What can go wrong, will.
There are many examples of websites which do not work as a customer expects, or has missing information. Normally we just find another website with the information or contact. If the requirement is important from a particular website, in this case a Northamptonshire newspaper, then using a email address or contact form should get the required information.
In this case a reply was quickly supplied with an email address of the required department. We wanted to place an advertisement before Easter and requested pricing and dates. Nothing, A couple of days later sent another email. Nothing.
Finally went back to the person that supplied the email address, confirmed the problem and received the reply, somebody should contact us. After 2 weeks, nothing. Again emailed the first contact, this time, no reply. For a local paper not bothering to be interested in a customer that made every effort to establish contact it is very bad customer relations, and the news will spread.
This leads onto the problem of meeting customers expectations. Nowadays with instant communications, multiple suppliers, any company not providing good customer service will soon lose customers and go out of business.
What should be done?
Large companies have the resources to offer good customer services, but sometime even they do not make a fully independent website audit. If its a major on-line website supporting a store, restaurant chain, hotel group, there is the opportunity to use an on-line Mystery Shopper. For the small local company an independent Website Audit is often the more cost effect method to find out if it is meeting customer requirements.
This really happened to the Liberal Democrats (Liberal Democats)
Don’t assume because there is a professional Marketing Agency involved, it is what is required by the customer. Think of the Liberal Democrats poster at the end of March, the name was spelt as Democats, although they did get a lot of publicity on the TV.
What happened to the Northampton Business Directory advertisement we planned to place in the paper?, we spent the money somewhere else.