The Opposite of Ryanair

An American Airlines tale

lecraic — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 10:38:36 +0000

A great post by Mike Orren about an airline that really went the extra mile when he left a laptop behind. Visions of the baggage handler as Indiana Jones rushing to the plane just in time!

High fives most definitely.

As Mike says, he’s had quibbles with AA in the past, but at least he’s taking the time to point out the good stories too.

Today could be the day you write about your “Opposite of Ryanair” story. It doesn’t have to be an Airline. This blog is about shining the spotlight on companies that are doing things right, or at least trying their hardest.

The original idea for this blog came about because of the incident between Jason Roe and Ryanair staff about their website. He was basically dealt with in what I perceive to be typical Ryanair fashion. Because their CEO, Michael O’Leary, is such a “character”, this permeates the whole organisation. Every single time Ryanair do something that raises the heckles of customers, they get tons of publicity. Twitter goes crazy with Ryanair mentions. Maybe some day we’ll have Twitter go crazy with “Opposite of Ryanair” stories.

ROI Revolution Customer Service leaves customer “floored”

lecraic — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 12:09:06 +0000

A great post from Frank Reed about a company called ROI Revolution. They provide various services for online marketing and website optimisation.

They also offer training on Google Analytics and other Google offerings. Frank decided to purchase their online Google Analytics training but soon discovered that Google were offering similar training for free.

Without any quibble or fuss, ROI Revolution refunded the cost of training.

Frank has a Takeaway at the end of his blog post saying:

There are people in this world who are ready to tell everyone when you do good. We are conditioned to think that people only get vocal when they have been wronged. Not so. Tell someone they did a good job for you today and then follow up with the question of “How can I serve you today?” You may be surprised with the results.

This is the whole idea behind this blog and delighted to highlight Frank’s story here.

Bus Eireann and The Bus Driver

lecraic — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 12:16:00 +0000

Any time I read about public transport in Ireland, it’s pretty much always negative and I’ve been critical of Bus Eireann in the past. I have fallen victim to the tell 10 people about bad service and only 3 about good service. But now I’m more conscious of this and this post is to rectify that.

The route I travel each day has recently been revamped with the addition of new buses and a new timetable. It’s been a fabulous improvement and a very welcome development. There are a good number of new drivers on the route as well. One in particular who has been driving the 8am bus this week is a real gent. He has a genuine ‘Good morning’ for everyone boarding and a “You’re welcome, have a good day” when getting off the bus.

So this is just a shout out for that driver and a thanks for getting the day off to a good start.

A garage story

lecraic — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 21:57:36 +0000

Derry O’Donnell writes about his experience in a garage near where he lives. He pulled in to buy some oil, but the owner did some unexpected which prompted a blog post.

Read Derry’s story of Excellent Customer Service.

What’s this all about

lecraic — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 16:22:50 +0000

This blog is NOT about Ryanair – despite the title ‘Opposite of Ryanair’. Let me explain.

On February 19th 2009, an Irish web developer called Jason Roe found a bug in Ryanair’s booking process. He blogged about it and not long after that he had Ryanair staff calling him an idiot and a liar among other things. Click on the link and take a look at the comments and see how Ryanair handle things.

I followed along with the story on Twitter and basically shook my head thinking ‘this is just typical of Ryanair’. The story went viral during the week and got acres of coverage in the press. Ryanair came out and confirmed that it was indeed their staff that posted the comments on Jason’s blog saying :

“Ryanair can confirm that a Ryanair staff member did engage in a blog discussion. It is Ryanair policy not to waste time and energy corresponding with idiot bloggers and Ryanair can confirm that it won’t be happening again.”

On Friday 27th, Jason Tweeted that he had been asked to “write a 500 word piece in defence of blogging… what would you say?”. I replied to say that defending blogging is like defending free speech and to cite examples of business that listen, improve and grow with the help of bloggers.

It got me thinking about something bloggers could do to turn the spotlight away from Ryanair and focus it on businesses that do care about their customers and take feedback in a positive way.

I wrote about it on my personal blog on Friday and would encourage any blogger to write an ‘Opposite of Ryanair’ story. Just give a shout out to a business that deserves to be in the spotlight and I will link to your story here. Anything goes – if it’s a restaurant you think more people should visit because they are consistently good – blog it. Does the person behind the cash register put you in a good mood – blog it. Any and all examples are welcome if you think it’s the ‘Opposite of Ryanair’.

If you don’t have a blog, just email oppositeofryanair at gmail dot com and tell your story. You can also follow me on Twitter.

Apparantly, when we have a bad experience we tell 10 people but only tell 3 people of a good experience. It’s time to change that and send some business to companies that deserve it.