Tell Us But Don't Expect Us to Listen

November 17, 2008

I own a marketing company so naturally I have an interest in following the various marketing techniques and creative ad campaigns of industry geniuses.

Everyone I talk to loves the branding of this company and for some reason even I have fallen for those cute little animals that grace their advertising. We are captivated by the nose-twitching bunnies, mischievous monkeys, parading parrots and even the lovable-looking reptiles. That emotional connection is probably what attracted me to sign up with Telus in the first place. But I think that they have focused so much on the visual identity of their branding that the customer experience (THE brand itself) has gone to the dogs. Maybe their next advertising campaign will feature adorable puppies scampering about. I won’t care because I am disconnecting.

My most recent experience with Telus was phoning to complain about extra charges on my phone bill (a long distance administration charge even though I hadn’t used Telus long distance services.) I politely threatened the agent with terminating my telephone/Internet service with them after almost ten years. The agent did not want to lose me as a valued customer (so I thought) and so offered to upgrade my modem and Internet to the higher speed, and gave me a free month of service. I exclaimed that they had made an unsatisfied customer very happy. I felt like the rabbit was finally going to get a carrot.

I received the free modem a few days later. On set-up I discovered that it was not working- only the power light illuminated. I called Telus and their IT person walked me through the set-up which again proved only the power light on this new modem lit up. “This is simple enough to fix,” I said “send me a new modem.” However, Telus wouldn’t hear of it and insisted on sending an IT person to my house to check the lines even though the old modem was working just fine on those lines.

I waited and waited some more. I made at least 8 calls to Telus over a two week period and received a daily promise that an IT person would be coming to my house to fix the problem. Perhaps he had been dispatched via the back of one of their huge tortoises. With each call I was required to re-check the lights and each time I would respond with “Just send me a new modem-I don’t need an IT guy.”

Finally, 2 weeks later, an IT guy arrived (in a van decaled with love birds) to check the in and outside lines which were fine. The IT guy confirmed the modem was dysfunctional. Had the IT guy brought a new modem with him to replace the one I had told them all along was not working? No. Apparently he was also dysfunctional.

Call number 9 resulted in me not so politely telling the agent that I wished to cancel my Telus service all together to which she replied, “You can’t. You now have a three year Internet contract which is why you got the free modem and free month of service.”

I suddenly felt like one of their crocodiles had a hold of my leg and wasn’t going to let go. It wasn’t customer service I was getting when I had initially complained. It was fraudulent sales tactics. The future, (and all their cuddly critters) may be friendly at Telus but the here-and-now sure isn’t.

This month’s campaign is featuring a litter of the most adorable little puppies. Is this marketing genius? A distraction from the obvious? Both?

Posted by Craig Blackburn

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