Jumbo shrimp. Plastic glasses. Diet ice cream. Daily special. Google customer service.
The economic base in the United States has long ago shifted to a service economy. Rather than manufacture goods our economic power and stability is predicated upon providing service to individuals and other industries. Yet it seems increasingly commonplace that the foundation of a service economy – customer service, is lacking or even nonexistent.
Let’s take a look at the remarkable example of Google. Google must be the largest corporation in history that has no readily apparent customer service department.
Need to get in contact with a human being regarding an issue on Adwords or Adsense? Good luck.
Has your business revenue plummeted because your ranking on Google has dropped dramatically and you want to talk to someone at Google about it? No chance.
Would you have imagined 10 years ago that a multibillion dollar company having a significant global impact could exist without offering access to a single customer service representative on the telephone? It boggles the mind.
I’ve been having an issue with one of my Adwords accounts on Google. I had received the standard bot e-mails, and eventually recevied an email message indicating my issue would be elevated to the level of a specialist. It never was apparent that it was elevated and my issue was never resolved. While attending Pubcon 2009 (a search marketing conference) I stopped by the Google booth, and actually spoke to a human being from Google! They listened to my issue and took my business card and contact information and said they would forward it to the appropriate individual. That was a month ago, and no one has ever contacted me. This disregard and disinterest is experienced by small customers as well as large customers of Google who spend six figures a month.
The customer service at Google is a terrible omen for our economy. We have no manufacturing base. What happens when our service economy doesn’t offer service?
P.S. Look at this vignette of Richard Branson trying to generate business. Do you ever expect see Sergey Brin or Larry Page do that?
