I posted last week about the doublespeak I hear on airplanes, and how refreshing it would be if companies would say what they mean in social media. I got some great comments on my post from Sara Livingston and DJ Waldow and AnnMaria De Mars that got me thinking.
Yes, we all want companies to be more honest and transparent. We would all love it if a company said, “I’m sorry. That sucks. We screwed up. Let us fix it.” Some companies do, but a lot of companies are scared.
Why?
Well, let’s look at the current situation with BP. They’ve taken a tremendous amount of flak for the work of their flacks, and it’s arguable whether or not there is anything they could say at this point that would make the situation any better. But what would happen if they said, “It’s our fault. We screwed up and we’re sorry”?
It would be used against them in court.
In many ways the traditional customer service model, especially consumer interactions with merchants, is adversarial in nature.
Consumer: “You took my money and you screwed up and now you should pay.”
Company: “You gave us your money and we aren’t sure we can trust what you’re saying and so we won’t pay unless you make us.”
Social media does create a pathway to make customer relationships more human, and allow everyone involved to see the people on the other side as people.
But if that’s going to work, we as consumers have to accept that companies are made up of people and people make mistakes. That means dropping the self-righteous indignation. Lots of people seem to deal with the powerlessness they feel in their everyday lives by exploiting their power as a customer. And lots of people are constantly on the lookout for a reason to sue.
That doesn’t work if you want openness and authenticity on both sides. The only way companies — and their legal departments — will become comfortable with acting and talking like humans is if consumers avoid the temptation to use it against them.
photo by Kyle MacKenzie