The 14 Deadly Sins of MindSpring —
or Ways that We Can Be Just Like Everybody Else

by Jason Zigmont HowToSell.net [January 21, 2000]

(Note; The core of this column is reprinted here with permission. Special thanks go to Lance Weatherby, Executive Vice President of Sales and Marketing, MindSpring Enterprises, Inc. -JZ)

In the world of ISP marketing, I have yet to find a company that is a better example than MindSpring. From the beginning, MindSpring always kept an eye on the details, and has done just about everything right. While AOL may have more users, MindSpring's users are much more loyal, are acquired at a lowercost, and are happier overall.

Nearly a year ago, Charles Brewer, CEO of MindSpring, articulated the 14 deadly sins, and Lance was nice enough to reprint the entire list on the ISP-Marketing discussion community.

These are essential rules that all ISPs should live by. I have posted them herem (along with my comments in small type) for you to consider.

1. Give lousy service—busy signals, disconnects, downtime, and ring-no-answers.

The easiest way to loose dial-up customers is by breaking #1. Do you track your usage? Do you know if your CLEC/LEC is truly providing P.01 level of service? - JZ

2. Rely on outside vendors who let us down.

3. Make internal procedures easy on us, even if it means negatively affecting or inconveniencing the customer.

Remember the saying "The customer always comes first"? The saying has been around for ages, and by making something easy on yourself, and putting yourself first, will cause you to end up in last place. - JZ

4. Joke about how dumb the customers are.

Every time you call a user a luser, idiot, or the like, you show your disregard for the customer. While joking around after hours may seem like fun, it will influence the way you see customers, and therefore the way you treat them. - JZ

5. Finger point at how other departments are not doing their job.

My mother always said "If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all". If you have constructive criticism, or some way to help another department, then express it. If you're looking to pass the buck, or boost your ego by putting another department down, then grow up, and keep it to yourself. - JZ

6. Customers can't get immediate "live" help from sales or support.

Service is king. Customers will stay on hold for only so long before they'll leave. One thing that amazes me about some ISPs is that there is no hold time for sales, as new sales are important, but a hold queue for tech support. It's much easier to keep customers then to find new ones. - JZ

7. Poor coordination across departments.

Is there a way for sales to talk to tech or vice versa? How about billing and sales? Management and the rest of the world? The Dilbert effect has killed many companies. Don't let it kill yours. - JZ

8. Show up at a demo, sales call, trade show, or meeting unprepared.

Preparation is the key to a successful demo, sales call, etc.. If you go into a meeting unprepared, you will waste everyone's time and loose the respect of the people you are meeting with. - JZ

9. Ignore the competition, they are far inferior to us.

Unless you know your competition's strengths and weaknesses, you will never know how to beat them. Just as important is to know whom your competition truly is. Is your competition AOL or the mom and pop across the street? - JZ

10. Miss deadlines that we commit to internally and externally.

Never cut yourself short on time. Both internally and externally, it is better to set a realistic deadline and make it, then to have to ask for extra time as the deadline comes near. Remember that other people's deadlines may rest on you making yours. - JZ

11. Make recruiting, hiring, and training a lower priority because we are too busy doing other tasks.

Finding, and keeping, trained, qualified people, is the hardest task any company has. The Internet market compounds this problem, as the number of qualified people is limited, and the good ones all have jobs already. - JZ

12. Look for the next job assignment, instead of focusing on the current one.

If it is worth doing, its worth doing well. When you don't focus on the job at hand, you short both yourself and your company. - JZ

13. Indulge in office gossip, rumors, and politics.

More time has been lost in gossip, rumors and politics then any other place in a corporate environment. For example, in a sales environment, there are always the winners and the losers. Finding the losers is very easy. Walk by the water cooler. The ones standing around talking to each other are 9 times out of 10, the losers. - JZ

14. Rely on dissatisfied customers to be your service monitors.

If you wait for your customers to leave to find out why they left, then you are throwing money out the door. Customer surveys are easily done, and can save you customers that you may have otherwise lost. - JZ

—End