Business Blog: Hoover’s Business Insight Zone

Jeremiah Owyang names the perpetrators.

November 20th, 2007

Forrester Research analyst Jeremiah Owyang describes three companies that have wasted his time lately: Real, Delta Air Lines, and Peoplesoft. Rather than merely gripe, he does the right thing by suggesting ways they could improve what they’re doing.

Possibly I’m reading too much into this, but Real and Peoplesoft (or rather, someone from the Oracle mothership) have already responed to Jeremiah, within just a few hours of his post. Delta . . . M.I.A.

It shouldn’t be surprising that Web-oriented software companies would respond sooner than an airline. On the other hand, Delta has 51,000 employees, and you’d think that someone there would have the sense to realize that Jeremiah is a blogger with a good-sized following (and a top-1,000 Technorati ranking) who has built a reputation among the many who read him for operating in good faith. Would it kill some Deltoid to leave a comment? Drop him a quick e-mail?

What I’m reading into it, perhaps unfairly, is the millionth verse of the old campfire song, “Airlines Don’t Care about Those Who Fly.”

Category: Management, The working life

4 Comments so far

rsomers November 21st, 2007 7:26 am

I spent a few years in the airline industry and I know that campfire song by heart. A good example is the recent public mocking of a passenger who used his iPhone to call BS when the captain announced a weather-related delay.

While I’m all for mocking iClones, making fun of your customers isn’t a good strategy for keeping them. Check out http://www.planebuzz.com/2007/11/we_knew_this_was_going_to_happ.html

Paging Delta Air Lines, paging Delta Air Lines . . . -- Hoover’s Business Insight Zone November 26th, 2007 9:14 am

[...] pointed criticism of Jeremiah Owyang, who called them out last week for faults in their service. (We talked about Jeremiah’s post last week.) Yes, it’s been a busy traveling time, but surely there’s some VP or flack within [...]

Does Delta Air Lines care about its customers? -- Hoover’s Business Insight Zone December 14th, 2007 1:15 pm

[...] revisits two posts from a couple of weeks back, in which I pointed to Jeremiah Owyang’s even-tempered [...]

Delta Air Lines: Should I cut them some slack? -- Hoover’s Business Insight Zone December 19th, 2007 2:21 pm

[...] been hard on Delta lately. Maybe I shouldn’t be so hard on them for failing to answer one blogger’s complaints. My Mom, who remains my #1 fan, read my earlier postings on the subject and sent me the link to [...]

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