A Little Customer Service Goes a Long Way

The mantra of running a successful business in the 21^st century is to “connect with fans and give them a reason to buy.” Successful companies take the time to provide quality service to each of their customers, knowing that building loyalty is more important than short-term bottom lines. Zynga, the startup responsible for the majority of those Facebook games your friends are always inviting you to join, still has a ways to go.

I actually don’t play any of their games myself, but Rachel plays FarmVille, which means I often end up tending her fields on mornings when she leaves in a hurry for work. Over the weekend, they had an issue where a number of users were unable to save their game states. Even though these players couldn’t get their harvesting to “stick,” the game clock continued to run, causing a lot of players to lose their crops and the coins they spent planting them. Like most “Web 2.0” startups, their income comes from players converting real money to in-game money, and signing up for offers with “partner” companies, also to get in-game money. Aside from their millions in venture capital, their income is entirely dependent on their users sticking with their games.

Now that it’s been fixed, they’ve posted a typical “we’re sorry for the inconvenience” message and pointed to their wonderful item restoration policy, a nondescript corporate piece absolving them of responsibility for most things. Yet here is an example where a little bit of actual customer service could go a long way toward building a loyal fan base that will be inclined to give them their money: simply giving players affected by the error some in-game coins or even “one free item” would put some weight behind the talk of appreciating their fanbase. Best of all, this is something that costs them little to nothing. Imagine being able to turn hundreds of disgruntled customers into loyal fans without costing the company a thing more than a few minutes of a developer’s time.

It’s unlikely they’ll do something like this, meaning their userbase is vulnerable to every other Flash/Javascript-based, Facebook-integrated game company. They’re counting on their users to more or less be drones, willing to not only test their code for free, but also to part with real-world cash in exchange for virtual items. Ignoring an opportunity to at least pretend like the company cares about these users is a business mistake—one with detrimental effects that will only increase as time goes on.

Of course, this particular situation doesn’t really “matter” in my house, as Rachel has hundreds of thousands of in-game coins (thanks to smart RPG-playing), but it’s an example of the opportunities to build a lasting customer base that are squandered when companies see their users as nothing more than “consumers,” money machines adding to their profits. As time goes on and the web space becomes more crowded, the companies with this outdated view of their customers stand to lose big.

It might feel very smug to be able to quote something like that, but you’re missing the point. A company like Zynga that ultimately depends entirely on its users for income should have a fundamental attitude of customer service. The reality is that a large number of users lost a lot of time and virtual money due to an error on their end. It’s nice to just say “We’re sorry, thanks for your patience” like companies did in 1998, but ones that really succeed in the 21^st century understand that even small gestures go a long way toward making customers happy.

Can the FarmVille team go through all of the accounts and reimburse people’s exact monetary losses? No, that’s not realistic. But giving everybody who played FarmVille over the weekend a unique item or a few thousand coins would be the kind of gesture that would cost them nothing and make hundreds of users feel far better than a “we’re sorry, read the policy” rules.