The BIG Kahuna

As the manager of a brand you have to make sure that all your ducks are in a row. That means making policies and procedures that leverage your branding. Here’s a great example of what not to do.

I received an email from Yahoo! today concerning my listing for Brand Identity Guru. The fee for the listing is $299/year. I never really use Yahoo! so I couldn’t remember my user name or password so I called their 800 number. Here’s what transpired:

Hi, I’d like to pay for my listing.

Y: Can I have your user/password?

No sorry, but I have your order number

Y: What is it, please verify the account. Favorite sports team, birth date, address, zip code

Y: I need to transfer you to the accounts department

Can’t I just pay my bill?

Y: No

Y: This is the accounts department I understand you don’t know your ID/Password, please verify the account.

I just did that with the other woman

Y: We’re a different department

Okay, ask away

Y: We need to transfer you to the billing department.

Ok

Y: Welcome to billing we need to verify your account.

Are you kidding me? I just did that twice. I want to pay you $299 now. Will you take it?

Y: After you verify your account.

Never mind, I don’t want to pay anymore.

Listen if you’re setting up ridiculous roadblocks for customers that want to give you money then I suggest you change your policies and procedures. At Brand Identity Guru we take all forms of payment, quickly.

This entry was posted on Monday, February 23rd, 2009 at 6:42 pm and is filed under Branding News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.