Center Networks tested the customer services of 10 well known internet companies and Dogster.com was deemed Best in Show.

Since Dogster’s first public day, I decided to read and respond to every email, even though I hardly had the two hours a day it took me. If you don’t care about your customers’ experiences it’s very hard to have a successful customer-oriented business. After burning out a couple friends who thought they could handle the side work, Howard Rheingold introduced me to John D. Williams from the Rheingold & Associates Network who became Dogster’s first employee. John personally answers hundreds of emails a week and even his boilerplate responses are personal and caring. While responding with links and FAQ tips is pretty straight forward, what is very important to us is that each emotional concern, as trite or as ridiculous as it may seem, is answered with the sincerity and dignity that all our members’ deserve.

A trap many tech-focused companies fall into is a feeling that automation and cost-cutting are the keys to success which makes them view customer service as a overly human process that should be stripped down to a mechanized minimum. In the end I cannot tell you how many emails we’ve received that start “thank you so much for the thoughtful response, it’s so good to know there are still people that care about their websites,” or even better, “please accept my apologies, if I had known a real human would have sent me a real response I wouldn’t have been so curt in my first message.”

In today’s era of low-cost start-ups and everyone-is-a-company the more you can create a direct emotional experience with your customers the better off you will be. Your customers will stick by you through the bad times and cheer with you during the good. While automating code backups and server upgrades are brilliant ideas, automating the customer interface is a very risky indeed.

Thanks to Center Networks for taking the time to highlight the importantance of customer service and letting us shine up against some very big companies with some very deep pockets.