Everything About Business Except The Bottom Line: FunnyBusiness

WSJ answers top 10 customer service pet peeves

To The Satellite Sisters who entertained me quite a bit this afternoon as they discussed the Wall Street Journal's article today called Pet Peeves in Customer Service. Of course my pet peeve is that the WSJ is subscription-based and unless you pay, you can't read the article.

The article provides explanations these  customer service situations that can create meltdowns of enormous proportion.

1. When you call a customer-service line, an automated voice often asks you to punch in your account information. So why does the live operator ask you for that information all over again?

2. Why can't stores ever deliver an appliance or piece of furniture when they say they will? And why do I have to sit around all day waiting for them to show up?

3. Why are public-address systems frequently inaudible? This isn't just a problem with antiquated speakers in subway stations. Brand-new sound systems in airports and other transportation hubs can also be impossible to hear.

4. Why can't you buy a non proprietary cellphone and use it with any carrier, the way you can do with a land line?

 

5. How come banks immediately take money out of your account for debit- card transactions, but when it comes to depositing money it can take as long as five days for a check to clear and be posted to your account?

6. Why do you have to pay for incoming and out- going minutes on cellphones? Essentially, a cellphone carrier is collecting twice for one call -- from the caller and from the person receiving the call. Shouldn't only outgoing calls cost money?

 

7. Why do rental-car companies charge so much money to put gas in the tank, forcing travelers to drive around near airports looking for a normal gas station so they don't get gouged? Also, why is rental-car insurance so confusing? You already have insurance through your credit- card company or your own auto insurer, so why do they try to sell you double coverage?

8. If companies are allowed to sell personal information about you to third-party marketers, even without your consent, why can't you just sell your own information directly to marketers?

9. Why is mobile directory assistance so unreliable? It seems that when you call from your cellphone, they can never find the number you need.

10. Why are items in hotel minibars so expensive? Do candy bars and bottles of water really have to cost $5? While we're at it, why do cheap and midprice hotels often provide wireless access free, while expensive hotels charge for it?

 

On the radio, The Satellite Sisters focused most of their discussion about the inability to get a correct number from  directory assistance.

WSJ's explanation is that there are too many database's around. However, a former directory assistance operator said that the problem was two fold. First, she agreed there are some very bad databases out there and some have numbers that are three years old. In addition, the phone companies put a lot of pressure on the directory assistance operators to handle the call in a certain amount of time. According to this former directory assistance operator, if they can't find the number you want immediately, they're not going to try any harder because it will look bad on their record.

Here's the thing. Even though I read the explanations, it didn't make me feel any better. I still hate going through all the levels of an automated voice mail system and all the reasons in the world won't change that.

Notes From The Road -- Passengers Tell You The Darndest Things

  It wasn't until we began our descent  into the Twin Cities that I learned the passenger sitting next me was a prosecuting attorney on his way to interview a defense witness in a very high profile case.

Despite the fact that I shared I was a freelance journalist, he chatted with me about the case and the witness who by now has undergone his interrogation.

The case involves the death of an infant back in the 90s. A man was convicted of the murder and spent 10 years in jail before a higher court reversed his sentence on grounds that his defense had not provided proper counsel. He has been out of jail for nearly 5 years.

The county has recently reopened that case and my seat-mate is part of the prosecution team. The defense witness he was interviewing is a pathologist. Evidently the state maintains there is no way that the head injuries that caused the baby's death could have occurred from her falling out of her high chair.

The defense pathologist says those injuries could have occurred that way. So it is  a professional he said-she said. The prosecution's strategy is to attack the credibility of the pathologist. That is what my seatmate was hoping to do.

He indicated that her resume had some questionable entries and it was on those points that he was hoping to put into question her integrity as a witness.

I have no idea whether he succeeded or whether the pathologist was able to explain away the discrepencies.
He did tell me her name and gave me her website.

I will be checking in with her next week.

Social Marketing via Beef Cake Calendar

  Social Marketing...not to be confused with Social Media... has been around since 1971. The basic concept -- an organization uses commercial marketing methods to affect positive social change.

For consumers it means that you purchase products knowing that the profits or a portion of the profits go to a cause that you support.

That's where this calendar comes in. From the AP by way of Sister Toldjah this calendar features marines and former marines who fought in Iraq. Two of the men featured in the calendar were injured in the war.

“It’s a stopgap effort to help people where government programs leave off,” said Rudy Reyes, who served two tours in Iraq and one in Afghanistan and is on the calendar’s cover. “This is a way for citizens to help citizens.”

The “America’s Heroes” calendar is being sold by Freedom is Not Free, a San Diego-based nonprofit group that helps injured service members and their families with such expenses as travel, mortgage and utility bills and special beds for burn victims.

Reyes and the other men who appear in the glossy 2007 lineup served in Iraq in Marine reconnaissance units. Sgt. James Wright, 31, who lost his hands and part of his leg, appears on the back cover in full uniform, saluting with what’s left of his right arm.

Several members of the group, promoting the calendar on a cross-country tour, said Thursday they have medical conditions, ranging from combat stress-related symptoms to injuries to their feet, knees, hips and backs from carrying combat loads of more than 200 pounds.

When service members come back, “many don’t have the financial or emotional support to get back to daily life,” said former Sgt. Michael Saucier, 24, of Prior Lake, Minn., who served two Iraq tours and is now a carpenter’s apprentice in Lake Tahoe, Nev.

The calendar can be purchased at the FREEDOM IS NOT FREE

The Grandma of this particular genre of Charity Calendars was the subject of a film called Calendar Girls --   based on a real event in 1999 when about a group of middle-age British Women posed nude and sold calendars to raise money for an organization that supported the terminally ill. 

The British Women thought they would see a couple hundred copies of their calendar. Instead they sold over 300,000.

McVirus,McLaw Suit,McGadget, McSales

It feels like the vacuum cleaner phenomenon.That's when you need to buy a new vacuum cleaner, open up the paper( if you still get a hard copy of the paper)and voila..there is a vacuum cleaner sale. Now what you learn in an advertising class is that vacuum cleaner sale ad has probably been there for months but until you need the vacuum cleaner you never saw the ad before. That's how I feel about all the bizarre stuff I found about McDonalds this week. Some of it just happened last week, some a month ago..it was all new to me.

First, there's the contaminated MP3 player.

Under the category that you can't win for losing, McDonald's Japan has issued a recall of some 10,000 MP3 Players it gave away as part of a promotion. As reported in the Register

"Punters received the contaminated gift after purchasing a large drink form the fast-food chain in Japan and submitting a serial number contained on the beverage holder as part of a competition, sponsored by McDonalds and Coca-cola. Users who connected the McDonald's-branded MP3 player to their Windows PC were exposed to spyware code programmed to transmit their web passwords and other sensitive information to hackers. The cause of the accidental infection is unclear but past experience suggests a contaminated machine involved in loading content onto the players is the likely culprit."

Then there's the judge who reversed himself and said two teenage girls could sue McDonald's for making them fat because of misleading advertising. ABC's John Stossel is not amused about the case that is now entering its fourth year.

"Whatever happened to self-responsibility? Sure, McDonald's commercials put the best spin on its products. All advertisers do that. Individuals should exercise caution, and parents should teach their kids a little skepticism. It's not as if information about nutrition is hard to come by. Today we're constantly harangued about cutting calories, reducing fat, and exercising more. McDonald's competitors, such as Subway, provide lots of counter-information. You'd have to live in a cave not to know about this stuff.

Fast food doesn't have to make you fat. Soso Whaley of New Hampshire once ate only at McDonald's for a month. The result? Unlike the guy who did the "Super Size Me" documentary, Soso lost 10 pounds, and her cholesterol dropped 40 points. How? She didn't pig out. Low-carb dieters have lost weight at McDonald's by eating the burgers without the buns and skipping the fries."

Speaking of informing  customers  about nutrition, Customers in McDonald's Japan ( yes those same customers who got the infected MP3 players) can scan their food with a gadget that displays nutritional info on their cell phones.

Known as a QR Code, these printed codes look somewhat like a barcode and are scannable by many photo cellphones. All sorts of information can be packed into these little codes, from the website to find the amount of calories and fat in a Big Mac to a company’s contact information on a business card.

Meanwhile, despite all the turmoil, business has never been better.

After months or declining sales and despite a good deal of negative publicity, McDonald's announced that they hit a six year high in sales both in the US and abroad, with the best performances from stores in the UK. The company cites in increase in healthier menu items, including salads and less fattening kids' choices. At UK restaurants, the new options include deli sandwiches, free-range eggs, more fruit and beef that is only "from the forequarter or flank of a cow."

P.S. In case you missed this in May ( I did), McDonald's is also undergoing an extreme McMakeover which will include cozy couches, WiFi, plasma TVs and premium Coffee. Think of it as the Starbuckization of McDonald's.

"After 30 years without a major design overhaul, the 51-year-old fast-food giant is adopting a hip new look. The world's largest hamburger chain is redesigning its 30,000 eateries around the globe in a 21st century makeover of unprecedented scale.

The redesign is risky and has many franchisees up in arms over the high costs of a makeover. But company officials believe the overhaul is needed. McDonald's, whose restaurants are visited by more than 40 million people every day, has moved aggressively over the past three years to revamp its menu and attract a new breed of customer."

While customers may enjoy the change, the franchisees are less than enthused. It will cost them around $300,000 to make the change. This is not an optional change. The only way to stay part of the McDonald's family is to order that cozy couch.

Once again, it pays to be a hare aka The Story of a Sun Country Flight Attendant

When she decided to become a flight attendant 17 years ago she could have as easily applied at Northwest Airlines. 

Instead she opted for Sun Country-- a smaller , privately owned airlines also headquartered in The Twin Cities  that offered lower pay and fewer benefits.

" At the time we were flying to Oslo Norway and I am fluent in Norwegian," she explained.

She stayed with Sun Country because these days the airlines doesn't have lay overs.

" We do turnarounds. I leave the house in the morning and I'm often home before the kids get back from school."

She says she started as the same time that one of her friends started at Northwest Airlines. At the time the friend was making more money. She had more benefits.

Today, the flight attendant at Sun Country makes more than her friend---Northwest has slashed attendants salaries by nearly 40%. Morale is horrid.

Most importantly, the Sun Country flight attendant likes her job.She said, " we have fun." Of her friend she says, " she's not having much fun these days." Then she shudders.

Image Credit: Hare and Tortoise Sculpture in  Boston'sCopley Square . Created in 1995 by Nancy Schon as a tribute to all the runners who have participated in the Boston Marathon. Click here to read about the inspiration behind this popular Boston sculpture.

The business story behind Dove's Evolution Video

               
 

It is fast becoming one of the most watched videos on the Internet. For  Dove,all those eyeballs will translate into increased sales. In the two years since Dove decided to brand itself as the beauty company that celebrates real beauty that strategy has rewarded the company with double digit sales increases.

 

A year ago, Strategy Magazine looked at Dove's strategy to transform itself from marketer to social activist.

"[Women] are really connected to the brand, and in a way that it's not just 'I like their message'; they're starting to see now that we're really doing things that are working toward social change." That strategy is key to the brand's success. "The way we see it is that people buy brands first. They access a brand through products," she adds.

And sales prove it: "We've experienced strong double-digit growth in every new category that we're in," says Mark Wakefield, marketing director. Brand recognition is also strong. During its brand tracking, consumers were asked if they recognized the Dove blue bird logo. "Ninety percent of people recognized it," he says. "Just slightly behind the Nike swoosh."

Moving forward, the plan is to continue focusing on the successful formula.

As part of its marketing, Dove is providing financial support to organizations that help "foster a broader definition of beauty."

Notes from the Road NYC: Is there a new, new math?

It's early. I'm in a lovely hotel room in NYC. It has a kitchen and a coffee maker-something that is a rarity in New York hotels.

So when did they change the definition of a cup? All this time I've been working under the misguided impression that there were 8 oz to a cup.

According to Krups, I'm wrong. A cup of coffee is 5 oz.

Has anyone ever seen a 5 oz coffee mug?
If you have one, please send a picture.

                                                                                                

The Burka as business attire

In southern Afghanistan ,it's becoming increasingly dangerous to be a working woman.Writing in Canada's Globe and Mail, Jane Armstrong reports on how these women are coping.

Last month's assassination of activist Safia Ama Jan, the director of women's affairs for the province of Kandahar, who was gunned down outside her house as she left for work, put a chill in the hearts of female professionals. It harkened back to the time when the Taliban were in power and women were routinely beaten, mutilated and killed for disobeying their restrictive edicts. The women now say the death threats are on the rise, but local police can do nothing to protect them.

At Monday's gathering, eight women sat around a table in a shabby board room, lamenting the rise in violence. They are educated, married women with families. Like nearly all Kandahar women, they wear burkas in public — and remove the head-to-toe covering once inside their offices.

“When I leave for work in the morning, I don't know if I will be coming home,” one working woman lamented during a Monday-morning meeting at a women's resource centre in downtown Kandahar.

I change my route every day,” she continued. “I wear a different coloured burka. Everyone has fear.”

The weekly meetings are a chance for female professionals to gather and vent about the current spate of violence against women in this troubled city.

In Afghanistan  it seems the only way a woman can work is by wearing a burka out in public. And yet, in Europe several countries ban women from not only wearing burkas but the hijab- the most common form of headcovering for Muslim women. 

The issue of banning burkas is now being discussed in the UK after politican Jack Straw said he would like to ban burkas.

The veil question has exposed a staggering level of thoughtless illiberalism, and not just where you'd expect to find it. Hot off the mark, the Express consults its readers about a ban on the veil:

 

"An astounding 97% of Daily Express readers agreed a ban would help to safeguard racial harmony." It's not quite clear how this ban would be implemented. (Policemen ripping veils from women's faces? Asbos? Flinging wearers in jail?)

 

In response to the debate in England, Bill Maher brought up the issue of banning Burkas on his weekly HBO program. Maher asked the guests  -- CNN host Lou Dobbs, Ben Affleck and  terrorism expert Danielle Pletka, what they thought of the idea of forbidding women in the United States from wearing burkas. Maher  is in favor of the ban --saying the burkas are a sign of oppression.

Dobbs agreed. Affleck warned that a ban would be a violation of religious freedom and the terrorism expert said despite her reservations of infringing on religious freedom, she too is in favor of the ban.

While burkas make me uncomfortable for a myriad of reasons, I agree with Affleck. So does David Edgar, a playwright who wrote an opinion piece about the Burka controversy in The Guardian.

And yes, the veil can be alienating to people trying to communicate with the person wearing it; it is sometimes (but not always) worn involuntarily, and (for me) is an expression of devotion to a non-existent supernatural being whose worship excuses all kinds of barbarism. But if we want to have a leg to stand on when we stand up for The Satanic Verses or Behzti or Jerry Springer, we must defend to the death the right to wear it.

Image Credit:  Flickr member Netjeret men Nefer

 

Do Funny Ads Sell ?

Debatable. In the 60's Alka Seltzer had some of the funniest spots ever--their classic "Try it. You'll Like it" is one of the most famous advertising lines, ever. So was their commercial that featured the line, " I can't believe I ate the whole thing."

  Only problem: these entertaining spots didn't sell more Alka Seltzer. This happens to be Alka Selzer's 75th Anniversary. Last year they reintroduced the " I can't believe I ate the whole thing" campaign and this year the resurrected the "Try It . You'll Like it" campaign with Kathy Griffin.

Not sure if  this spot called "Ironworkz" will end up selling more product for its client.

But it's a very funny spot. It's Friday. And maybe you'll think of it as you order dinner tonight.

Help Create The Women's Executive Coloring Book

One of the best parts of having people leave comments on your blog is that you go visit their blog and find stuff you'd never otherwise see. That's the case with "The Executive Coloring book" circa 1961.

When I checked out Todd's blog, The Bullshit Observer: Politics, Advertising, Hollywood and Other Bullshit he had recently discovered this classic which is hosted by Adtothebone.com

 

I''m in a cafe right now near the Castro in San Francisco. Every single person in here stopped what they were doing just now and looked at me as I was cry-laughing uncontrollably about this Executive Coloring book.

Walk through the executive's day and color his things for him. For example, his briefcase. The instruction copy: This is my attache case. It helps people know I am an executive. It makes me look efficient,organized, competent. I wonder if it opens.

Not sure whether the coloring book was the real thing or a spoof, I went to Amazon. Here is what an anonymous reader shared,

"This coloring book for grown-ups is a forgotten spoof of the "Man in the Grey Flannel Suit" generation. Published in 1961, it became a best-seller, and was so popular that it was parodied in Playboy Magazine and talked about on the Tonight Show. If Jack Paar had a copy, you know it was cool! There is a potentially vast audience of martini-drinking lounge devotees out there who would love this book's tongue-in-cheek approach. If you can find a copy of The Executive Coloring Book, buy it!"

Still not sure whether this coloring book was actually created in 1961 and not a 2006 spoof, I did a Google search.That's when I discovered that in  1978 Leo Burnett, the ad agency that brought us the Jolly Green Giant had its own version of the coloring book, called The Adman Coloring Book

"THIS IS MY ATTACHE CASE. It helps people know I am an account executive. It makes me look efficient.Organized. Competent. I wonder if it opens."

Completely inspired by Leo Burnett's, parody,inspiration or semi-plagiarism, I decided it was time to create  The Executive Women's Coloring book.  The thing is I can't do it by myself and think this blog would be a great place to have a collaborative effort.

Here is my contribution.

In place of the attache case....
" This is my Hermes Bag.  It makes me look very successful. Martha Stewart carried one just like it to her trial every day.  Lots of celebrities have this exact bag. .I'm a vice president. I bought it on eBay. I carry my breast pump inside."

Want to add a caption or drawing.?Visit either the original Book or Leo Burnett's version and  write the gal's version.

If I could draw I would adapt the graphics but alas and alack I don't even do stick people all that well. But share your drawings and your captions and help create the "The Executive Woman's Coloring Book .

" I look forward to your contributions.

UPDATE;  I created a Wiki. It's my first so if it needs revisions, please let me know. But if you want to help create the Executive Women's Coloring Book, click here.