Filed under: Customer relations | Tags: Bob Meighan, Customer relations, Intuit, public relations, Quicken, Quicken 2006, Quicken 2009
In my previous post, I lambasted Intuit for what I labeled as disingenuous marketing-speak. Evidence of their PR savvy showed up quickly, as their PR Department and VP of customer relations commented on the blog. Their responses to what I wrote are absolutely first-rate, and can be found here.
The reason their responses are so great is that they explain, in no uncertain terms, why they have taken the steps they have. This is the kind of communications that actually resonate with consumers, because it’s not vague, nebulous marketing fluff. I might not agree with it, but at least I understand it.
I think the lesson here – at least from my perspective as an entrepreneur who needs full information about the factors that affect my operations – is that your customers should be treated as though they are discerning, intelligent people rather than lowing masses to be placated with platitudes.
Intuit’s second response was excellent; if only it could have been their first.
Filed under: Customer relations | Tags: bad pr, Bob Meighan, Customer relations, Intuit, public relations, Quicken, Quicken 2006, Quicken 2009
Talented writing can take you only so far when it comes to breaking bad news to customers, and Intuit pushed that limit to the breaking point with its recent notice to customers that they can either pay for a product upgrade or lose critical features of the product they bought. Although most of my PR analyses are based on a dispassionate assessment of communications that don’t directly affect me, this one is different because I’m the one who got the message from Bob Meighan, Quicken’s VP of Customer Advocacy.
I bought Quicken 2006 because the accounting professional who does our taxes suggested it, and uses it herself. Now, about a year later, Intuit (the maker of Quicken) sends us an e-mail saying this:
As of April 30, 2009, Online Services and live technical support for Quicken 2006 will no longer be available.1 To maintain uninterrupted service, upgrade to Quicken 2009.
To entice us to upgrade, we are offered incentives, including a discount, free installation help and shipping, and bonus software that we don’t need. There’s no mention of the fact that this upgrade will cost us another $80, until we click on the link that takes us to the download site. And not only that, but if we don’t take this upgrade option, we lose the ability to download data from our bank account online (among other services), which is critical to our ability to conduct business.
The wording they use to describe this form of customer blackmail is:
To provide the highest service levels and deliver leading-edge solutions at a low cost, we are discontinuing online support for older versions.
Nice words, aren’t they? “Highest service levels” and “leading-edge solutions” and “low cost” sound lovely. But no amount of talented wording can cover the reality of what they’re saying, which is:
Either you upgrade from Quicken 2006 to our newest version of Quicken, or you lose some of the most critical functionalities of the software you bought from us. Your deadline for compliance is April 30.
I have no doubt that the Quicken end-user license agreement states very clearly that they can gut their software of critical online functionalities at their whim. But I’m also pretty sure that customers don’t expect to be treated like this. Intuit’s e-mail to customers is the worst kind of public relations – the kind that has to make a bad management decision sound like it’s in the customers’ best interests.
One of my former colleagues – a PR veteran with decades of experience – had a saying that applies to situations like this: “You can polish that turd all you want, but you ain’t foolin’ nobody: it’s still gonna smell like a turd when you’re done.”
