I worked in healthcare and what I learned is that "who is the customer is blurred". There is a love triangle: Provider, Payor and Patient- The Provider (example- Your doctor, hospital, etc.); the Payor (usually the government or your insurance agency); and the Patient (that's you). Given that there is ample supply of patients, you can see that you are not really important to this equation. If you decided not to take advantage of the healthcare system, there are plenty of others ready to take your place.
I've had YAHOO! as my home page for more than 5 years. I have a YAHOO! mail account. I use their portal personalization services on MY.YAHOO!. They do a great job.
Recently, I've changed to GOOGLE as my home page and personal "port of entry" on the Information Highway. They didn't require me to change my 5 year old email address so conversion was easy.
I thought I would let YAHOO! know that they lost a customer. After searching in vain for how to contact them (I even went to Investor Relations), I gave up. I wanted to tell them I switched to GOOGLE and why. I left their site frustrated.
Anyway, I went back to GOOGLE to tell them they got a new customer and why. Guess What? Same problem.... no place to tell them they increased their market share with me as their new customer. No place to complain either.
Do you know why? Because I am not a provider nor a payor. In the internet world, I am simply the patient. Had I decided not to log on and simply die of information deprivation- no one would have cared. No one. No company. No Government. No Non-profit institution.
Here is what I learned... You've heard people say there is "no free lunch". Or, perhaps you've heard people say that "If we give it away, the value is zero".
I have another thought for... If it's given to you for free... you're not important. Sure if I give you something tangible (like a physical sample of something), I must think you are important. Like Pharma companies giving drug samples to doctors or supermarkets giving food samples to shoppers.
But in the information world, if you get something for free, it's because you are not important.
I remember how floored I was when I heard the phrase, "For a TV network you are not the customer you are the product" and realized that like pork-bellies, viewership was a commodity that delivered in bulk to advertisers and that I was just another piece of bacon.
ReplyDeleteNow this isn't all bad. Companies usually need to take pretty good care of their products or their customers won't pay. Yahoo doesn't notice when one piece of bacon falls off the truck, but when they can't deliver a full load they realize that to keep their customers they probably need a more product-centric view.