Last week Dooce (aka Heather Armstrong) flexed her social media muscle and using Twitter called out Maytag for their shoddy customer service on a newly purchased washing machine that broke down. Her influence is far reaching as she has over 1.2 million followers and moments after her tweet they chimed in with 140-character stories of their own. Almost as quickly, retailers and manufacturers (Not Maytag) offered to help.
If you’re not already familiar with Dooce, you need to realize that she is one of the most influential bloggers and internet personalities on earth. But she did not achieve this through wealth or position. She does happen to be an extremely talented writer and graphic designer as well as with her husband, very tech savvy. Dooce is a pioneer in the Power to the People moment that has arrived and all business’, organizations and public entities should take notice. No longer can Directv deliver a subpar product without taking a hit on their reputation. The same applies to home builders, electronic giants, and service providers.
Dooce doesn’t take her position and influence lightly and if she made a habit of tweeting frustration of every single product that broke, her influence would begin to wane. But she doesn’t nor should she feel bad for speaking her mind and sharing her opinions with her friends, family, and online social network (which happens to be larger than the greater population of SLC). Fortunately she’s got a philanthropic heart and ended up working with an opportunistic Bosch Appliances to donate a washer and dryer to the Rescue Mission of Salt Lake City.
As I see it Maytag erred in two areas.
1. Not providing a reasonable solution to a new customers challenge.
2. Not being where their customers are and that is online and more specifically monitoring the Twittersphere.
With the balance of power tipping towards the masses, companies can no longer afford to ignore us. Please continue to speak your minds in the comments of corporate blogs, through Yelp!, Citysearch, and your own personal blogs. The power is in our hands and who knows, maybe they’ll start listening.
