Excuse me, but wasn’t technology designed to save us time and help us become more profitable?  I remember my first word processing program I used, (First Choice) and when I was able to perform a simple mail merge with names and addresses from a database to my word processing document, I was blown away!  Finally, I could easily and quickly send letters to stay in touch with clients and customers regularly.  It was GREAT!  However, as time has continued to move forward, and new mechanism’s like e-mail, text messaging, Facebook, Twitter, etc., you would think that positive customer service would be at an all time high.  Unfortunately, (at least in my observation) it’s gotten worse.  Case in point:  My wife and I are looking for a new church to attend in our community.  While visiting one new church, we were greeted somewhat warmly by the folks there, but after our visit nothing else happened.  No calls, no e-mail, not even a postcard or letter thanking us for attending the service.  What’s odd, is that I completed a card and willingly gave the church all of our contact information.  Strangely, this is not the only church who has failed to utilize today’s technology tools to follow-up and reach out to us after we have visited their services.

But it even goes beyond a simple House of Worship.  In the last week I have sent e-mails (on more than one occasion) to people and businesses with no reply.  Not even a simple, “thanks for your inquiry John, we will review your information and get back to you shortly.”  Nope, not one response from four different individuals and three different companies.  Maybe we’re all just so overloaded with work that we cannot respond to our e-mails we receive, or perhaps it’s a time management thing.  The funny thing is, you can watch many of these same individuals post updates to their Facebook wall, or take the time to check in at their favorite dining spot.  And to this day, if you ask most real estate sellers (the industry I am associated with) what their biggest complaint is during the home-selling process, they will tell you that it’s a lack of communication from their agent.

Please don’t misuderstand me, I’m really not trying to whine, but I am concerned that we have become a society of technology junkies, and yet fail to remember what an excellent vehicle technology can be for staying in touch with clients and customers.  I don’t know if Facebook and Twitter can be the blame of this downfall in customer service, but I hope busiensses and others will begin to see the light, and figure out a way to stay in touch with people reguarly, tell them thanks for attending a service and more.  To me, the company, church, organization who can figure this out and implement it will win.  After all, it’s easy to beat your competition if no one else is doing it.

Your thoughts are welcome on this subject….