2 builders who never spoke to each other · contested
Take the market on service the incumbent cannot give
Where buyers pick whoever seems to care most, visible care is the position: answer fast, apologise properly, and fix the reported bug while the reporter is still in the conversation. A small team can meet that expectation in a way a large one cannot, though the return depends on the category rewarding repeat purchase and word of mouth at all.
Where this splits
Most members treat conspicuous service as a route to taking share from a bigger rival, while one argues that in a low-repeat, low-referral category the same spending on delight moves nothing.
6 claims against 1
Arvid Kahl · Harry Dry · Jason Cohen
Win share on conspicuous service the incumbent cannot match
- 01You can take a market from an entrenched incumbent on service alone, without undercutting on price, product or delivery speed.
- 02In categories where buyers pick the supplier who seems to care most, such as pets, healthcare or education, visible care is the positioning.
Without repeat purchase or referrals, delight spending moves nothing
Check the multiplier before copying a delight strategy: in a low-repeat, low-sharing category the same spending will not move anything.
- 03Compete on being visibly human about failure: buyers now expect a company to care and to apologise properly rather than never to break, and a small team can meet that expectation in a way a large incumbent cannot.
- 04Turn a bug report into a brand moment: thank the reporter, fix it immediately, and tell them the moment the fix is deployed. At FeedbackPanda this sometimes took under 30 minutes from support chat to shipped fix.
- 05Make customer service the thing you are known for and charge a premium for it, which can sustain growth at large scale.
What it returned
- 2011
Chewy was founded in 2011 and passed Amazon within five years as the largest online pet food retailer in the US, despite investors refusing to fund it because Amazon was already there
- 30
Under 30 minutes from customer service chat to deployed fix, and some reporters turned into the company's loudest evangelists
A hosting customer told him he wants someone watching the server, and if it does go down, he wants an apology, where a decade earlier the same sentence would have ended in a refund demand.
An online kitchenware shop cannot out-service Amazon into a win
Sources
- Human + Fallible = Love; Corporate + Sterile = RefundJason Cohen · longform.asmartbear.com · Human + Fallible = Love; Corporate + Sterile = Refund · 2010-06-28
- The rise of the “successful” unsustainable companyJason Cohen · longform.asmartbear.com · The rise of the “successful” unsustainable company · 2012-10-23
- How Chewy delights customersHarry Dry · Marketing Examples · undated · dissenting
- How Jürgen Klopp makes fans smileHarry Dry · Marketing Examples · undated · dissenting
- The Myth of The Finished Product – The Bootstrapped FounderArvid Kahl · thebootstrappedfounder.com · Bugs: Correcting the Dysfunctions You Never Meant to Create · 2020-02-27
the second source
Three plays a week, for the phase you are in
No roundup of links, no news. Three tactics more than one builder arrived at separately, with the numbers each one returned and the disagreements left in.
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