Google, Meet @Zappos
There’s little doubt that Google is one of the great technology innovators of all time. The pace at which they introduce new products and features is staggering and I use a host of their products personally and professionally.
That’s why when LaunchSquad began to grow and as our technology needs became more complex, we made the shift to Google Apps. With the premium edition, we have a great, ad-free email program that’s easy to set up and manage and seamlessly works across computing devices. Google Docs provides an easy way for the team to share documents, which is particularly useful for collaboration between our San Francisco and New York offices. Anecdotally, I’ve noticed a boost in productivity around the office since we’ve made the switch.
Unfortunately, just as Om recently broke up with his iPhone due to continuous service interruptions, I’m seriously considering a break with Google Apps. In our case, the problem is two-fold: 1) we’ve had a growing number of service outages, and delays and lost emails and 2) Google’s customer service and support sucks.
I get that Google Apps is either free or very low cost for users. Indeed, Forrester recently reported that cloud-based email is the cheapest option for companies with fewer than 15,000 employees. And, generally speaking, companies want to keep support costs low for products that don’t generate significant revenue (Google is generating a miniscule $10 million from its Apps suite.)
Henry Blodget says Google Apps doesn’t bring in the dough because Google is having a hard time converting free Apps customers to paid ones. I say it’s because Google doesn’t have customers, or customer service, in its DNA. Maybe the two are connected. After all, you wouldn’t expect a company with its roots in search algorithms and advertising optimization to have a soft spot for IT admins and information workers.
If Google wants to keep our business and remain threat to Microsoft and its Office Live initiative, it should embrace customer service as its #1 priority for 2009.
Google, meet @zappos, aka Tony Hsieh, CEO of Zappos.
@zappos is building his online shoe business into the Nordstrom of e-commerce and the legend of its customer service grows daily. As BusinessWeek’s Keith McFarland wrote last September, Zappos offers extremely fast shipping at no cost and will cover the return shipping if you are dissatisfied for any reason at any time. As important, customer service reps are given a lot of leeway to make sure every customer is an enthusiastic customer.
Google on the other hand, makes it difficult if not impossible to get customer care. Support questions are managed almost exclusively via email and, in our experience, are rarely answered (we have half a dozen or so out there somewhere). Google aims to help customers self-support through a knowledge base and user forum, but it’s poorly moderated and lacks depth of solutions. Most of our problems are so fundamental (emails getting lost or bounced or service downtime), that forums don’t help anyway. We’ve been able to get live support once when a team member and former Googler pulled some strings with a former co-worker.
So while Zappos is building its brand on customer service and accesibility, Google is alienating customers and hurting its long-term prospects in an enormous market. Why can’t Google, a company with more than 10,000 employees listen and respond to customers? Not that I have high hopes, but I’m @throck if anyone has the answer.