A discussion about business and marketing communications (or marcom).

I just read in a recent article by Anne M. Obarski, ‘Your Customers are Cranky! 6 Proven Ways to Fix Their Frowns!’ that “the latest results from the University of Michigan’s American Customer Satisfaction Index show a continuing decline in consumers’ happiness with the goods and services they are receiving.”  I’m sad to say that I totally agree with those results.  But what I loved about this article was---you guessed it!  The fact that customers were cranky and the “C” in cranky stands for COMMUNICATION PITFALLS!!  I agree that people have got to understand that hearing and listening are two different things.  I’m constantly teaching my son, to hear is to acknowledge or heed, and to listen is pay attention and appropriately respond.  That’s the problem, many customer service people hear, but they don’t pay attention and satisfy the customer.