Brokentoy

Like many of the over 8 million World of Warcraft subscribers I preordered my copy of The Burning Crusade to get it on launch day. When I went to check my shipping status I was greeted with this slap in the face:

“Due to system maintenance our order status system is temporarily unavailable. Please do not call our customer service center as they share the same system and do not have additional information. We apologize for the inconvenience; please check back later.

World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade orders are shipping today, on schedule, out of our Louisville, Kentucky distribution center. If you placed an order before 2:00pm (cst) on Monday January 15, 2007, and have NOT received an email from us requesting additional payment processing information, your Burning Crusade order should ship today at the shipping service level you requested.”

Having “system maintenance” on the launch of the year’s most anticipated video game is a such cop out. This bad PR excuse is as believable a publicist’s claim that Britney Spears “fell asleep” on New Years. I’d be more satisfied if the page just said that EB doesn’t want to waste precious server cycles on bandwidth on their own customers. I’d still be insulted, but at least they would be honest.

I was recently asked how I handle charging clients GST/ RST (Goods and Services Tax and Retail Sales Tax for non-Canadians) for my design and code. My quick answer to them is that I don’t. And if you follow this key rule then you can avoid some accounting hassles by avoiding both charging and reporting GST on your invoices and tax returns. It comes down to this:

• If you deliver or publish your work electronically (upload to web, email as attachment) then you are providing a non-taxable service, and do not have to charge tax.
• If you deliver or publish your work as a physical object (CD, print ad, flyer) then you are obligated to charge and remit tax.

If you want the official interpretation then Ontario has provided some example situations to put your mind at ease. From one of their interpretations:

“Where artwork or graphic designs are sold to clients and transferred via the Internet or electronically via a modem to the client or to the client’s printer, on behalf of the client, no RST should be charged to the customer. This is the provisions of a non-taxable service. The provider of the non-taxable service must pay RST on any materials, equipment or taxable services purchased in order to provide the non-taxable service. Where a proof or approval sheet is faxed, mailed or given to clients to show them what was sent to the printer, RST does not apply to the charge for these sheets.”

If you’re outside Ontario your state or province may have a different interpretation of your situation so it’s important to make sure you aren’t setting yourself up for an uncomfortable situation with your friendly neighbourhood auditor. But for any designers or developers in my neck of the woods it looks like if we can avoid getting physical we’ll do just fine.

Technorati Tags: canada, business, taxes, design

Last night I went banner hopping and came across designerID, a directory and portfolio service for designers of all kinds. I completed the first part of their sign up form but stopped at the free trial when I had to enter my credit card. I added it to my ma.gnolia bookmarks and made a note to take another look later. To my surprise I got an autoresponder email from Brian at designerID that really impressed me:

Dear Michael,

We noticed that you identified yourself and did not make the account active by finishing the last step. I would like to extend a year-free trial to try designerID out and not have to enter your credit card information. At the end of the year trial you can either disable your account if it is not a fit or simply pay for the next year. Simply enter “[omitted]” in the promotional code field on the credit card screen and ignore the other fields and hit submit.

Thanks for taking the first step and we hope you’ll take this next one.

We look forward to seeing you on designerID.

Best Regards,

Brian Hock
Chief ID Officer

–

designerID
2175 Central Parkway
Cincinnati, OH 45214
USA
+1.513.289.4048
www.designerid.com

There are a lot of annoying autoresponders out there (GoDaddy and LinkedIn are on my worst offenders list) but this one really stood out as a great example of how to do things right. Let’s go through the details:

Tell me who you are and how you got my email

The first thing I look at is the email’s from line. The message is the real name of a real person working at a real company. Brian Hock, not the name of a department like “sales@freestuffgateway.com” or the arbitrary name the developer set up in his php mail() function. I would even be happy with a from line like “donotreply@abccompany.com ” if nobody was responsible for monitoring the list. Now that I know who is emailing me how you got my email I can stop freaking out that one of the sites I used this email on has sold me out to a spam list.

Clearly tell me what you want

The first sentence of the email tells me why you’re emailing and what you want to offer me. You recognized that some people interested in your free trial weren’t expecting to hand over their credit card information and you want to give me another option to become a customer.

Some marketers try to sneak a few sentences from their mission statement before they get to the point. People don’t fill out forms and hand out their emails to products they know nothing about. Not unless Kevin Rose or 37signals tells them to, anyway. This isn’t the proper time for you to try and explain me anything but why you’re taking my time up by reading your email.

Impress me with the little things

The email was addressed to my name. It thanked me for my time and extended an invitation one final time - tactfully. Plus I got the full contact information of a real person. Truthfully, I found it difficult to tell if this was an autoresponder or an actual person emailing me. And in this situation I’m happy to not know the answer.

Startups take heed

This email made enough of an impression on me to make me take a second look at designerID. If anybody out there has a project on the go then do yourself (and your customers) a favour and use this email as a guide.

And the icing on the cake? When I complimented Brian on designerID’s email I got a reply back before I finished writing this post.

Technorati Tags: designerID, business practices, etiquette, marketing, communication

In a medium where bad customer experience are often highlighted I thought I would point out a surprisingly good one from my latest online purchase.

Yesterday I went to Zend to pick up a license for Zend Studio Professional. After going through the online shopping cart and getting my confirmation email the “usual four hour window” of order processing passed and I had not received my serial number or license key.

I emailed their customer support guys and got a response within a couple hours, along with a voice mail follow up on my mobile the next morning. Not only did Zend they solve the problem, they also provided a seven day extension to the evaluation I had been using, and a real person called to follow up and left me a direct line where I could contact them.

I’m just floored by the level of customer service provided, and in a market of ever-increasing do-not-reply emails and call centers I challenge other online vendors to strive for the same level of professional courtesy to their customers.

Technorati Tags: Zend, customer service, business practices

I�ve spent the last few weeks on a website demo and a mountain of email has accumulated in my inbox: feedback for outsourced employees, requests for short notice meetings, and the odd correspondence to a few corporate lawyers just to name a few. As the deadline approached I noticed that the emails were becoming shorter, more direct, and in some situations more than a little hostile.

In situations with stress and anxiety it�s natural to want to get through your inbox as quick as possible. Here�s some tips on how to keep on task while maintaining your composure. If you can deliver while presenting a calm and in-control presence you�ll become a fast favourite with your boss or your clients. (more…)

Let�s start this week with an example. Read about these two graduates and see if you can guess the outcome:

A tale of two graduates

Grad A was a bright student with top marks. He spent his school years tirelessly researching and investigating industry trends, fads, and has mapped out a career plan for the next five years. People ask and email him with questions and ideas and he always makes time for a quick reply.

With his talent and work ethic, Grad A could land his first job in any business, or perhaps he will open his own business and wear all the hats necessary to maintain a small group of clients.

Grad B has a solid understanding of the theory and principles of her industry. While no means the best student, she asks questions, gives opinions, and shares her ideas with her classmates to make sure she�s on the same page. People come to her with as many questions as Grad A but through her conversations people have a good idea of her personality, her strengths, and her weaknesses.

After a few internships Grad B lands a permanent position in a medium-sized office. She chats with her coworkers on breaks and even managed to sell HR on hiring a friend from school to fill her vacant intern spot.

Five years later, who do you think will be more successful?

The value of networking

Both graduates have the basic skills to land an entry-level job in their field. But what happens when it�s time to think about moving up the ladder?

There is strength in numbers. Eventually in your career you will hit a point when your current options or resources don�t allow you to continue to grow. For example:

• Your company is downsizing and you want to find a new job
• You need to hire more qualified employees to allow you to take on more clients
• You want to update your skills to remain current in your field

A network of like-minded individuals in and around your field will help you overcome or find alternatives to problems that otherwise would take too much time of effort to do on your own. And it works both ways � a relatively small effort from you can make a world of difference to somebody else.

So, while Grad A is trying to manage his career without any help, I believe that Grad B will be able to use her network to find better opportunities and expend a lot less effort for a larger gain.

If you�re interested in starting or adding to your professional network, here are my suggestions. (more…)