I promised. And once again, I appear to have delivered:
Photos from a superb, sunny, surprisingly stormy Easter weekend in Cape Agulhas are available in the appropriately-named Summer Moved On set on my Flickr.
Knock yourself – metaphorically – out.
Category: this is south africa
Wind
It’s Sunday, and I may still be around. I’m not 100% sure, because I’m writing this on Saturday and there’s a rather large storm headed towards Agulhas this evening. We’re talking 90kph winds and plenty (or more) of rain.
It’s already breezy, but I like this sort of weather, and I’m not the only one:
We watched this guy having fun in the surf near the Mees Suidelike Punt. I suspect that tomorrow’s (er… that’s now today’s) forecast wind may be a bit much for kiteboarding. It may actually be a bit much for anything other than red wine and a roaring fire, but fortunately, we have those bases well covered.
Social Media & Public Customer Service
There’s obviously more to running a business’ social media account than there seems to be. Otherwise we’d all be at it. But it seems that some businesses don’t really get it. I think it’s one of those things that your business either does, or it doesn’t. If it doesn’t, then (maybe) you’re missing an opportunity and (almost certainly) you will make some people on Twitter very annoyed:
“OMG! Like, [Brand X] isn’t even on Twitter! Talk about backward! Ugh!”
Those individuals are perhaps forgetting that there’s a whole other world out there that doesn’t rely on social media in the same way that it relies on oxygen, and gets on with life just fine.
But if your business does do social media, then the expectation is that it has to be all in. There is no halfway house here. That’s even worse than not doing social media at all. And you’ve got to do it correctly. History is littered with horrendous social media own goals from just about every company ever, as the hoards of Offendatrons seeking outrage at the slightest misinterpretation or misplaced word in those 140 characters are ready to jump – loudly – all over your case.
Yes, social media is the public face of your company to anyone using Facebook or Twitter, and if you mess up there, you mess up in front of (potentially) hundreds of thousands of individuals, some of whom may once have been future customers.
Oops.
Fortunately, there’s always another social media outrage bus to jump onto, and the public’s memory is short, meaning that these ‘scandals’ don’t last long.
But what if you were to use these facts to your advantage? What if you were to brand all your company’s easily-distinguishable, bright red vehicles with your twitter handle, inviting public engagement, and then used the public face of twitter to appear caring and on the ball when negative comments came your way, but then – once people had swiftly moved on – actually did nothing about addressing the problem?
Step forward then, catchily-named Sport 24 hrs Taxis – they’re @Sport24hrsSA on twitter. And I was “rather disappointed” by the quality of the driving and maintenance on one of their vehicles last week. When I contacted them on twitter, they replied within 5 minutes. Evidently, Sport 24 hrs Taxis are one of those “all-in” companies who “do” social media.
Impressive response time. And taking it private sounds like a plan, because actually no-one else really cares about the outcome, which will surely be something along the lines of “Sorry about all that. We’ve told the driver not to use his phone while driving and we’ve fixed the brake light”, right?
There was a hitch though – Twitter rules mean that I couldn’t DM them (send them a direct message), because they didn’t follow me on the popular microblogging service. Silly people.
Still, there are other ways to get in touch with me, as I let them know, (right after I had made the kids some dinner):
And so they got in touch with me and they said “Sorry about all that. We’ve told the driver not to use his phone while driving and we’ve fixed the brake light”.
Except: no.
No, they didn’t.
I’m here to tell you that once their public facade had appeared caring, helpful and concerned, I’ve not heard a single word from them on any forum. No contact whatsoever. I’m using this blog to let you know that as far as I’m aware, they’ve done absolutely nothing about the broken brake light on Taxi 26, nor have they addressed the issue of the driver using his phone and weaving all over the road at 80kph past UCT. Because surely if they had done anything about it, they would have dropped me an email or contacted me on twitter to tell me that they had. No?
So, if you publicly comment on a company’s service on twitter and they tell you that they are going to follow up, please hold them to their word and make sure they do.
And, don’t be fooled by a company responding promptly to and promising to follow up on a negative comment or observation on twitter, because the quick public response followed by fokol aksie in private approach is all too easy to use when you want to make it look like you care, but you actually don’t give a toss.
Promise fulfilled
Yesterday, tired and emotional, I promised that I would upload photos from the weekend onto Flickr. Well, now I have. I’m nothing if not reliable.
As I explained earlier, the weather was nothing if not variable, with a gloriously sunny Saturday (above), followed by a moody and grey Sunday (below). I quite liked both.
My walk was just to explore a bit of coastline I hadn’t managed to get to before. Any beach walk with the kids typically has to end at or nearby the cottage at Piet se Punt, which is 2km from our place. Add the 2km back, the fact that it’s beach walking, and the detours to see rock pools, sand dunes and the like, and you’re going to run out of time, youthful energy, or both.
Thus, I chose to go alone when I set off to see a bit further around the corner (ironically the first bay you come to is Hoek se Baai). And when I got back, I had done 16km in 3 hours. I’d love to share tales of towering cliffs, rocky inlets, smugglers’ caves and possibly, aliens. But the truth is that this bit of coast is actually rather non-descript in geological (and extraterrestrial) terms. Dotted with seemingly abandoned buildings all the way to Die Walle (apparently, a really good fishing spot), I got almost as far west as the end of Brandfontein beach (you may remember that from here or here). And there, I found a handful of really modern lodges which looked like self catering places, and which I guess must be part of the Brian Mansergh Private Nature Reserve, but which I can’t find anywhere online, or on Google Earth. Recent build then, but poorly publicised too, and that’s a shame, because they look fantastic.
My aim was to get a photo of a Black Oystercatcher to enter into a competition from a local vineyard (bet you can’t guess which one), and I got several, including finding a chick in the weed on the beach. However, other pictures may also have been taken.
You can see these much promised and discussed images here.
Foam
It’s been a bright, blustery day in Agulhas today. It’s also been calm and sunny, and then at times it was also wild, wet and windy as well. A mixed bag then.
After an early morning bike ride with the boy, I set off around the corner from Suiderstrand. It’s a walk we’ve often done, but then turned around and come back. This time, free from the responsibilities of kids and beagle (and wide, I suppose) I walked for about 8 km along the coast, almost as far as Brandfontein. Of course, I then had to walk back too, and with that cycle ride and that weather playing its part, I’m pretty tired this evening. (Photos to follow via Cape Town ADSL.)
The foam, above, was spotted on the way back from Struisbaai later in the day, where we had just been turned away from a restaurant, as it was closed – a status that the waitress greeting us had to check with her boss. How could you not know if the business you’re working at is open or not?
Anyway, we ended up at the mees Suidelike pub van Afrika as an alternative, and not only were they open, they also served beer as well.
A double bonus to end the day.