Yesterday I visited a professional-service company I’ll call Glow and bought one of Glow’s services. I filled out the new-customer form, gave it to the receptionist, and sat in the waiting room to be called by the Glow consultant assigned to me. As I waited, I checked my email on my phone.
I found that I had received this email from Glow:
Subject: Thank you for your appointment
Lynn,
Thank you for visiting us. We hope your experience was a positive one and that you will be returning to see us soon. . . .
If you have any questions or would like to provide feedback to us, we would like to hear from you. Please contact us at your convenience.
Thank you,
Glow Customer Service
I always appreciate a sincere thank-you for doing business with a company. But how sincere could the thank-you be when the receptionist apparently launched it from “Glow Customer Service” before I had even walked across the room?
If I were to receive a specific thank-you from the professional who worked with me, I would appreciate it and would reply with my thanks to her. However, the generic, premature message felt phony and meaningless.
You may often write thank-yous to help build relationships with customers, coworkers, and others. Those message need to be sincere and specific. Of course, that requires sending your thanks AFTER you complete the transaction, receive the requested information, or benefit from another person’s excellent service.
Have you experienced anything like my ill-timed thank-you from Glow?
Lynn
