Posts Tagged ‘Dublin’

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The Golden Era of Social Media

October 14, 2015

Jack Dorsey - twitter

Will we look back at this time and talk fondly of the ‘golden era’ of social media….?

I write this as we have just heard that Twitter have announced that they are laying off up to 336 people, 8% of their workforce. When the most beneficial of all the social media platforms has reached this point it makes you wonder.

Like every other business they must make money!

Roll forward just 5 years. Will we be saying..

“It was an innocent time when for free we all opened personal accounts on Facebook, we connected with friends, shared and uploaded our pictures. It was pure, we were able to communicate and voice our opinions without interference.

Businesses jumped in and opened accounts for free and publicised their wares.

It was really enjoyable and effective with all of us being able to see content that we wanted to.

Mark Zuckerberg - Facebook

Unfortunately it all changed when it became big business (like every other business they had to make money!) and now it is just like a huge advertising platform, which no one bothers using any more because we stopped seeing the content that we wanted.

And what about Twitter …We had such fun opening accounts for free and following who we wanted and them in turn following us and interacting as much as we wanted.

Eventually they wanted all of our personal details for advertising purposes and business accounts became different to personal accounts.

Of course the ‘free ride‘ had to finish at some point – we were naive to think it could continue the way it was.

Looking back, considering all of the benefits I enjoyed I think I would have been quite happy to pay a subscription instead of seeing it ruined the way it has been.

It’s a pity it’s gone.

Do you remember when LinkedIn was free and you could connect and post content until the cows came home, all for free!

It’s ironic that it’s half as effective now as it was when it was free!

As for Instagram ..we had great fun posting fab photos and interacting and now unfortunately its full of adverts and corporates posting commercial pics that make our skin crawl!

As for things like Foursquare, Google+, Snapchat, Pinterest and Periscope …. we used them all for about 6 months and then we got bored.

As for social media taking over from newspapers and traditional media – what were we thinking?

Did we really want a world where no one was paying journalists to investigate, where great writers and columnists could not make a living, so they stopped … Crazy!

It did seem like this would happen for a while because we stupidly thought that we could get everything for free – when did that ever make sense?

Inevitably Apple, Microsoft and Google have mopped up everything online and the lesson that there is no such thing as a ‘free lunch‘ has come true.”

I miss those days and wish I could ‘tweet’ again one last time.

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion

Fuzion offer Social Media Consultancy and Training in Dublin and Cork

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Posted in Facebook, LinkedIn, Social Media, Twitter | 1 Comment »

Dyson – Rising to the Customer Service Challenge

October 4, 2015

Dyson Customer Service

Back in January our Dyson vacuum cleaner packed up and we were more than happy to replace it with another one. It’s a brand I really believe in, so much so that I wrote a blog about it called ‘Hoovering and Storytelling‘.

Three weeks ago we had a problem with our relatively new Dyson so we rang the customer service number and after a very straight forward, quibble free process the offending part would be replaced and delivered to us. The promise was that we would have it within ‘10 working days‘.

To be honest I thought 10 working days was quite a long time for a part they said was in stock but at least they were going to replace it and in the meantime we would manage.

Three weeks passed and there was no sign of our part so we called the Dyson customer service number. They had a record of our transaction and confirmed that due to a system glitch the part had not been dispatched. The operative was very polite, very apologetic but explained that unfortunately we were back at the beginning of the process again and a replacement part would take up to 10 working days to get to us.

It was time to take a stand and explain that this really wasn’t good enough.

Without getting argumentative we asked the operative if there was some way of expediting the delivery of our part. He told us he needed to check with his supervisor so he put us on hold briefly. After about two minutes he came back to us and confirmed that while the circumstances were unfortunate there was “nothing they could do“.

I detest those words because quite simply there is always something that can be done. ‘There is nothing I can do‘ is a choice about what you are prepared to do, a choice about what is acceptable.

This was the system.

There is nothing I can do

We left him know that we weren’t happy and that surely there is ‘always something that can be done‘? Nope ..

We had exhausted the ‘official channel‘ so we reluctantly reverted to twitter to vocalise our disappointment with the Dyson brand.

Immediately the Dyson social media team reacted and wanted to know what happened. Without too much fuss they confirmed that what happened wasn’t good enough, that it wasn’t consistent with the Dyson culture so they would investigate our situation immediately and check with the customer service team.

They thanked us for highlighting a ‘flaw‘ in their customer service procedures, which they would take on board as a learning. Instead of waiting 10 days for a replacement part a new, better machine would be delivered to us in three working days.

With all of our businesses we have to make decisions on a regular basis about how we handle complaints. What do we do, how quick do we respond, what is fair – what do we decide is acceptable?

Things will inevitably go wrong from time to time and while we all hate complaints we need to make a decision about how we deal with them. A complaint is a great way to show the real ethos of your business and instead of saying ‘there is nothing I can do‘ we need to embrace the issue, do our very best and learn from it.

If you were cynical you might decide that Dyson reacted because the issue was highlighted on a public social media platform but I do believe they were genuine and they rose to the Customer Service Challenge. Instead of being a negative for the brand it is a positive. My faith is restored!

Well done Dyson ..

Greg Canty 

Greg Canty is a Partner of Fuzion PR, Marketing and Graphic Design, with offices in Dublin and Cork

 

 

 

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Posted in Brand Loyalty, Branding, Customer Care, Handling Complaints, Staff training | Leave a Comment »

Emotionally attuned

September 22, 2015

Mr Bing

It was a very sad Sunday ..

I came down the stairs to let our four legged one, Mr Bing out and I couldn’t believe it when I found him lying there, half on and half off his bed in the kitchen.

It was obvious that our 13 year old precious dog had passed away during the night unexpectedly and the moment we always dreaded had arrived – he was gone.

I had the awful job of telling Dee and then we had the even more awful job of figuring out what do to next. I had no idea as I was never in that situation before.

Outside the rain poured down and I briefly imagined that we would have to bury him in the garden – is that what you did? I had no idea.

In between the tears and the upset we managed to gather ourselves and call the local vet. We were the worst customers ever as Bing had only ever been there twice (just as well as he hated the vet!) – he was the most convenient dog ever, including picking a Sunday to wave goodbye to us!

The vet had a ‘for emergency use only‘ number and within seconds I found myself explaining our situation to the kind voice at the other side of the phone.

“I’m so sorry to hear your news, you must be very upset. I will be at the veterinary surgery at 11 if you want to bring him over. Don’t worry we will take good care of him”

He immediately settled us down and now we had the very upsetting job of carrying Bing from the house for the last time and into the car to make our way to the vet surgery in Togher.

Poor Dee was inconsolable as we drove to the vets. When we arrived there I went inside and was greeted by the loveliest and gentlest person, a girl called Karen.

“I am so sorry” she said . “Let me open up the door at the back and I’ll help you bring him in” . This gentle woman helped me carry in our precious Bing and she covered him respectfully in a blanket.

As I went through the details with Karen I realised that I had to bring Dee in to figure out some of the options about cremation and what we wanted to do with his ashes. Karen realised how upset Dee was but we managed to get through the arrangements before saying goodbye to Mr Bing for the last time.

Dee wanted to put our own blanket on Bing, which we did. “Don’t worry , I’ll take good care of Bing until he is collected next Friday” Karen reassured us.

Before we knew it we were on the way home with empty hearts and plenty of tears but Karen made this horrible experience so much better.

She could not have been better, she fully understood how upset we were and she was absolutely perfect with us. She emotionally attuned to us and delicately went about the job that had to be done efficiently and professionally.

Our scenario was a very obvious emotional situation and she read it and attuned to it.

Not all emotional situations are as obvious as this one: I can’t afford to pay, the last customer caught us, the last work was shoddy, someone is sick in the family, I’m not well in myself, I’m worried about my kids or something bad has happened on my way here…it could be anything that has you in that emotional state.

The emotionally attuned person might pick up on this and flex accordingly but unfortunately many won’t do this even when the situation is very obvious. We are all too familiar with these situations “I’m sorry but there is nothing that I can do” might sound familiar! This is when it is too easy for someone to say the wrong thing and upset the situation, which could easily lead to it spiralling out of control.

The next time you are dealing with a customer try to emotionally attune and if you are the customer assume the person serving you is not a mind reader and do your best so they can understand your state of mind. We can all do better if we understand how the other person is feeling.

A huge thank you to Karen from Abbeyville Vetinary – you were absolutely brilliant with us and as for Mr Bing, we will always miss you xx

Bing with Ellen and DeeGreg Canty 

Greg Canty is a Partner of Fuzion PR, Marketing and Graphic Design, with offices in Dublin and Cork

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Posted in Bereavement, Communications, Customer Care, Staff training | 6 Comments »

Can you do our social media for us?

August 12, 2015

setting the bird free

Of course we can look after your social media content for you but I must say a very loud BUT ..

Content

To be meaningful it requires you/whoever in your organisation to take the time to provide us with good content on a regular basis, which you will find often takes as much time as doing the actual posting.

Let us show you how.

Spontaneity

Up to the minute, perfectly timed updates are nearly always lost when you pass the responsibility of posting to someone external – we won’t see your team getting ready for an event, we can’t react when you spot something relevant in the media, we can’t see the chef preparing something in the kitchen or spot that funny/unusual thing that can be photographed or posted as it happens.

Let us show you how.

Interaction

For us the real magic with social media is the interaction with other strategic accounts and customers (in particular with twitter) – get this right and you achieve much greater reach, you develop powerful relationships and connections and your posts will be more effective and genuine.

Let us show you how.

Solution..

So if you feel uncomfortable with social media but you still want to achieve the maximum benefits from it what do you do?

Lets start by trying to find a few champions internally who know and understand the business. Then we will train them including clearly outlining the objectives, the guidelines, the protocol and all the necessary knowhow and only when ready we will give them the relevant access to each social media platform depending on their role.

We can support them each step of the way until they are ready to fly alone.

Let us show you how.

Greg Canty is a partner of Fuzion

Fuzion offer Social Media Consultancy and Training in Dublin and Cork

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Posted in Communications, Social Media | Leave a Comment »

Defamation and your reputation

August 8, 2015

Defamation

This week we had to deal with a potential defamation scenario for a client because of some of their online activity.

In this case they had received a solicitors letter accusing them of defamation because of something that they had posted in a personal blog post. This whole area is very interesting because it deals with the most valuable of assets,”your reputation” and it also had the element of online, which makes it even more intriguing.

Your Reputation

Your good reputation is one of the most precious assets that you have and it is in your interest to protect it at all costs. A good reputation is built up over time and it comes about from how you conduct all aspects of your business including the delivery of your products and services, how you treat your customers, your suppliers and your team and how you interact with the general public.

A good reputation will win you business, it will attract customers who will want to do business with you and it will give suppliers, banks, investors and landlords that necessary trust so they are happy to deal with you. If something does go wrong, as things often do then a good reputation will protect you because people will know that you are to be trusted and that whatever has happened you will sort it out.

A lot of the work we do with clients can be described as reputation management. We work hard to ensure that all the great things that our clients do are publicised and if potentially damaging incidents occur then we make sure that these situations are carefully managed so that any damage is limited.

A reputation often takes many years to build, but this can be destroyed easily in just moments by circumstances.

Defamation

Because your reputation is such a precious asset it is only right that their is legal protection available to you, should anyone ever defame you.

We have found that defamation can be quite a misunderstood term as many feel that it applies whenever someone ‘says something bad about you‘  which is certainly not the case.

A few elements must normally be in place for something to be deemed as ‘defamation’:

Precise information – You must know exactly what has been said or publicised about you and be able to demonstrate this.

Clearly identified – The parties claiming to be defamed must be clearly identified in the offending publication.

False statements – It can only be deemed as defamation if what has been said is largely untrue. You might not like what is being said about you but if it is true this is not defamation!

Publication – It is only deemed as defamation if the publication of the remarks was relatively wide. Being overheard by a few people would not be enough.

Defamation

Online dimension

The online environment makes this whole area even more complicated.

Does a post on a blog or on someone’s social media accounts such as Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn carry as much weight as an article in a newspaper, some other publication or a comment on radio or TV? If I have 6,000 followers on twitter and someone else has 100 is a false statement by me a bigger misdemeanour?

It’s all a question of distribution and how many people may have seen or heard the false statements and then someone has the tricky job of assessing how much potential damage has been done by the false statement.

Another tricky dimension with the online environment is that if others make defamatory comments about someone on your ‘platform’ (blog/discussion board) then you could be liable as you did not remove the offending posts.

Defamation is a notoriously difficult area of law so even when all the elements are in place anyone considering a case in this area must have deep pockets and lots of time on their hands before considering legal action. (Check out some of the cases that have been tried in Ireland).

Our client

With the scenario that we had to deal with this week none of the critical elements were in place so our client had nothing to worry about and certainly nothing that would damage their own reputation – in fact it was quite the opposite.

In this case one of the people involved had written a blog post about the personal impact of an incident whereby they had been seriously wronged. They never once mentioned who the offending party were in their post and they were 100% truthful in what they had said.

Ironically the offending party ‘recognised’ themselves in the post and cried ‘foul’ and immediately ran to their solicitors who were happy to claim defamation, which it clearly was not. In this case the solicitor should have known better than to make such an incorrect and unprofessional accusation – is this a defamatory comment?

I’m always amused to see how it’s nearly always the ‘offenders’ who get most vigorous about protecting their rights!

Your good reputation is hard earned and it is a precious asset of huge value to your business. The best advice is to manage your reputation carefully so no one ever has a reason to say something bad about you.

If someone is making false, damaging accusations about you then you do have a legal mechanism but make sure that all the right elements are in place before going down this potentially costly and distracting road.

Your good reputation is everything.

Greg Canty 

Greg Canty is a Partner of Fuzion who offer Reputation Management and Crisis PR services from our offices in Dublin and Cork, Ireland

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Posted in Bullying, Reputation | Leave a Comment »

Poor expectations 

July 30, 2015

sunglasses

Trying on the shirt in the dressing room in Brown Thomas I knew I should have put my sunglasses in one of my bags instead of putting them on the chair.

Sure enough as I had paid for my new holiday shirt I realised I had left my glasses behind in the dressing room.  Surely there would be no problem and my glasses would still be there?

There was someone in the cubicle I had been in so I waited – no joy, glasses gone.

I had a quick word with security who went to check if someone had handed them in. Two minutes later he came back beaming with sunglasses in his hand – he clearly loves when he puts a smile on someone’s face by finding their lost property.

He handed them to me and while they looked quite like mine they unfortunately weren’t and I gave them back to him. They took my details just in case mine turned up. Needless to say my sunglasses never turned up and quite sadly this is what I expected.

Why do I have such little faith?

What would make you see sunglasses or anything that clearly belongs to someone else and decide “I’ll help myself to these“?

What would make you even want to wear someone else’s glasses?

It’s no big deal as they weren’t particularly expensive and they probably needed replacing but it is really sad that an everyday shopper felt it was OK to help themselves to something that wasn’t theirs.

It’s even sadder that I’m not that surprised ..

Greg Canty 

Greg Canty is a Partner of Fuzion who offer Marketing, PR, Graphic Design services from our offices in Dublin and Cork, Ireland

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Posted in Personal development | 2 Comments »

Something fishy and great neighbours

July 19, 2015

Quinlans Fish Restaurant, Cork

This week it was fantastic to see the doors open of a new fish restaurant, Quinlan’s in Princes Street in Cork – things are definitely improving and people having the confidence to open new places is proof of this.

Something even more fantastic was the little sandwich board that I spotted outside Nash 19, one of Quinlan’s neighbours.

Instead of listing the specials for the day “Welcome to our new neighbours” it read, which was a very generous gesture from another restaurant, who effectively would be a competitor of sorts of the newcomer.

As usual I like to tweet when I see a new business opening and very cleverly Quinlan’s responded to my tweet by inviting me and the Fuzion gang in for our #FuzionFriday lunch, which is our team tradition, one that we have kept going for 15 years.

We duly accepted the invitation and enjoyed a really great ‘fish and chips‘ lunch (and some vino!) at Quinlan’s and when we were there we had a great chat with their owner, Liam Quinlan, a Kerryman from Cahirciveen.

The first thing he mentioned was the fantastic support and welcome he had received from his new neighbours, many of which would be competitors. He spoke about the Nash 19 sandwich board, he mentioned Ernest Cantillon from Electric, Salvatore and his mum from Rossini’s and some of the traders from the English Market who all popped in to wish him the best.

I was absolutely thrilled and proud to hear about the genuine warm Cork welcome that some of the business people in our fantastic city have given to Liam and his team – well done to everyone involved.

We live in a competitive world and one where we have to focus all our energy on our own business. It is too easy to forget about good manners and making a little effort to be nice and offering a genuine welcome to another business person trying to make something positive happen.

The really great thing about giving a warm welcome is that it speaks volumes for those who offer it – being a great neighbour is actually great for business.

Greg Canty 

Greg Canty is a Partner of Fuzion who offer Marketing, PR, Graphic Design services from our offices in Dublin and Cork, Ireland

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Posted in Customer Care, Marketing, Positivity | 6 Comments »

Believing

July 17, 2015

Steve Jobs and wozniak-1977

When you believe in something it engages you.

When you believe in what you are doing then you do it with enthusiasm and purpose.

When you believe in who you are doing it for and why then you do it with even more intensity and passion.

When everyone in the team has the same belief then you have a common bond and you become a powerful collective force.

When your customers believe then you can make real magic happen

Without belief you have nothing.

The most important thing you can do as a manager is to give your team something real to believe in

Greg Canty 

Greg Canty is a Partner of Fuzion who offer Marketing, PR, Graphic Design services from our offices in Dublin and Cork, Ireland

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Posted in Brand Loyalty, Motivation, Personal development, Positivity, Teamwork | 7 Comments »

A picture paints a 1,000 words ..

July 13, 2015

Homeless man

How many times have we used the expression that “a picture paints a 1,000 words?”

Arthur Brisbane - New York Editor and JournalistArthur Brisbane a high profile journalist and editor in New York is first credited with an expression close to this “Use a picture. It’s worth a thousand words.”

This very clever quote appeared in a 1911 newspaper article discussing journalism and publicity.

In our very busy, frantic, no time to stop, no time to read or study anything properly world with multiple media coming at us non-stop does this expression this hold up?

The idea that a picture is a powerful way to convey a message certainly holds up. The idea of using a multiple of 1,000 words is interesting – already I have used 116 words in this piece.

When I read that Arthur Brisbane penned this quotation I wanted to know what he looked like for some reason. He looks like James Stewart in the ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’ era. He looks like a wise man!

As an editor and a journalist Arthur probably had a very strong instinct about how many words it took to deliver a message and what job an equivalent image would do.

If you consider the likelihood of something grabbing our attention today and you think about the job an image can do and the equivalent article (or articles) to do the same job it makes you think about that multiple.

Is it more than 1,000? Is it 10,000? Is it 100,000.

Of course it all depends on the image and how well this is constructed to deliver the necessary message.

At Fuzion when we issue a press release to the media we will often insist that a strong photo accompanies the release – sometimes the picture will be the thing that will get the big space in the newspaper and sometimes we will get both the picture and the article.

For the reader if the image is strong enough it will convey the message or story that we wanted and it may be the hook that will make the reader stop and actually read the ‘words’.

Does a picture paint 1,000 words?

We guess it does and much more besides ..

The story of the photo (top of the blog post)

A family of a missing man spotted him in a photo taken of homeless men that appeared in a Sunday newspaper. Nicholas Simmons, 20, was in upstate New York on New Year’s Day, but he vanished leaving all his belongings behind, according to Fox News on Jan. 6.

Someone in his family spotted Nick in a picture that showed a group of homeless men. The men hovered around a steam grate trying to get warm on the streets of Washington D.C. recently. The homeless men looked destitute, including Nick, trying to get warm in the frigid temperatures. Nick’s parents called the police, who were able to locate their son.

The photographer who took the picture conveyed more than 1,000 words ..

For your website, brochures, posters, press releases get great photos that tell your story.

Greg Canty 

Greg Canty is a Partner of Fuzion who offer Marketing, PR, Graphic Design services from our offices in Dublin and Cork, Ireland

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Posted in Communications, Media, Photography | Leave a Comment »

Tenders and sun tans!

July 4, 2015

Working on holidays

At last our holiday – a week in Italy with family and great friends. We had a nice place booked for all of us just outside Siena for seven days to rest, relax, chill out and generally recharge the batteries.

Myself and Dee got there a few days in advance and we were due to pick up our buddy and his girlfriend from the train station in Siena for their much deserved break – he works his ass off all year round and the odd time we get to collaborate on work projects.

I called him the day before we were due to collect them to confirm arrangements and he was a little upset – his company was on a supplier panel for a semi-state body and a project was just put out to tender.

This project, which was right up his street and closely related to a bigger project that we had worked with him on was given a one week deadline for responses.

A one week deadline on a tender for a complex project like this is highly unusual and quite unreasonable. At this holiday time of the year it is more so.

Not only is it unfair but if this organisation are genuine about getting the best providers pitching then one weeks notice just shoots themselves in the foot – you have to ask the question, is it a genuine tender process or is designed for their preferred supplier who are fully briefed and ready to submit to win?

Dilemma – Was he to grab a laptop from somewhere and work on the tender submission, which would take up at least a full day of his hard earned holidays or pass? A contract like this would be important to him and his company so it was a big decision.

My buddy did the reasonable thing and asked for a one week extension – surely this was quite reasonable?

They would have done well to allow him this “break”:

  1. There was no real urgency on this work (this semi-state have dragged their heels on this project for well over a year already)
  2. He is hugely knowledgeable on the project and would provide a valuable tender (they know he has this knowledge)
  3. A weeks notice is unreasonable and highly unusual
  4. The request was ‘fair’ and reasonable
  5. They will have a better chance of more quality tender submissions

As expected he got his response;

“I have contacted the evaluation team to review the possibility of extending the deadline, unfortunately we are unable to extend”

..fantastic!

I know a guy working there who holds quite a senior role and asked him to look into it.

He investigated it and confirmed that nothing could be done …. the thing is of course it can be. When it suits them anything can be done.

My buddy as he was taking a rare week off with his other half decided after much torment against working on the tender proposal and ruining a big portion of his holiday but it did upset him.

In truth I believe he made a great decision because if they really wanted a proposal from his company it would have happened.

I suspect that if he had given up his time and submitted the best, competitively priced proposal of all time it still would not have won him the job.

Readers of my blog will have heard me giving out about the tender process before – some agree with me and others feel I am moaning and I should accept that this is just the way it is and ‘shut up‘. It has been suggested by some that most tenders are done and dusted in advance of them being published and this is ‘Just the way it is‘.

I strongly believe that tender processes are too often being manipulated, including the use of every possible trick at times to ensure that fairness and the very reason that these processes were introduced in the first place are not applied – this happens over and over.

I have also come to believe that complaining is a total and utter waste of time and probably ends up working against you both in the short and long run.

The sooner there is a body with real power that can oversee the proper application of our tender rules (these are the government agencies that we pay for) and processes and genuinely investigate complaints the better. Without this nothing will change and these farcical situations will continue as they always have.

As for my buddy I suspect his frustration will last longer than his tan ..

Greg Canty 

Greg Canty is a Partner of Fuzion who offer Marketing, PR, Graphic Design services from our offices in Dublin and Cork, Ireland

 

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Posted in Holidays, Relaxation, Tenders, Travel | 2 Comments »

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