It seems that many companies have not yet caught on to the reality that people care about customer service. People will shun a company if it provides bad customer service, and sometimes, they will publicly (and with the power of social media) complain about it.

Last week, the news came that Facebook is rated as one of the companies  with the worst customer service. The conundrum is that it is also one of the fastest growing companies with a very large customer base (500 million people worldwide). Although people keep using the social sharing website, they are not happy about it. Will this have repercussions?

The perceived decline (and complaining about) customer service is not relegated to the United States. Writing in the Sydney Morning Herald, an Australian blogger writes about her difficulties in getting any type of help while shopping for clothes.

And yet, as we have discussed previously on this blog, customer service is a differentiator for businesses and can help the bottom line.  Julia Clarke, writing in the Australian blog Dynamic Business, concurs.  She says:

Australia’s small businesses can use exceptional customer service to attract customers away from big businesses, a new survey has found.

People care about customer service, they rate companies based on customer service and they reward the companies that make customer service a priority.  It is that simple.