Having a Company Voice

Dick Costolo in his "Ask the Wizard" blog has an excellent post today about company voice.

Dick argues that it's a competitive advantage for a company to have a voice and a personality that is visible to its customers. Too many companies work to remove evidence of personality in favor of a blandness that seems less risky. But people enjoy dealing with other people, Dick says, and companies with personality remind customers that there really are real people at the other end of the line.

To me this is also about having company values, values that really say something about how a company intends to behave and how it will treat its customers (and employees). It is easy for a company to have a statement of values to which everyone pays lip service, which are non-controversial and yet somehow seem positive. It is harder for a company to have real values that it lives by even if it seems to cost more or be less efficient as a result. But those kinds of values are the ones people buy into sincerely and which build loyalty and buzz.

What is most difficult for a company, I think, is having those values and applying them consistently across the business and its many activities. If you do a good job of conveying your values, or personality, to customers but then fall short of applying them, the disappointment customers feel is even greater than if you had not articulated the values at all. You have set them up, and then let them down.

In those cases honesty and sincerity are always best -- we meant well, we messed up, we're sorry, we'll try to do better. And then really try -- and let the customer know how you're getting on. Companies, like people, won't always get it right, but customers will forgive a lot if they know you're trying.