Meet (one of) the support staff!

Since we now have a blog, I can introduce myself officially. I’m Kevin, and if you call or email Ilium Software for tech support, there’s a pretty good chance you’ll talk to me at some point.

I’m not just a tech support guy who provides PDA software tech support - I actually use the things I support on a regular basis. In general, Ilium “eats its own dog food” - I think that’s the saying. We use eWallet for company passwords and other super-secret things, and we use ListPro for keeping track of not-super-secret things (including many of our QA test lists, the phone support log we keep notes in while on calls, and our feature request tracker.)

I use eWallet to keep track of all my passwords and bank information (you cannot believe how cool it is to be able to call for a pizza and just flip open eWallet on the same phone and read the number right off!), and ListPro to handle my grocery list, consulting hours, and car mileage. I can’t go shopping without looking in ListPro first. This isn’t a sales blurb - I really use both products, they really help me out, and I figure it’s important for people to know that I’m not just paid to say eWallet is super cool.

I’ve been using PDAs since I was in middle school: the first one I got was some 20 dollar electronic organizer that I’d keep my homework assignments in, to the astonishment of the other 6th graders. Next was a Palm IIIx (the screen broke), Dell Axim X5, Palm Zire 31, Audiovox SMT5600, and finally a Palm Treo 650 which seems to be the best fit.

I don’t just support our products; I also help test them. As a result, my desk is a breeding ground for PDAs as you’ll see in the picture below: Back row: Dell Axim X51V, HP iPAQ 3870, iPAQ 4350, Palm Tungsten T, iMate Pocket PC, Orange SPV-e200, iPAQ 3600, Handspring Visor, Sony Clie NR70.

Front row: Palm Zire 31, Memorex U3 flash drive, Palm Treo 650, Motorola MPX-220, T-Mobile SDA, Motorola MPX-200, Palm M505, Palm Tungsten T3, Palm Zire 71, and my iPod.

The camera: Palm Treo 700w

That’s a lot of PDAs.

Responsible Customers

Seth Godin writes today about customers and their responsibility, whether companies can (or should) blacklist customers, and consumers gaining power. I wish he’d written more, actually, but since he didn’t, I will.

Anyone who spends any time with the public knows that some people are going to take advantage of, or behave irresponsibly in, any situation. I think it’s the responsibility of the company to their other customers to control this behavior however they can. For example, if someone is talking on a cellphone in a theater (I can’t believe this happens, but it does), I think it’s the theater’s responsibility (not just their option, but their responsibility) to throw the offender out. Their responsibility is to the other people who have also paid for their seats (upwards of $110 on Broadway).

But then the company has to deal with some irate consumer with the power to post anything he wants on the internet. The person thrown out of the theater can post that the theater was rude, or that the play stunk. Or even that they got food poisoning from the drinks at intermission. And they probably won’t hurt the theater at all.

But abusive users do have the power to hurt smaller companies. A smaller company can easily be harmed by 1 or 2 negative reviews or comments, even if there are many more positive reviews elsewhere. Most people are far too busy - and there’s way too much content available - to keep looking for information once they find at least one answer.

We provide excellent service because we believe in it, not because we’re afraid of bad comments. But we’ll occasionally give someone a refund on a very old purchase, or a “replacement” of a product we know they didn’t pay for, just because we don’t want to deal with the possibility of a bad review online. Some people might call this protection for the consumer, but I think it’s much more like the kind of protection people get from organized crime (at least in the movies; I’ll admit I have no experience with it at all). It’s just paying someone to go away. Unfortunately, it’s reinforcing the bad behavior, which just means encouraging it.

Price Wars by PC Makers

There are a bunch of news stories around this morning about Dell announcing “more aggressive pricing”. Analysts are writing about potential price wars.

Dell apparently also announced a planned improvement to its customer service and support, but either the analysts just didn’t believe it or they didn’t think it was important enough to write about. But I think a serious customer service war between Dell and anyone would be such a huge benefit to the PC users of the world.

Customer service is getting worse and worse, and Dell is one of the biggest offenders. The internet is full of Dell horror stories. I don’t know about HP’s customer service or tech support, but I’ll probably find out, as I doubt I’ll ever buy another Dell. We’ve always bought Dells here (except for the guys who build their own PCs), but after the last experience, at least I’ll never buy one again. It’s too bad - I like their PCs - but I will not support any company that treats me this badly.

We’re known for our excellent customer service and tech support. I don’t expect that level from other companies, but I do expect much more than I’m getting.

I’ve seen many discussions in the various ISP groups I read about customer service and tech support. Yes, it’s expensive, and, yes, it’s time-consuming. And yes, some of the users try hard to take advantage of it, and then everyone gets frustrated. But I really can’t see that providing bad service is the answer. And since I’m in charge, my vote is the one that counts.

NewsBreak and ListPro Get More Action

A great review of NewsBreak by Todd Ogasawara showed up on Microsoft’s website. Thanks very much, Todd, for cheering up a day that really needed it (though the weather’s beautiful) (though not as beautiful as it no doubt is in Hawaii).

ListPro got a bunch of sales from being featured on Bits du Jour, and one very nice comment about how well it runs on Kubuntu under wine. I’m fuzzy about what that is, but am very happy it works!

Many Nice Words about ListPro

Thanks, Andrew and Jeff for the very nice words about ListPro.

And thanks to Pocket Goddess and Clinton Fitch for the great reviews too!

To the people who commented and asked: Yes, we’d like to do a Mac version, but I’ll be honest here and say don’t hold your breath waiting for one. Each additional platform takes away from adding features. It’s a difficult trade-off.

Motorola Q Review

Don McDougall has a review of the new Motorola Q phone on the Mobility Site. The “Q” looks a bit like a Pocket PC but is actually a Windows Mobile-based Smartphone with a high-resolution screen. Thanks very much to Don for his kind words about our NewsBreak RSS reader.

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