About the saying "The customer is always right..."

So in my checking to see how someone can dig himself deeper in his own stupidity, this being Mr. Christoforo, I ran across this comment that made me stop for a second...

WTF is wrong with this guy? He doesn't think he is deserving of the backlash and all the hate that came from HIS inability to realize that the customer is always right. Never mind the fact that the customer is either handicapped or is buying the controller for someone who is.

This is a comment referencing the fail that Christoforo has done. But one thing I have to say, the customer isn't necessarily always right. I never really 100% agreed with this statement, since there are dozens, if not hundreds of times where the customer uses this as their soapbox to rant and rave about something they don't know in the face of people with the knowledge. Now in Christoforo's case... He was never right on his side. The customer may not have all the facts, but the way he treated the customer was well past the line of 'good common sense'. But enough of focusing on the failure of Paul Christoforo... That's a dead horse beating there. One thing to note is that there will be a fair share of the time the customer is NOT right. It is, however, important to help the customer as best you can. At the same time, this is a good time to help educate the customer in some things they may be misunderstanding. While I rant about how I find the customer being foolish or much stronger words, the thing is, I try also not to let the customer know that they are such unless we are on really good terms or literally facing me. The reason for this is so both of us can see what is going on and also gauge the frustration level. The problem with phone support is that often times, you can't really 'see' the person and judge beyond their voice. The other thing is, that sometimes people will speak in a tone that will often be confused as something else. For Example: I know of a couple of Chinese people, worked with them a few times, however, when you just 'hear' them, at first, you think they are very abrasive. The thing is, that is not the case, it is how they learned to speak in english as well as their dialect of Chinese tends to sound abrasive, when in fact, that is just normal. You would not know they were joking until you saw their face, the expression showing whether or not they are angry or just joking with you because you can't get that from just the tone. Now while some will cite the same thing with e-mails, this is true... Text shows no means of expression short of the typed emoticons like :) or ^_^ type stuff. But it is also important, regardless of being a customer or a service rep to not take the message personally, but try to reach a compromise. A customer should never always 'take take take'... You have to relent a little because not everything works exactly as you expect it.

Digging a deeper hole...

Yes, back to the same rant about Mr. Christoforo again... Just listened to his 'interview' with Gametrailers from Spike TV. One thing I have to say about the interview, is that Mr. Christoforo still proves that sometimes, even telling his side still proves he shouldn't be employed. Let me give you some tidbits that makes the case: The interview, obviously focuses on the event that got him into trouble. His statement, "I got a little a bit out of line..." It wasn't just 'a little bit'. He also stated this: "I had no idea who (Mike from Penny Arcade) was. I didn't even know what Penny Arcade was, to be honest with ya." Yet, in his e-mail to Mike, he said he loved Penny Arcade. So he is lying on the air or lying to Mike, being a condescending person. He further comments how it was not a well put together site. The sad thing is... Not all sites are not going to look 'flashy'. There are several comic websites people follow that are NOT flashy at all, some are down right 'plain', yet have popular followings. Again, a man who is suppose to be in Marketing, making comments about a website from his own view that is from a limited perspective and he is the PRESIDENT of his own Marketing company. But it gets better... When he is quoted something from his own e-mail... You see on his face, "Oops..." But then you hear him say this: "Like I said, I don't even know some of the stuff that came out when I said it, I wasn't even thinking about it..." For the love of god... You are creating an e-mail... Hell, I am creating a blog posting that will probably be read by the public. I take a moment to replay that section over and over again to make sure I have the words, in context, properly, to be reasonably fair, even with my biased attitude to the situation. I even stopped a few times before posting this, looking over what I am about to post, editing my own message to make sure it comes across carefully. While I may not be under pressure, even at work, I try to send DRAFTS of what will be an official communication to the place of work, to make sure it comes off reasonable and people can understand the message. The failure here, is Mr. Christoforo not doing his job properly once again. What I find interesting is when the interviewer talks about PR and marketing, the very thing that Ocean Marketing is 'suppose' to be about... Here is the response we hear from Mr. Christoforo: "Let's be clear about one thing... I'm not in PR and Marketing..." Wait... He's NOT a PR and Marketing... THEN WHY THE HELL ARE YOU RESPONDING TO PUBLIC RELATION BASED EMAILS? WHY WERE YOU IMITATING OTHER PEOPLE USING A COMPANY'S DOMAIN? Obviously, the answer that this response gives is, grifting the public. I've talked to some of the REAL marketing people or people who do what Paul is SUPPOSE to be doing. I even showed them this failure of a person's foolishness and most of them shook their head. What does he do with Ocean Marketing? "Sales... That's what I do... From cars to real estate..." Again... Why is a person who is doing sales, responding to customer service e-mails? He shouldn't be. What really gets me riled is this, the interviewer asks, "If this hadn't gotten viral, would you have changed your tactics?" His answer: "No, no I think that ultimately, that if this stayed between me and Dave... We would have worked it out..." He commented that he would have gone back and re-read his e-mails and asked himself, "Why did you do that dude?" When the third person walked into the whole thing... It should have pinged right away that it was handled wrong. The sad thing is... This is NOT the first time he has handled the customer inappropriately, with already one noted entry. http://www.natesnetwork.com/Poor-customer-service What more, Nate pointed out that this didn't change until AFTER he posted his issue as well. The problem I see here, is that I do not believe that, ultimately, he would have worked it out. The way it was handled, and the fact that he used the 'bad day' excuse for Dave... Is the same problem he used back in JUNE with Nate. What more, the time in which this went out of control... He should have realized his 'habits' about this situation and not proceeded the way he did with his responses in general. When they talk about the memes... Even Christoforo didn't recognize his situation at the time. Again, Mr. Christoforo didn't take the time to look at anything, like the source of it or even looking back in his OWN emails. Didn't take the time to actually follow Mike's suggestion to GOOGLE him. His comments on Twitter, as posted before, about taking a swing at an undeclared mixed martial artist in a bar (His own analogy)... The problem I see here, is a man who is not a 'people' person. At best, a schister. Or in most cases, the stereotypical used car sales man trying to pull the wool over your eyes. What makes me twitch even more is he states he doesn't remember any of the things he wrote. While I admit, there are many things I would not commit to memory, he has HOTMAIL, GMAIL accounts... Accounts that have 'sent items' and the fact it is reposted by people, verbatim, back onto the internet. When people single you out, they will point to what was written, just as this interview, I replay sections over again to get it down RIGHT. Now when he goes on about how it isn't fair to him to be hated... Here's something you have to consider. The reason why there is so much hate for Christoforo, at least, why I hate him, is that I know roughly where he comes from. There are times I feel the customer isn't right. Hell, I wrote this blog and I enjoy reading the 'The Customer is Not Always Right' website for that reason. But at the same time, when I engage with techs, or deal with customer service reps, I try to be nice to them, and even when I am frustrated, I try not to take out my anger with them, because I know that they deal with some unreasonable customers. Dave, in this case, wasn't being unreasonable at the beginning, but got pissed off because of the dismissive attitude towards him about the situation and vague responses. And the times that I dealt with the Customer Service reps, showing my irritation and almost getting to the level of using stronger language with them, in majority of the times I have been dealt with, they tried their best to appease me, but in all accounts, they were NEVER condescending or insulting. I find myself agreeing with Mike that while Mike may have become a bigger bully to Christoforo in some eyes, the simple fact of it is, Christoforo should be genuinely sorry about how he handled anything regardless of who he is dealing with. Not just Mike, but the simple fact that his name dropping and brow beating responses in e-mail will always come back to haunt them. There is a reason why companies are very hesitant to put out information and Paul Christoforo is a prime example of what happens when a person goes off on the customer. In the end... My ranting about Paul Christoforo is basically to etch just another mark for when someone does a Google Search on him. Eventually, it shows up that people are talking about him and at the same time, understand parts of the reasons why some of us rant about him. I have to say, his 'ethics' and 'work' are questionable when it comes to Social Media... His 'sales' are questionable as well. His reputation is definitely not something I would trust, and with the way he tried to handle his termination from N-Control and how they have to keep paying for it in the long run... I would not trust him with much beyond manual labor under major supervision.

Christoforo again...

As much as some people want to defend Paul Christoforo, the saddest thing of it all... It is undeserved. The reason I state this is by looking into two things:

This is a screenshot of a tweet he sent out... Second, is this: http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/114994-UPDATE-Ocean-Marketing-Attempts-To-Extort-Former-Client Now some of this is old news for people, but I have to say to people who want to defend Paul about this situation to consider this... In the tweet he put up, his analogy is the WORST excuse for his situation for a few reasons. 1) Most civilized people will not go into a bar to throw a punch at anyone, regardless of whether or not the other person is or is not a martial artist. 2) His analogy fails again at the fact that he claims Mike K. is a martial artist champion that didn't tell him he was. Apparently, the fact of the matter is, Mike literally told him, "Google my name... I run PAX and Penny Arcade." 3) He makes Mike out to be a bully looking for trouble. That he intentionally wanted Paul to punch in him the face... Except when you READ the series of e-mails, you see Mike didn't really go into it until the end. Another thing to consider, when you read the Escapist Magazine entry, Christoforo was literally holding his client's digital assets hostage. Demanding a CONTRACT and pay from the company that fired him due to his own bad faith. If anything, this is a prime example of the man getting what is coming to him. He treated others with contempt and now he is reaping the karma he had coming to him. Needless to say, those who wish to keep defending him, go right on ahead. However, those with any common sense, consider this man a pariah with regards to employment for anything Customer or Public Relations in mind. I will also leave one last thing to consider. A man who is 38 and does not like to 'write' being in a position of Public Relations is NOT a good idea. As you can see, this man has already torn down one company's business with his practices and with his unwillingness to see what he did as being wrong in general, only sorry for picking the wrong kind of fight and then even extort his former clients... This is one person who is more likely to cause ruin and destruction than actually be 'helpful' for a company.