Thursday, November 04, 2010

Turns out @Clearwire isn't the only one lying about download speeds

I'm going to skip the urge to write yet another post on my horrible experiences with #clear.. having given up when contacted by their social media guy who said he'd either fix things in a day or make sure my contract was cancelled and issued a refund.

Instead, I got turned over to collections that same day.

But no, I'm not here to repeat that I've never met anyone who tried #clearwire and had a bad experience. Or that their parent company @Sprint has spotty 4G coverage at best. Not my ax to grind today.

I just want to #amplify this graphic.

American mobile providers are so good at hype that they actually have arguments over which is fastest on a standard that is about 10% of the real standard.. saying anything to get you into a contract for service that is continually behind the rest of the world.

How do we let them get away with this?

I know better is possible.I've watch @CoxCable learn to interact with customers, offer me a "it works or you don't pay" ultra super fast service that I'm happily paying 5 times as much for. When it has a problem, I tweet and someone answers me.

My hope for the future is that we all will learn to DEMAND that a company perform. The locked in contracts are dinosaurs. I'm betting that the telcos will soon retire to tell stories of the good old days when they had their customers confused.

So who's going to take their place?

Posted via email from Warren Whitlock's Best Seller Book Marketing Posterous

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Friday, August 20, 2010

Trying to find a human at @Clear

Amplify helped me connect with Cox Cable.. that came out very good. We had a conversation on Twitter within a couple of hours.

Today, I'm going back to CLEAR or Clearwire or whatever they call this division of Sprint.

I posted the humorous chat I had with a Clear rep today.. and detailed my story. Like the Cox situation.. I'm mostly trying to reach out and find a rep who doesn't mind talking on any social media channel. Twitter is preferred, but Facebook is fine too. Of course, we want comments on this post or the LaserPage.com blog with the full story.

Know anyone that works for CLEAR? Tell them Warren is looking for them.

If you don't know anyone on social media that works for CLEAR then TELL EVERYONE.. Retweet this to your network and let's find at least one human being to bring to the conversation.

I'll be talking about this on my Social Media Radio show, on my other blogs and anywhere else I can. This time, I do want my problem fixed.. but the PRIMARY goal is to open a real conversation.

Disclaimer: ANY conversations will be reported. I've put 50+ hours into talking in private with Clear.. now I'm reporting everything you say.. even when you attempt to "take it offline"

C'mon Clear. Talk to me.

I want to LOVE WiMax.. I was begging for it for YEARS and now I'm not giving up just because you got bought by a big uncaring telco cell carrier (Spring is next on my love the big company tour)

Amplify’d from laserpage.com
Logo

This is representative of every exchange I’ve had with Clear or Clearwire or whatever Sprint allows them to call themselves this week. Nice people, mostly clueless and ultimately dropping me at another dead end.

So I yelled a bit more and got them to schedule a service tech. Only a one week wait.  This tech came out and said such things as

  • The newest modem they sent you is crap

  • The tower across the street isn’t accepting traffic and overloading the one a block away

  • There is new software that will let me see what tower signal is, but I missed the training on that

  • I can’t do anything. It’s those dang tower guys. They’ll probably have to reboot something. I’ll put in a ticket and they’ll get to it in a week or so. I don’t know if that will work.

  • The tech support people screw up modems. I’ve reset yours and it will be fine (refusing to hear that I had tested extensively BEFORE they reset it using settings that had been better for 3 weeks).

Does Clear work for you?

Are there any Clear reps working online that are willing to address the social media outcries for help?

Do you know anyone that will talk to me publicly?

Read more at laserpage.com

Posted via email from Warren Whitlock's Best Seller Book Marketing Posterous

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Wednesday, August 04, 2010

What do you do if you don't have @Comcast? (looking for @CoxCable to engage)

@comcastcares give unbelievable service to Twitter users. Has done this for YEARS now. Every Social Media training includes homage to their excellent team and we've had Frank on the Social Media Radio show

I live in an area with Cox Cable service.

As far as I can tell, they have excellent technology, and for a years I used them as an ISP and loved the service.

We went bi-coastal for a few months in 2009, at one point we were in Vegas and shut off the cable because we don't watch TV and were leaving town for months. We had just bought a CLEAR modem that was supposed to work in Atlanta and Vegas and I thought I was a pretty smart shopper. I assumed I'd go back to Cox in a few months to have dual source as a backup.

Next time we were in Vegas, I got a bill from Cox. Call them to inquire and make sure the bills would stop, and then paid the bill to avoid the hassle.

Months later, knock at the door. Cox guy wanted to get paid or he "has to take our cable box" We didn't have one, so we knew Cox has screwed up. We called a third time to make sure it was off.

Another two months go by and another guy shows up at the door.

Then we get calls on our voice mail telling us that the "cable box people have a special offer for you."  I know from years ago when a friend did cable collection, this is a highly thought out elaborate process they use to get people to reinstate, pay a bill, or at least get to the write off stage. The cable industry has always been very thorough having something at every point of contact to bring you back into the fold.

I've also had an issue with another cable company that LEASED me one of the first cable modems for five years, collect many times the cost of the equipment, and then put a ding for $175 on my credit report when I moved and left it in the house... I KNOW to be careful with cable disconnects :)

A few months back, I decide to let bygones be bygones and take the $19/mo ISP offer to have a back up to CLEAR (they are another brewing). I call Cox and tell them I want the package. I suspect that they will bring up the bill, and assume that at some point we'll work it out or I'll grumble and pay them.

Woman on the phone tells me "sorry, we can't sell you service. You have an outstanding bill".. When asked what I can do, she says "nothing"

Well, it's 4 moths later. They don't have my monthly payment and whatever dozen services they would have talked us into adding.

But that's not why I'm posting.

Today, my co-author on Twitter Revolution, @CoachDeb tweeted about her AT&T ISP service being down and how the tech came out and mad it worse. We had a brief exchange of tweets and NOBODY responded (that I could see).

There are thousands of people that see Deb's tweets, many more see mine. Our references to Cox and AT&T are there for any of the thousands of employees of those compannies to see. I know from expereince that Sprint, T-Mobile, Verizon and one network engineer at Clear see their brands and respond.

And CoxCable has an EASY example to follow.. Maybe the best big company use of Twitter is @ComcastCares

Today, nothing...

This is not the first time I've tried. I've send tweets to @CoxCable and use many variations of Cox Cable and Coxcable in tweets with hashtags, without, with @ sign and without. If anyone were monitoring, they would have noticed.

I've already done a blog post about CoxCable. Got a lot of "Cox Sucks" tweets but nothing from the company.

I'd love to have a happy ending to this story. I'm not looking for special treatment, just a sign that someone has started monitoring social media. I'll probably buy some service from Cox just to add to the story.. but whether I do or not.. I think it's time we all start SQUAWKING about companies that haven't learned to listen.

Do this with LOVE. The people working at Cox are people just like you and me. They will respond when they start listening. The companies that have employees listening and acting as good people do will thrive in the future. I don't want my local cable company to be one that doesn't survive. I want them to "listen and love" (the marketing strategy for the 21st Century).

If you know anyone who works for Cox that may be listening, please let them know about this post.

If you don't know anyone who works for Cox, tell everyone in your network. I believe that someone who know someone who reads this will help us show Cox some love and bring them with us into the 21st Century.

Posted via email from Warren Whitlock's Best Seller Book Marketing Posterous

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