NONE: ONLINE-ADS>> WHY search engines are dying
ONLINE-ADS>> WHY search engines are dying
Ray Taylor (taylor_at_bizbiz.com)
Wed, 19 Nov 1997 10:53:59 +0000
Yesterday, I got a whole bunch of invoices from a US search engine for
several thousands of dollars of Web advertising (most of which I had,
incidentally, already paid). Despite the fact that my company is based
in the UK, the initials "UK" did not appear on the invoice, resulting in
several days spent doing the rounds of post offices in New York before
somebody realised that BR3 is not a US zip code.
Today, I get another invoice, from a different US search engine, and
what do you think? No "UK" in the address and more time wasted sending
the thing around Massachusetts. I sometimes wonder who the damn fool was
who gave this medium the name "world-wide web."
So who cares? I'm in no hurry to receive invoices. And worse things
happen.
But this is just one, tiny, insignificant example of the fact that Web
media owners, particularly the big ones, cannot grasp the meaning of the
term "customer service." They program the campaign details into their
systems, fire off some computer-generated invoices, and forget it.
I seem to waste an inordinate amount of time arranging to get people
large sums of my clientsí money. Yet when I do work for American
clients, I always make sure that payment is as simple as possible, and
usually in US dollars (despite a huge drop in the value in recent
weeks). The easier I make life for my clients, the more likely they are
to spend more money with me. You donít need a Harvard MBA to work that
one out.
All of the ills of the search engines stem from this simple, obvious,
failure to address the real needs of their customers (and not just the
paying ones). The ONLY way they will recover is to invest time, effort
and money instilling proper values of customer service in all of their
people.
Ray Taylor
New Media Communications, UK
http://www.bizbiz.com
+44 181 639 0015
----------------------------------------------------------------------
This week's Online Advertising Discussion List sponsors:
When it comes to ad performance, not all search engines are equal.
Infoseek gives you solid reporting and highly targeted placement.
(And we return calls, too.) http://info.infoseek.com/doc/sponsors.html
-----
The first legitimate search engine position improvement system
Pay per click-thru pricing model as low as 15-cents
http://www.ClientDirect.com/
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Online Advertising Discussion List To Unsubscribe send UNSUBSCRIBE
http://www.o-a.com/ to online-ads-request_at_o-a.com
