It’s the founding CEO’s job to personally email the first 1000 users
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It’s the founding CEO’s job to personally email the first 1000 users
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Re: It’s the founding CEO’s job to personally email the first 1000 users
#2As long as you have their first name, I don't see why this can't be automated. It doesn't seem time well spent and there is more chance for error doing it manually.
I agree with getting in touch, I just don't agree with spending your time each day doing it.
Re: It’s the founding CEO’s job to personally email the first 1000 users
#3I personally wrote thank you cards to our first hundred or so customers. It really goes a long way to show some sort of personalization.
Re: It’s the founding CEO’s job to personally email the first 1000 users
#4As long as you have their first name, I don't see why this can't be automated. It doesn't seem time well spent and there is more chance for error doing it manually. I agree with getting in touch, I just don't agree with spending your time each day doing it.
That doesn't work. Users can spot an auto-generated email a mile away.
I answer a lot of mail and I make sure that I always refer to something in the original email that is unique to the writer. That goes a long way to getting out of the 'form letter' rut and the response is much better than with emails that contain no 'personal note'.
Re: It’s the founding CEO’s job to personally email the first 1000 users
#5I think it's a nice trick, and I will definitely apply it myself once we're ready to roll out. I do have one comment though (similar to redguava's).
Emailing the first 1000 users, fine. But doing it personally and manually, why? Aren't you going to end up using exactly the same text for all your users (either that or risk typos that make you look less professional, not more human)? Don't forget the risk of developing CTS while you could be doing much more constructive stuff.
I would say, have it automated but sent a couple of hours after signup, or have them sent in batches at a time where you would normally sit down and do it. I'm thinking that people either assume it's automated or they assume it's manual, one way or the other.
Re: It’s the founding CEO’s job to personally email the first 1000 users
#6As long as you have their first name, I don't see why this can't be automated. It doesn't seem time well spent and there is more chance for error doing it manually. I agree with getting in touch, I just don't agree with spending your time each day doing it.
That doesn't work. Users can spot an auto-generated email a mile away. I answer a lot of mail and I make sure that I always refer to something in the original email that is unique to the writer. That goes a long way to getting out of the 'form letter' rut and the response is much better than with emails that contain no 'personal note'.
Reading the email in the linked post, I don't see any "personal note" in there. Other than the first name which, as redguava points out, is easily obtainable. It looks personalized, sure. But there's nothing telling me it isn't sent by a cron job.
Re: It’s the founding CEO’s job to personally email the first 1000 users
#7This is a great recommendation for a startup looking to differentiate based on customer service.
I don't buy the implication that this isn't a great use of "executive time". I'm not the CEO, but I run a business unit and the buck definitely stops here. I still make time to:
- respond to random emails I pick out of our customer service email queue
- read all customer feedback submitted from the "feedback" tab on our website, and pick out any submissions that I think need special handling
- put my email address on many, if not most of the automated emails that get sent out, especially renewal notices and anything else we view as "really important". This usually generates a few hundred inquiries that I need to respond to, or route to another staffer
- troll social media looking for opportunities to perform random acts of kindness for our customers and prospects. This year I've sent t-shirts to Norway, a custom order of premium teas to Capetown, a box-set of books to Lincoln and many, more little gifts to surprise our customers.
- personally manage our primary twitter account, @hover to make sure it has a consistent voice and purpose. This account is in addition to the group-managed accounts we operate in support of the primary account.
So what's the pay-off? Why should a founder or leader be concerned with such trifling things? In the three years since making our commitment to providing real customer service (as opposed to lip service), we've built a culture where everyone understands what we each need to do to meet or beat customer expectations, and fix it when we don't. I don't think it hurts for my team to see me working alongside them helping customers and fielding inquiries day-to-day. The rest of my senior team works similarly and it really makes it easy to raise the quality bar when the leadership team is "walking the walk".
In our business, this extra efforts means that our renewal rate beats industry average by light years and our customer sat metrics are world-class.
(edit to fix formatting and some stupid grammar that crept in while I was distracted)
Re: It’s the founding CEO’s job to personally email the first 1000 users
#8I use this formula instead.
10,000 emails x 0.1 ctr = 1000 leads 1000 x 0.02% sign up = 20 users
I want to make sure I got enough leads or first time users and assuming only 2% of my leads actually sign up. I want to still have a decent monthly recurring income.
Re: It’s the founding CEO’s job to personally email the first 1000 users
#9As long as you have their first name, I don't see why this can't be automated. It doesn't seem time well spent and there is more chance for error doing it manually. I agree with getting in touch, I just don't agree with spending your time each day doing it.
Doing it 1000 times may show you a few ways that automation can screw that up.
Also you may see someone you know.
Re: It’s the founding CEO’s job to personally email the first 1000 users
#10I think it's a nice trick, and I will definitely apply it myself once we're ready to roll out. I do have one comment though (similar to redguava's). Emailing the first 1000 users, fine. But doing it personally and manually, why? Aren't you going to end up using exactly the same text for all your users (either that or risk typos that make you look less professional, not more human)? Don't forget the risk of developing…
Its not an engineering problem, its a customer service, business and relationship problem. I contend that the more you humanize these types of interactions, the better your results will be, the more you will learn. Look at it this way, 30 seconds to send each email works out to a bit more than 8 hours work to get some amazing customer feedback. Some organizations will spend this much time in planning meetings just to setup a discussion to strategize customer sat approaches. You can get the feedback for almost free. For me, its an easy choice! ;)