Thursday, May 26, 2022

The man I am having dinner with is a barbarian

You sell us water and keep the good wine for yourself

When you have a complaint about your date's uncouth behaviour, or the wine being served, you have options. A quick tweet while they are in the bathroom perhaps, or an angry Trip Advisor rating in the carpark afterwards.

The first century residents of Pompeii, lacking access to a reliable mobile network, instead scrawled their complaints¹ directly onto the nearest wall. Which must have been somewhat obvious to their targets, but does mean we are still able to read them now, almost 2,000 years after they were buried in the catastrophic eruption of Mt Vesuvius.

Pompeiian graffiti has given us even more than one-star restaurant reviews. The thousands of examples found have become a primary source for understanding what and how people ate, the way they lived their lives, and how they really spoke to each other (as opposed to the classical Latin of official documents and literature).

Our own customer service inboxes can perform the same role. The conversations that happen in support reveal the true ways in which our customers talk about our companies. The phrases they use to explain their problems, how they think about our competition and market, and how they actually use our products and services, as opposed to how they were intended to be used.

Understanding those differences is hugely valuable for people across the business. Product designers, marketers, sales people, documentation writers. All of them need that knowledge, but may rarely be exposed to undiluted customer interactions.

So customer service teams must be archeologists². Identifying, translating, and categorizing customer insights, and presenting them to the right people, will make better CX possible and customer service roles more impactful.

¹ The subject line and heading of this email are both real examples of graffiti complaints found in Pompeii. Check out the Ancient Graffiti Project for more.

² Whip and fedora optional, but encouraged.