Truth is, as Jess’ comment illustrates, poor customer service becomes a permanent piece of history as well.

Perhaps if more companies encouraged blogging by their employees, they would be forced to hire more carefully, provide better training, and treat their team members as they want their customers treated.

Hmmmmmm….

It all began innocently enough–my husband and I were feeling lazy, didn’t want to cook, and were craving pizza. Pizza Hut had a good deal, so although we don’t normally order from them, we decided to try it out. Fast forward to almost two hours later, and we don’t have a pizza. My husband calls to find out why, and they had arbitrarily canceled our order, were incredibly rude to my husband, and did nothing to offer to make it better.

I called the corporate hotline to file a complaint, and although they did take our information down and send out a free pizza coupon, the girl on the phone could not have cared less. She very obviously read from a script, interrupted me, laughed, and was generally quite rude.

I Twittered about my experience (heat of the moment!) and also blogged about good vs. bad customer service, as I have been on the receiving end of some really poor service lately. To my surprise, someone from YUM! Brands (the corporate entity that owns Pizza Hut, among many others) was listening. He found my tweets, he found my blog post, and he offered a sincere apology.

I was flattered AND flabbergasted! That was all I wanted–someone to apologize for the poor customer experience–and the blogging world made that happen. I believe that companies should allow savvy employees to blog and also to do a little reputation management on their behalf. If they don’t, they are missing out on the power of the Internet community! It was clear that Nick (the YUM! employee) really cared about his company’s service levels and what his company stands for. I wish more companies were paying more attention.