Monday, November 25, 2013
Charbroil Done Right!!!
I had an interesting recent customer service experience with Charbroil. As a person who enjoys food, especially grilled or bbq meats, I stumbled across a Charbroil product post. It was a product I had purchased in the past and I was looking at the accessories to see how they would work with my product. One of their social media personnel contacted me and directed me to the actual product page on the company website. I went there and waiting for me was an online chat customer service representative. As I asked questions about the product we discovered I was missing an important accessory that was supposed to come with the product I purchased. After answering all of my product questions and directing to Charbroil recipes and how to's, they showed me how to place a trouble ticket online to get a the the replacement item I needed. The trouble ticket was submitted and they responded within 24 hours. Granted it was not a one response resolution but the entire issue was submitted and (hopefully) resolved online. Within a few days I expect the item to be delivered and Charbroil will celebrate another happy customer. Thanks Charbroil and I will enjoy my Charbroil Big Easy for the holidays.
Monday, November 18, 2013
Social Media and Food
Back in the day you had cooking shows like Julia Child, the Galloping Gourmet, Justin "The Cajun Cook" Wilson, Jeff "The Frugal Gourmet" Smith and a few more. How has the internet changed cooking?
The first obvious answer is that it has made recipes more accessible to the world. If you did not know how to make something you either did not make it or you called your grandmother for the recipe. Then publishing took over the world and anyone who spent time in the kitchen needed the latest and greatest cookbook with all the new secret recipes. Chef's were getting rich off of publishing their own recipe books. Today a recipe found across the world is one google search away by computer, an Ipad or even a cellphone. Sometimes you might try a recipe of something you saw on Facebook, Twitter or Pinterest. Some of those outstanding images come with recipes waiting for you to try them. This has not stopped the publishing of cookbooks but you don't need to go to your local bookstore or library to get the recipe.
Cooking shows have taken over the airways and if you missed a recipe during a broadcast you can be sure to get it from their website of Facebook page. Once you hit these sites they can steer you to other recipes, other chefs or products. Getting people to visit these sites is important so they can obviously make money but it helps them measure a few things. It is possible to measure visitors so you can determine the amount of exposure, certain kinds of foods/recipes might be more popular than others and the show may want to focus on that segmentation of recipes and in cases of the Food Network you can see which shows are more or less popular which could determine future support of that show. Some say it is even more important to feed visitors to the website from Facebook or social media sites. the reason being is that these visitors bring demographic measures which can help in attracting advertisers.
Live shows can see instant feedback on Twitter and Facebook to help show producers determine whether to extend or shorten a segment.
The internet has made the average person much more educated about food and related topics. You now have an average guy cooking gourmet dishes at home for a date, serving it on bone china and pairing it with a Napa Valley wine. This same guy 20 years ago would have been serving Hungry-man tv dinners with a couple of forty ounce beers or possibly some Bartles and Jaymes wine coolers.
Restaurant goers have moved from eating at Mel's diner to touring Chicago steakhouses or visiting every restaurant in the Hour magazine in Detroit. Because these eaters are more educated they are harder to please. A whopper and fries no longer satisfies when you know you can get a medium rare USDA Prime Filet Mignon covered in zip sauce with Portobello mushrooms and Tiger prawns. It is because of the internet that these consumers are not only educated about food but restaurants around the world where they can consume them. It doesn't only have to be gourmet food but shows like Diners, Drive-ins and Dives is an excellent example in which a show uses input from its viewers to determine what diner or dive should be showcased on the show. I can pretty much guarantee that each of the locations on that show has gained more customers and fans nationwide than it would have without the internet.
Whether you are at home cooking some asian zing chicken wings for the game or at top rated restaurant eating a Wagyu Kobe beef steak the internet had something to do with dish or recipe being made available to you.
The first obvious answer is that it has made recipes more accessible to the world. If you did not know how to make something you either did not make it or you called your grandmother for the recipe. Then publishing took over the world and anyone who spent time in the kitchen needed the latest and greatest cookbook with all the new secret recipes. Chef's were getting rich off of publishing their own recipe books. Today a recipe found across the world is one google search away by computer, an Ipad or even a cellphone. Sometimes you might try a recipe of something you saw on Facebook, Twitter or Pinterest. Some of those outstanding images come with recipes waiting for you to try them. This has not stopped the publishing of cookbooks but you don't need to go to your local bookstore or library to get the recipe.
Cooking shows have taken over the airways and if you missed a recipe during a broadcast you can be sure to get it from their website of Facebook page. Once you hit these sites they can steer you to other recipes, other chefs or products. Getting people to visit these sites is important so they can obviously make money but it helps them measure a few things. It is possible to measure visitors so you can determine the amount of exposure, certain kinds of foods/recipes might be more popular than others and the show may want to focus on that segmentation of recipes and in cases of the Food Network you can see which shows are more or less popular which could determine future support of that show. Some say it is even more important to feed visitors to the website from Facebook or social media sites. the reason being is that these visitors bring demographic measures which can help in attracting advertisers.
Live shows can see instant feedback on Twitter and Facebook to help show producers determine whether to extend or shorten a segment.
The internet has made the average person much more educated about food and related topics. You now have an average guy cooking gourmet dishes at home for a date, serving it on bone china and pairing it with a Napa Valley wine. This same guy 20 years ago would have been serving Hungry-man tv dinners with a couple of forty ounce beers or possibly some Bartles and Jaymes wine coolers.
Restaurant goers have moved from eating at Mel's diner to touring Chicago steakhouses or visiting every restaurant in the Hour magazine in Detroit. Because these eaters are more educated they are harder to please. A whopper and fries no longer satisfies when you know you can get a medium rare USDA Prime Filet Mignon covered in zip sauce with Portobello mushrooms and Tiger prawns. It is because of the internet that these consumers are not only educated about food but restaurants around the world where they can consume them. It doesn't only have to be gourmet food but shows like Diners, Drive-ins and Dives is an excellent example in which a show uses input from its viewers to determine what diner or dive should be showcased on the show. I can pretty much guarantee that each of the locations on that show has gained more customers and fans nationwide than it would have without the internet.
Whether you are at home cooking some asian zing chicken wings for the game or at top rated restaurant eating a Wagyu Kobe beef steak the internet had something to do with dish or recipe being made available to you.
Monday, November 11, 2013
Consumer Bullying
While searching for material for a recent assignment I ran across a story about Amy's Baking Company from Scottsdale, AZ. It was a typical story of a restaurant looking for assistance to become successful so an arrangement was made for the television show called Kitchen Nightmares and its star Chef Gordon Ramsey to come in and save the day. Usually the chef comes in and tastes the food which is terrible which leads him to modify the menu. He then does a walk through of the kitchen which is usually in unhealthy condition and needs a major cleaning or renovation. Then finally speaks with the staff to see if there are problems with the staff or management. After speaking with the owners there is typically a little resistance to reality and resistance to change but that is usually overcome. That is pretty much a typical episode. Then there was Amy's Baking Company.
As stated above Chef Ramsey tasted the food which needed improvement. Apparently whenever a customer was unsatisfied with the food the head chef and owner Amy's was never told. Her lack of knowledge of her customers real feelings led her to believe her food was nothing less than excellent. When a customer did complain, the manager Samy Bouzaglo husband of the head chef and co-owner, would berate the customers telling the customers they did not understand good food or did not know what they were talking about. There was one incident that was caught on film that seemed to almost escalate to physical assault instigated by the owners. On several occasions customers were told they did not know what they were talking about, they were bullied and told never to come back. Why would a customer come back if they were treated like that? I wouldn't.
Quite a bit of this bad behavior was caught on film and when Chef Ramsey attempted to sit down like an adult and speak with the owners about the issues Amy went crazy. She said she was being attacked by Chef Ramseys, the customers, Yelp, the bloggers and pretty much anyone who had a pulse. Chef realized this situation could not be helped and for the first time on air the episode completed without him helping the restaurant.
I don't always agree that the customer is ALWAYS right but since when is it ok to chase customers away that you have disappointed? Since when is it ok to berate customers and employees for giving feedback? Social Media is a way for a customer to connect and stay engaged with it's client base. In this case it seems like they use it as a tool to chase and berate anyone who does not agree with them. See the entire episode on YouTube here.
As stated above Chef Ramsey tasted the food which needed improvement. Apparently whenever a customer was unsatisfied with the food the head chef and owner Amy's was never told. Her lack of knowledge of her customers real feelings led her to believe her food was nothing less than excellent. When a customer did complain, the manager Samy Bouzaglo husband of the head chef and co-owner, would berate the customers telling the customers they did not understand good food or did not know what they were talking about. There was one incident that was caught on film that seemed to almost escalate to physical assault instigated by the owners. On several occasions customers were told they did not know what they were talking about, they were bullied and told never to come back. Why would a customer come back if they were treated like that? I wouldn't.
Quite a bit of this bad behavior was caught on film and when Chef Ramsey attempted to sit down like an adult and speak with the owners about the issues Amy went crazy. She said she was being attacked by Chef Ramseys, the customers, Yelp, the bloggers and pretty much anyone who had a pulse. Chef realized this situation could not be helped and for the first time on air the episode completed without him helping the restaurant.
I don't always agree that the customer is ALWAYS right but since when is it ok to chase customers away that you have disappointed? Since when is it ok to berate customers and employees for giving feedback? Social Media is a way for a customer to connect and stay engaged with it's client base. In this case it seems like they use it as a tool to chase and berate anyone who does not agree with them. See the entire episode on YouTube here.
Monday, November 4, 2013
Cyberbullying
In recent times I have read several articles that identified the use of social media for CYBER BULLYING. Cyberbullying is the use of the Internet and related technologies to harm or harass other people, in a deliberate, repeated, and hostile manner.[1] As it has become more common in society, particularly among young people, legislation and awareness campaigns have arisen to combat it.
A very recent incident involved two teammates playing for the Miami Dolphins in the National Football League (NFL). What was thought of as typical teammate hazing has turned into a teammate leaving the team to seek help for his mental instability and another player being suspended indefinitely. It has been reported that the suspended player used social media and texting to berate and harass his own teammate. A summary of this incident can be can be read on the NFL.COM website.
Other incidents have prompted suicides by the victims of this form of bullying. A recent incident in Lakeland, Florida led to the arrest of two young girls ages 12 and 14 for cyberbullying causing the suicide death of 12-year-old Rebecca Sedwick. Details of this case were read on the Time.com website. It seems that the increase use of technology has made it easier for people to attack others because they have KEYBOARD COURAGE. Keyboard Courage is a term I use when people communicate thoughts while behind a keyboard that they normally would not in person. It is not necessarily negative. In some cases a person could demonstrate their affection for another person via email, text, Facebook, Twitter or even a dating site that they could not say in person. In these bullying cases, people are harassing others 24 hours a day. If you had a bad day at school you could go home and not deal with those harassing kids until the next day or you were free for a weekend before you had to face them again. Today there is no escape when bullies have your email address, Twitter handle, Facebook account or any social media account. They have access to your family, your friends and possibly even your employers.
The next example is an odd one. It is a case in which a young lady from Michigan dressed up as a Boston Marathon runner who survived the terrorist bombing attacks for a halloween costume. The woman posted pics of herself using several different social media outlets for everyone to see. She may have used poor judgment thinking she had come up with a very creative halloween costume but it inspired a significant amount of backlash. People respond not only with thoughts of disapproval but responses with hatred and threats of violence. Someone had found images on the internet to determine he home address or telephone numbers to continue the threats offline. She did not think she was going to get any responses that she did but they were so bad that her family has also received threats and she has lost her job. Is this cyberbullying or is this people standing up for what they think is socially acceptable?
A very recent incident involved two teammates playing for the Miami Dolphins in the National Football League (NFL). What was thought of as typical teammate hazing has turned into a teammate leaving the team to seek help for his mental instability and another player being suspended indefinitely. It has been reported that the suspended player used social media and texting to berate and harass his own teammate. A summary of this incident can be can be read on the NFL.COM website.
Other incidents have prompted suicides by the victims of this form of bullying. A recent incident in Lakeland, Florida led to the arrest of two young girls ages 12 and 14 for cyberbullying causing the suicide death of 12-year-old Rebecca Sedwick. Details of this case were read on the Time.com website. It seems that the increase use of technology has made it easier for people to attack others because they have KEYBOARD COURAGE. Keyboard Courage is a term I use when people communicate thoughts while behind a keyboard that they normally would not in person. It is not necessarily negative. In some cases a person could demonstrate their affection for another person via email, text, Facebook, Twitter or even a dating site that they could not say in person. In these bullying cases, people are harassing others 24 hours a day. If you had a bad day at school you could go home and not deal with those harassing kids until the next day or you were free for a weekend before you had to face them again. Today there is no escape when bullies have your email address, Twitter handle, Facebook account or any social media account. They have access to your family, your friends and possibly even your employers.
The next example is an odd one. It is a case in which a young lady from Michigan dressed up as a Boston Marathon runner who survived the terrorist bombing attacks for a halloween costume. The woman posted pics of herself using several different social media outlets for everyone to see. She may have used poor judgment thinking she had come up with a very creative halloween costume but it inspired a significant amount of backlash. People respond not only with thoughts of disapproval but responses with hatred and threats of violence. Someone had found images on the internet to determine he home address or telephone numbers to continue the threats offline. She did not think she was going to get any responses that she did but they were so bad that her family has also received threats and she has lost her job. Is this cyberbullying or is this people standing up for what they think is socially acceptable?
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