing this all up here is as an application to advocacy or political campaigns. Once you enter the Twittersphere, you have to respond to its users - even if you wouldn't have done so the same way in other mediums. I got NOWHERE on the phone with Dell. But the minute I made my complaints public for the world to see, I had multiple higher level employees asking to work with me to make things right. It was the only option they had, really - the potential damage that even one critical voice can cause on Twitter is too great, especially given the ability to easily organize other users. Dell has carved out an important, profitable business on Twitter, and negative posts on the network can impact that reputation. Political campaigns and advocacy organizations have to keep this in mind at all times - or they risk turning one angry or upset supporter or critic into an organizer that can cause much greater damage without much effort. Concurrently, the flip side is also true - political and advocacy campaigns can USE Twitter to impact other organizations or companies to provoke action.
Once things get resolved with Dell, I'll post back here on the final verdict...but for now, I'm very impressed with the ability of Twitter to cut through the noise and get results.
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