The Founder and CEO of Superhuman, a red-hot email application, explained on Medium the changes made to the service after customer feedback poured in regarding a few features. You can read about the entry here. There are a few points that stood out for me from the post
Quick response shows how you truly take customers seriously
Upon reading this, I am pleased to see the quick response from an executive to customer feedback. It shows that at least the company took customers seriously to issue such an official response. Whether the answer is sufficient to please the troubled customers remains to be seen, but at least the effort is laudable. In the age of abundance in information, products and services, customer satisfaction is a commodity, a luxury and a differentiation that should be among the highest priorities. In this sense, Superhuman did well.
Don’t under-estimate the power of genuine apologies
Another point that I noticed in this post is that the CEO kept apologizing. I am not sure if the “read status” feature was originally and intentionally conceived by Superhuman, and it doesn’t matter. The apology is a welcome sign. I am of the belief that if you make mistakes, an apology and ability to avoid the same mistakes will earn back the trust of customers in time. Sometimes, I see companies go above and beyond trying to dodge their liabilities and find “force majeure”-like excuses. Just own up to your mistakes and apologize. Sincerely. We, human-beings, have a great ability to forgive. Don’t underestimate it.
Publishing contact details shows you are willing to listen
Jeff Bezos makes his email public and so does this CEO of Superhuman. Though I am not naive enough to think that a response is guaranteed, having their contact details public at least makes these folks look more accessible and friendly to ideas and feedback. Compared to a lifeless “contact us” page, this seems significantly better.
Minh Quang Duong 