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Book Depository rant (again...)

For discussion about particular book sellers (brick-and-mortar bookstores, online book sellers, auction sites, swap sites, etc.)
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EC2
Bibliomaniac
Posts: 3661
Joined: August 2008
Location: Nottingham UK
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Post by EC2 » Thu November 26th, 2009, 11:38 am

I think the immediate response of The Book Depository is interesting and a sign of reaction to changes in communication.

BTW Gyrehead - thanks for not shooting me! I have only ordered from the BD once and had no problems, but I am very much a neutral party. I twittered the complaint to throw it open to a wider field.
Obviously BD monitor Twitter -which shows a hands on forward thinking business approach. The immediate response shows they're up to the mark. But it also has the facet of being a damage limitation exercise. Twitter reaches far and wide. I have several hundred followers and they have their own followers, and many of these people are book readers ergo book buyers. So instead of one letter of complaint hidden in an e-mail that can be forgotten, suddenly you have this ocean of people hearing what a bum service your company is providing. I think that many companies now have PR guys working on Twitter, and sometimes the boss themselves...
Les proz e les vassals
Souvent entre piez de chevals
Kar ja li coard n’I chasront

'The Brave and the valiant
Are always to be found between the hooves of horses
For never will cowards fall down there.'

Histoire de Guillaume le Mareschal

www.elizabethchadwick.com

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Madeleine
Bibliomaniac
Posts: 5859
Joined: August 2008
Currently reading: "The Whitstable Pearl Mystery" by Julie Wassmer
Preferred HF: Plantagenets, Victorian, crime, dual time-frame
Location: Essex/London

Post by Madeleine » Thu November 26th, 2009, 12:00 pm

I haven't had any problems with BD yet, so far anyway.
Currently reading "The Whitstable Pearl Mystery" by Julie Wassmer

Chatterbox
Bibliophile
Posts: 1667
Joined: April 2009
Location: New York

Post by Chatterbox » Fri November 27th, 2009, 6:26 am

Aha, the merits of twitter...

Now, suppose I told them in an e-mail that I'm a business journalist who could choose to write a store about online marketing.... Too bad that would be horribly unethical. (I had to stop writing about Verizon after I took legal action to ensure that they fixed a problem with my service -- no incoming phone calls -- that had endured for four months.)

While I'm glad EC got a more proactive response than either I or Gyrehead have, I think it says still more about BD's business model that a Twitter post got the most detailed and accurate response rather than an individual complaint by a customer who had placed nearly $1,000 of book orders in the last six months. Yup, I'm a big book slut too. But I'm not going to reward bad behavior any longer.

(Gyrehead, FYI, I have been able to cancel individual items from orders, just by e-mailing them with the request to cancel that item.)

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