This was a site that I have linked to for years.  I’ve been using it for active purchasing for probably around 5 years, and I’ve recommended it to many for purchases as small as a dollar or two up to a good friend who bought a Phillips TV from there.  My wife and I have bought a laptop, watches, shirts, a back pack, a pico projector, and an iPod touch among others that I can’t remember from Woot or Woot subdomains.

I had a specific problem the other day on their site, and I immediately sought answers as to what went wrong.  It was during a time when there is a short amount of time for a specific product, and I experiences some very odd usability problems when trying to make a purchase. Let’s just say there were some technical problems with the site.  Problems I’ve never had or heard a whiff of in all my previous transactions with Woot.  It went down something like this:

• Initial interest in the item – hit the first buy button
• My info was already entered except for security code, enter that and hit another proceed button (about 5-8 seconds after initial button press)
• Order review page.  I scan all the important parts and hit the final buy button clocking in somewhere around 25 seconds after my first button press
• Site locks – 503 error code reported.  Site unresponsive for 3-5 minutes
• Site comes back up – ITEM STILL AVAILABLE (with an estimated 5-10%) remaining on it’s status bar graphic.
• Start process again – hit first buy button.
• Enter security code and hit second button
• Site locks – 503 error codes again.  Site unresponsive for another 3-5 minutes.
• Site comes back up. Item unavailable.

I turned to customer service.  At no time did I ask for access to the sold out product or any sort of restitution.  I am simply seeking an explanation as to what happened and why since I do spend a good amount of money and recommend this site to many friends, family, and other internet strangers.  I’ve now expanded what I’m seeking to understand is the customer service that I’m not getting as it is a reflection of the site as well and definitely goes into if I recommend such a site.

Quick timeline:

• Problem occurred
• I sent one initial email to their customer service, which generated a service ticket.
• Engaged their main twitter account (twitter.com/woot), but was brused off after one response.
• After a second tweet, their customer service twitter account chimed in (twitter.com/wootservice).  They generated a second service ticket.
• A response to the first service ticket was received (35 minutes after the first ticket was generated), but it was an obvious canned response not taking accountability for the problem in how it occurred.  The response given was to the effect of if the site locked up in process of the order and was unavailable when it came back up…  Not if I’d pressed all the requisite buttons, locked up, and come back to an available product before locking again.  It was also obvious that I needed to provide specific clarification as to the timeline of events.
• Provided detailed timeline of events and was generated a third service ticket.

All of that occurred two days ago.  I tried to inquire via twitter again yesterday, got a “what happened” response – but no engagement based on my subsequent messages.  No communication from Woot on any of my service tickets yesterday.

Where to go from there?

First, I sent the following email to their parent company (Amazon):

I have been trying to get an answer from customer service representatives at another site owned by Amazon for the past few days. I have no illusions to there being any restitution of any kind (it was never about that for me), I’m simply looking for an explanation as to the usability error and the subsequent trouble it has been to get any real answers via what is referred to as “customer service”.

The website is woot.com, which Amazon bought some time ago. I have tried to engage via customer service emails, and also two of their twitter accounts (@woot and @wootservice). I have been assigned three case numbers (i only wanted one), responded to on one case number (canned response), but a detailed clarification response from me about the case has not been responded to in a reasonable amount of time.

I am a prime member, and have been an Amazon customer since the 90′s. While this is a separate website, being owned by you should mean some level of accountability on your end for their practices.

I value good products that’s backed up by good service. I’m going to these lengths because I have spent a good amount of my own money and recommended this website to many, many others.

The sole thing I am seeking to have answered is whether my experience earlier this week is indicative of their practices in fulfillment and customer services. The answer to that question guides me to how I behave as a consumer and how I guide those around me when buying online.

Second was creating this post.

Next I’ll be tweeting Woot a link to this post.  Not that I think posting this will have an immediate effect on anything.  But this gives me someplace to point people at Woot or Amazon to while I try and get a few answers.

UPDATE:

Tweeted this around 2:20pm

@wootservice @woot with no responses of substance, to start I’ll have to blog and email your parent company for answers bit.ly/oELtBk

Got this email response around 2:53pm

Sorry about that. We had some server issues and we’re thinking Matt tripped over the plug. Crazy, right? Anyway, please don’t spread it around on your website, he’s kinda sensitive about how clumsy he his (did you see his finger after the Monkey Games finale). Maybe just say “their server went down” and make us look good? While we do occasionally have server issues, rest assured that we try to resolve it immediately.

So I’m not sure what I expected. I hoped for a little more then “sorry, my bad” with some jokes thrown in, but what else is really realistic?  Still unsure about why it was hard to get real customer service answers…

And to the response recommendation that I “Maybe just say ‘their server went down’ and make us look good”…  In what planet if I said “I was trying to make a time sensitive purchase on two separate instances in which their server went down twice” would that be considered making you look good?

But it isn’t realistic to expect any more of an explanation than “we f-ed up” on a site with their business model.  If they have a good product, they will sell them all, and that’s that.  You get it or you dont.  They don’t have to care about keeping their servers running well under load because it will sell out anyway.  It’s cost savings to not give a hell about the consumer when you’ll sell out anyway.

If someone get’s bad customer service, what’s the remedy with this business model?  They get a response that can be paraphrased to “I’m sorry. Don’t be mad. Nothing could be done. There’s nothing you can do about it anyway. Deal with it. Don’t speak poorly of us. Blame all the other consumers for ruining your experience.”

There was a lot of crap there that I wish I would have revoked access to long ago.

Anyway, it got me going down the road of doing some more cleaning of my Twitter account in other areas.  Mostly in concerns to who I follow that does not follow me.

I like the use of twitter for the reasons of getting the information that you want, while also having the possibility of some interaction.

I’ve just been noticing that I regularly get followers that seem all cool and great about sharing information and actually having a little bit of interaction before quietly unfolding and moving on to do the same thing in hopes of increasing their follower count.

This is pretty annoying.  It’s not gaming the system per se, but it’s misrepresenting yourself to other users.

Part of me wants to name names of some of these phonies, but to what end?

I almost went down the road of creating another twitter account that only exists to follow users.  When I was just about to touch the keys to start the process I thought: “that’s stupid.”

What this illustrates is part of the beauty of G+.  I can follow anyone to get their information, but keep it strictly separate from all the rest that I like for interaction.  Adding, subtracting, or moving between circles is pretty darn easy.

A lot can be done through TweetDeck for keeping some streams separate, but it’s not been revised as much as I hoped it would (especially since it was acquired by Twitter).  So, I’m unsure on how to go about reforming my twitter stream.  Time to put on my overanalyzing hat.

I can hear you all saying “not another twitter post!”  Chill for a second.  I don’t think it is.  It’s just an illustration on how small the group I’m talking about here.  It’s very similar to circles of friends at common gatherings.

I’ve met a lot of people in the years I’ve worked and events I’ve attended from time to time.  I follow a good number of people from the local community.  Some I do so because I like what they have to say, feel I can learn from them, or like interacting with them.  Some I do so out of basic obligation (you follow me and I’ll follow you).  There are more than a few I consciously choose not to follow because I think they are a waste of time.  I’m sure there are some that think the same of me in terms of that last thought, but I don’t care.

What I’m getting at is that there are those obligatory followers that I’ve only met once or twice and have never really gotten to know me.  There seems to be at least a few times per week that I’m holding back on criticizing online content because they happen to come from local people that I have a better than average chance of interacting with.

It’s like meeting a friend of a friend at a party who just says the stupidest things, but you grin and nod to let them save face.  You can laugh about them later in other company.

I’d love nothing more sometimes to hang a banner here on my site saying “hey so and so, you’re a jackass for doing so and so”.

But I won’t.  Not because I’m a wuss.  Because I don’t like to critique someone that’s not really in the public eye unless they ask for it.  Then it’s on.

Part of it is slowing down on using Twitter.  Why, because I’m growing increasingly weary on most of those that use it, and those that promote themselves as Twitter / Social Media experts.  I think there are legitimate uses for Twitter (both personal and professional) – but too many don’t understand the right and wrong way to use it.  Too many are about trying to take credit for the thoughts and information of others.

The other reason I’m disconnecting it is because I don’t want the crutch of an automatically generated post for my blog each week.  I want to start posting at least two or three times a week with actual information or things I’m doing.

That is to say I want to post at least two or three times a week here or on any other blog-type outlet.  I’ve got a few domains burning a hole in my online pocket.  I’m under no illusion that I’ll turn one on and be a success, but at the same time it’s a thought running through my head.

So anyway…  I already hit the deactivate link.

What brings all this on?  Just I hit a limit on what some local Tweeters were going on and on about.  There are so many marketing themselves as being far more knowledgeable than they really are.  They are using marketing lingo to other marketing professionals to puff up what they perceive as their public standing.  And some actually fall for it…

This is partially a Twitter problem.  It’s too easy for information to make waves (no matter how small) around certain circles.  This produced an obvious distaste of it becoming common for people to reuse the information of others without proper credit.  Even when proper credit is given, it seems that many only recycle information without contributing anything.

I’m mostly just annoyed at the fortune cookie marketing lingo thing to other professionals.  In Twitter, it like some profound saying that is meant to show just how wise the original posting person is…

Like fortunes and horoscopes, they are crafted to be such that everyone can get something out of it.  A few seconds after reading things like this, the flaws take over and show me why 140 characters shouldn’t be used to expose your backside so often to people with half a brain.

Maybe I am growing tired of Twitter and such.  I don’t think so…  I’ve always been annoyed at certain aspects of marketing professionals being disingenuous through outward communications.  But that’s the risk you run being part of the marketing profession I guess.  I value honesty and transparency.