I had my first real run-in with this today. It made me so angry that this individual, as a brand, thought that commenting or interacting with their consumers was "beneath them" and reflected poorly on their professionalism. Yet, they don't understand why their social media following isn't growing. I'm not demanding constant attention, but recognizing I'm your consumer and I'm of value to you would be nice.

Tyler, you're right. But allow me to say that you restated the obviousness, which is that big companies don't care about their customer's experiences.

Corporate America doesn't give a shit about people.They care about numbers. What makes them change business models? Numbers. What do investors care about? Numbers. It's all about making it to the next quarter.

They still act like media and people can be gamed and manipulated. 99% of the "social media success stories" that companies have are all about reacting to customer experiences. Those aren't successful -- that's merely damage control. That's old-school and nobody cares about that.

Example: Who remembers the United Airlines "Breaks Guitar" fiasco. Did their response get any coverage or acknowledgement from real people -- NO. People only remember that UAL ignored a customers' request after multiple attempts to bypass policy to amend a process. Reactive efforts only go so far.

This is primarily due to fact the baby-boomer generation still holds positions in high places in big companies. Once Gen-X/Y takes over, companies will evolve and come to the reality that people aren't stupid. Look at most startups that are privately funded and doing well -- all under the age of 40.

When it comes to big companies, they get a big fat "F" for social media or simply consumer experience. I can't recall ONE publicly traded company that I have loyalty for. That's pathetic and is a reflection of the state of American companies.

I once worked for a big company and trust me, as much as customers built the equity of the company, I was the minority who actually gave a crap about users. Naturally the overall attitude against customers perturbed me and receiving my severance check was the best thing that happened to me.


~Joe