twoflower: A Sense of Proportion

Stefan Gagne (

twoflower) wrote,
@ 2008-04-29 09:06:00

A Sense of Proportion
One of the good things about organizing my thoughts at night and writing up blogposts ahead of time for quickposting in the morning is that I can focus on the end of the day wrapup. One of the bad things about that is it tends to localize my thinking to what I've been dealing with in the last three hours, which usually stinks since that's when I handle most of the day's issues.

So yesterday, to paraphrase and omit names, I had this discussion.

Customer: "I hate your stupid update system. I don't wanna have to log in and replace parts of my fishing game because you sent me an update. In fact, I don't want you sending me updates. It's a pain and you're treating your customers badly. Die in a fire."

Me Thinking: "Obviously we're not gonna satisfy this jackhole since we have to release updates, it's the nature of the beast, but maybe I can come up with some non-push based method..."
Me Talking: "Okay, I'm putting a vote out to fishing area owners to see which of our two update methods they'd prefer -- being sent updates automatically, or being able to manually pull updates whenever they want. The proposal's up now in our group notices, so vote for whichever one would make you happy."

Customer: "Both are stupid. I want the game to magically update itself without me lifting a finger, despite that not being possible in SL with any sort of reliability or security."

Me: "*sigh.*"

Stuff like this really gets under my skin, when I've got one loud and angry customer. I always have this lingering fear (based on a certain level of reality) that one pissy person is all it takes to wreck everything, if they decide to treat it like some kind of holy war and rally all their friends to grief you and complain and spread bad word about your product to potential customers. So even though this one dimwit is a drop in the bucket compared to the hundreds of other customers we have, it does raise the 'ol blood pressure.

Now, because I prefer to KNOW when I'm being unreasonably stupid myself, I know this is in fact unreasonably stupid. It's just one guy. I gotta have a sense of proportion -- we have dozens of happy, happy people a day who talk about how much they love the game. One complaint does not mean the whole thing is a disaster. One complaint out of that pool means it's a smashing success. But when someone's all up in your area like that, I have a hard time FEELING like we're a success, even when I know damn well we are.

Just as I've had to train myself to only do things I want to do and not do things that are expected of me, I need to train myself to just let go and admit not everybody can be happy and that's okay and it's not going to ruin me to leave someone unhappy. It's all a matter of scale, weight, balance. Believe in what's important to you and let the rest slide.

(Post a new comment)

	grizzygriswold 2008-04-29 01:37 pm UTC (link)
	There's always going to be whiners. The fishing game has been a big hit at my place especially since I based an event around it last week. (Reply to this)

	shadrad 2008-04-29 02:16 pm UTC (link)
	All I can think of is the advice a marketing professional gave me at a seminar-- 'if they're not willing to pay the price you've set, they are not your customer, and you don't have to think of them as such.' You can't, and won't, please everyone. It's up to you to decide when to tell your non-customer that they are not, in fact, your customer anymore. (Reply to this)(Thread)

twoflower
2008-04-29 02:24 pm UTC (link)

True. And in this case, "the price" is both the L$750 purchase fee and the need to install ongoing updates. We're going to be adding to the fishing area manual that if you're not willing to pay THAT price, then we'll refund the other one and you can stop being a customer.

I personally -- and from a rough sampling last night, a LOT of other people -- don't feel it's all that onerous of a price to pay. You replace your gear when new gear comes out. It's not rocket science and it's not chain gang hard labor. Once in a blue moon I get someone who's vastly offended that I'm daring to ask them to do this, but again, I need to have a sense of scale... that's once in a blue moon amidst a sea of folks who are totally reasonable. That's good numbers.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

jenshikami
2008-04-29 02:53 pm UTC (link)

You took the words right out of my mouth -- I was about to reply to her with the same thing before seeing you had. :)

Arguably, updating your equipment in a timely fashion is part and parcel of your right to be a fishing area owner without paying us a maintenance fee. The price you pay for doing your own maintenance is (gasp!) doing your own maintenance. XD

And they don't HAVE to update. Just click "decline" if they can't be bothered. It's really their problem.

If that particular customer is getting on your case that frequently, tell him to stop talking to you AT ALL and to refer all inquiries to Sass or to me. We (Sass or me) can lay it on the line that if he is really so traumatized by the concept of dealing with it, he shouldn't participate.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

jenshikami
2008-04-29 03:29 pm UTC (link)

P.S.: If it helps you keep the importance of a customer in perspective, think of what it's like to admin a MUCK. Lots of players, self-sorting population for who likes it enough to stay and who doesn't.

So when a player decides to leave over how a game is run, then no matter how much drama they may cause on the way out, they're still irrelevant. The people who DO support the game and agree with how it's run are the ones that matter.

We're here to make a game that works the way WE want it to, after all. It's not all about maximizing the number of players.

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

twoflower
2008-04-29 03:57 pm UTC (link)

*twitch* MUCK adminning. Y'know, the thing I said I would never do again unless I was paid. ...then again, I am being paid now...

Also worth noting that we don't make people pay maintenance fees -- and that means the duty is shifted to the customer, DIY style. We should make a note of that in our notecard update this Thursday with the contest board release. (I'm tempted to say "If you'd LIKE to pay us $500 a week and $2000 up front and give us rez permissions on your land we can set it up and run it for you..." just to shut up these few complaints, but no. Running one service is enough. I'm willing to give that bullet point up to the competition.)

(Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	jenshikami 2008-04-29 05:27 pm UTC (link)
	In the MUCK admin analogy, you're the Building/Coding Admin who players shouldn't be bugging with _anything_. Your reasonable co-administrators are running interference for you. ;) That's not nearly as excruciating, eh? And No, god no, no running a subscriber maintenance service... (Reply to this)(Parent)

	chanlemur 2008-04-29 05:14 pm UTC (link)
	Don't let 'em get to you. You and Jen do excellent work for outrageously low prices, and I think you ought to feel proud about your body of design work. Thanks for sharing your talents with us. (Reply to this)

	I'm a giant ham for quoting my own lyrics, but... keikotakamura 2008-04-29 09:07 pm UTC (link)
	That's how they'll all record it Lookin' at my payscale Look at it through grayscale That's how I self-distort it Lookin' at my payscale Look at it through grayscale (Reply to this)

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