Perils of listening to your online customers too much
General
- March 30th, 2007
Via Digg I just learned that:
Dell, oddly enough, is listening to the many thousands of direct requests its customers made during its big public brainstorm (aka IdeaStorm) not so far back. The result of nearly 70% of participants requesting Linux on Dell machines…
Linux market share in the PC world is something like 2%. You do the math: what kind of bias you get from online feedback?
Note to myself: I must be extra careful when asking and consolidating your feedback to S60 developers around here.
It all depends on who you are looking to hear from, Tommi. If you are interested in what your early adopter, enthusiasts are after than online is great! But if you want to know what the more “normal” profiled user is up to then listening online through blogs and forums is probably far from ideal.
I’m sure you guys do plenty of research and know or at least think you know who your target customers are. I’d bet that for the N and E series online is quite right, but that for some of the more mass products it is not given their lower cost and degree of technical capability — and therefore interest from the geeks.
Just for playing games: could you “translate”/extrapolate the Dell story in Nokia S60 terms?
What can worse happen?
And what are the “risks” to REALLY achieve something good?
Enjoy the weekend!
Be careful here Tommi. While I understand what you’re implying here, the logic doesn’t apply. If you think about it, you don’t need to have a PC running Linux in order to make a request online for Linux or any other OS running on Dell machines.
Market share is a tricky number to work with. For example, if I tell you that I have a 2% market share of the whole world’s population as a customer, you may think that’s not enough. But if I tell you that my 2% market share is composed of 100% of the same 2% percentage of the world’s population that controls 98% of the world’s wealth, you may start thinking differently.
Is it a bias? If you ask people what their problem is, you will only get answers from people with problems.
Good comments, agreed.
When asking for feedback in this blog, I’m interested to hear what the early adopters want. Sometimes, your requests are very relevant for all S60 users. Other times, your requests are relevant for power-users only, but still worth implementing. And every now and then, your requests are too geeky and, in the worst case, would ruin the user experience for the rest 99,9% of people. I guess it’s our job here in Nokia/S60 to figure out which of your requests are worth doing and which are not
Re: Dell story, I think putting Linux built-in is a darn good idea, even though I don’t use Linux-based PC:s myself.
very very nice information thanks..
realy nice blog.i will come every time here.thankss..
Even with all the comments, I think there is something else to be gleaned from this story. Web 2.0 (though actually this phenomenon goes back as far as the web itself), has fostered a broad sense that everyone in general should be more responsive to the needs of their “clientele.” We have become used to having our voices heard here, and to those voices eliciting some type of action. Many companies are just beginning to try to shift their focus to incorporate these kinds of open forums, but in some cases, as with Dell, they are finding out that what the masses want is not always what they expected. The coolest thing, though, is that the same effect seems to be trickling out into the real world as well, with places like McDonald’s and Target already working to do more to listen to what their customers have to say. I suppose from an owner’s point of view maybe that’s a hassle, but it certainly seems like a kind of boon for consumers.
I completely agree with you. Listening to feedbacks and customer suggestions don’t guarantee more customers and increased sales after answering all customer concerns. Sometimes in the world of business we must learn how to be distant from the customers without sacrificing customer satisfaction because distance doesn’t actually mean that we don’t hear them out. I hope Dell finds this action beneficial on their part. After all, we sometimes need not to live up other people’s expectations because the more that we please everyone the more that we lose ourselves.
very thanks, for this blog I faund much information
Amazing information, you must be great man that you created this blog, thanks for it.
Neydi kanımı kaynatan bu güzelliğin adı?
Mutluluk muydu?
Bugün,
Ne varsa hüzünden yana
denize fırlattım az önce.
Sanki beklermiş gibi hepsini,
hop hop hoplatıverdi dalgalarında.
En güzel maviliğiyle oynaşıp durdu.
“Bak” dedi “fırlattığın hüzünlerine…
İşte; onların bendeki hükmü sadece bu!”
Sonra, şakalaşırcasına
bir kaç tuzlu damlasını
sıçratıverdi yüzüme.
Gülümsedim mahcup mahcup,
onun bu neşesine…
Duruldu.
Bir deniz yıldızı bıraktı avuçlarıma.
Yoksa mutluluk bu muydu?
Herkes kalabalıkken,
içimdeki yalnızlığı
alıp, gidiverdi sihirbaz martılar!
Bir de arkasından o bildik
şen kahkahalı bağırışmalar!
Hiç bu kadar güzelini görmemiştim.
Beyazmış meğerse
beni, onlarla bütünleştiren mucize!
Kanat çırpa çırpa,
yüreğimdeki isyanları uçurdular…
Yaşamaktan aldığım tad; işte buydu!
Yoksa mutluluk bu muydu?
“Sen mutluluğun resmini
çizebilir misin Abidin?”
Evet… Adım İNSAN…
Ya, tabii ki, çizerim!
Az önce;
ağaç oldum,
çiçek oldum,
güneş oldum,
deniz oldum,
martı oldum,
ölümsüzleştim…
Meğerse, hep
yanıbaşımdaymış
bu güzel resim!
Ben çizdim. Adı umudum’du!
Yoksa tüm umutlarım
beni hiç terketmeyen
mutluluğum muydu?
* * *
Mutluluk,
hepimize sadece
kendi çizdiğimiz resimler
ve uzaklıklar kadar
yakındır!
şen kahkahalı bağırışmalar!
Hiç bu kadar güzelini görmemiştim.
Beyazmış meğerse
beni, onlarla bütünleştiren mucize!