On December 9, 2006 at 03:29, JonW747 said...
That's why real companies have dedicated customer support
staffs to help their customers work through their problems.
Most CI companies aren't 'real' companies then. The company I work for does $10 to $14 million a year and has 35 employees, but we don't have a 'dedicated' customer support staff. This doesn't work for CI business models. I'm the dedicated customer support agent for the jobs I run, since I'm familiar with the system.
Huh? No. In my world, our customers review our prices,
and if we included an off the shelf item they can get
at a lower price and procurement isn't an issue, they
go buy it somewhere else.
That could work for us, but it usually doesn't. This has to do more with the inconsistency in consumer/pro electronics. There's many more variables in these products then something such as a PC.
It was comments from your fellow CI's that led me to believe
that this wasn't an actual issue, because your customers
aren't concerned with price, just getting the job done
right. Well. Apparently not *your* customers. See? We're
making some headway.
I thought I made it clear that I'm currently working in the ultra high end market. Many customers are concerned with getting it done right, but I've never said they weren't concerned about price. Everybody is concerned about price. Even the billionaire that I'm currently completing a project for now; he price shopped us through a competitor on the 11 plasmas on his project. The competitor offered to supply the plasmas at 17 points, and we were bidding them at 33 points. We went down to 31 points to make satisfy him.
He didn't do it because he was tight on money Jon.
Either way, I cut my teeth in the entry level market. I feel for the guys who work in this market and put up with the above occurence on almost every job. It's incessant and very taxing.
I'm more then willing to accept what you're saying when
you actually make some sense. The thing is you're not
the only one representing the CI point of view here.
I'm sorry you don't understand what I'm saying. I'm trying. True, I don't represent all CI's, I only represent myself. But, many sentiments I have are shared by many CI's. In that, I represent CI's. But, not all of us will agree on all things.
So let's take this the next step...
What happens if the non-AD's were ever shutdown?
It will help remove some negative challenges to CI's trying to do business. It will help end users who buy remotes who will hopefully be served by vendors who be a little more helpful and supportive to the end users. Before the 37th complaint that nonAD's and AD's aren't that helpful now, I know. But, that doesn't mean that it still wouldn't be helpful for the price whoring box movers to go away.
Ideally your customers can no longer discover lower prices
via a search on eBay, or via Froogle/etc. Does this solve
the unhappy customer problem for you? Or are you at all
concerned they may discover that AD's such as SurfRemote,
BlueDo, or ProRemotes will sell them the same gear for
1/2 the price?
See my second point above, it's not just about prices and price shopping. As for being concerned about AD's vs nonAD's, that's a non sequitir as you proposed it. Any halving of places to price shop would be net sum beneficial. Yet, customer's will still shop AD's, but the price differential will be less than it is now because URC is forcing them to offer more support for the remotes, so the prices will likely rise a little. That's a better situation than it is right now.
I've always made it clear that I think it's great for DIYers to have MX remotes available, but for most others there should be more help for them offered by the box movers and price whores.
