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PR Firm Unwisely Tangles With Penny Arcade
New submitter FSWKU writes "Courtesy of Penny-Arcade, Paul Christoforo of Ocean Marketing provides a perfect example of what not to do when interacting with customers, especially if you are doing so on behalf of another company. There's name dropping, an ego trip worthy of Charlie Sheen, and even what appears to be a promise to commit libel. Other outlets are already picking up the story and running with it, and an examination of Ocean Marketing's website has generated accusations of plagiarism."
At least Charlie Sheen's ego has some success to support it, what has this guy done other than troll the entire internet?
Personally I'd rather have my idiots at home glued to the TV than out doing idiotic things
I'd like to propose a new Internet meme: "Dave with a V".
their servers need to put on their "big boy pants"
with people who buy ink by the barrel. That's an old saying about fighting newspapers. What's the best way to update that for the internet? "Don't pick a fight with people who have huge daily unique views." "Don't pick a fight with people whose backlinks beat 5 digits." Help me out here.
I was one of the lucky customers to order an Avenger PS3 on Dec 5th via Amazon. There were only about a dozen reviews on amazon, and mostly positive, so I placed the order. I waited for about a week after the amazon estimated shipping date, and asked why my status was only "Shipping soon". Their first reply was that it was a pre-order, and that Amazon got the date wrong. I never saw anything on the product page to indicate it was a pre-order. They said that the product would be shipping Dec 17th. I waited 9 more days, and asked why it was still "shipping soon". At this point, I suggested that they do the right thing, and contact all the amazon customers and let them know the status. They pointed me to their order page (not through amazon) which had an update, but no specific date on it.
Today, I saw all the posts and reviews at amazon, and canceled my order. I commented that the reviews on amazon had bottomed out, and that I had lost all confidence in the product and company. The reply I got was simply "It's spam". Yeah, 128 1-star reviews from different people, and it's spam. This guy is already living in his own universe.
Go Penny Arcade! Not only do they run one of the oldest and kickass web comics for games, they run their own gaming convention, their own charity called child's play (its mentioned in the email thread) and they've featured jack thompson on the comic a bunch of times along with the modest video game proposal thing:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Modest_Video_Game_Proposal
Thank you for your email. Due to the overwhelming customer feedback we're getting from the situation with Ocean Marketing we are asking those with specific product related concerns to send emails to customerservice@avengercontroller.co Please know that Ocean Marketing is no longer handling any PR or customer service for our company. We apologize to our customers for Ocean Marketing's remark to one of our customers. We at Kotkin Enterprises know that it's our customers are the true arbiters of our products success and we would never intentionally jeopardize what we see as a relationship between us and our customers. We hope that this incident hasn't put you off of purchasing a truly revolutionary controller. Thank you for expressing your concerns and we hope for your continued support in the future. Kotkin Enterprises Avenger Controller Customer Service Team
Yeah, I gotta quit wading around in the Twitter during meetings. Not can I now not find the original hoax-claim, I'm seeing the Kotaku article indicating that it's just so, so, so much better than a hoax -- yeah, really at a loss as to how this could get better. But I am willing to wait and see, yeah.
Apparently N-Control decided to stick with this guy even when they were told not to:
http://kotaku.com/5871400/cut-paul-oceanmarketting-christoforo-a-breakhe-probably-just-has-roid-rage/
To explain the pre-amble, in the article, Paul pretends he's Brandon in an email earlier on:
Hi Joel,
I have been following this story since this morning when someone notified me about what was going on. I did not write that response to you.
Yes, in the past I received email at brandon@avengercontroller.com but even then we were an outsourced marketing agency for N-Control. I no longer receive email at that address because we fired N-Control as a client about 8 months ago due to constant shipping delays (which we had to deal with) and their association with Paul Cristoforo who is a street thug masquerading as a self proclaimed "Marketing Professional". This guy is a complete fool and somehow strong armed his way into working with the company so we walked away. I am not surprised in the slightest bit by what's going on right now. In fact, we told the owners of the company on many occasions that this would eventually happen.
I wasn't going to chime in but since he is replying as me, I can't resist. I personally can't stand him.
Brandon
"The true measure of a person is how they act when they know they won't get caught." - DSRilk
The reply I got was simply "It's spam"
Here's the problem: I'd bet money that at least 1/2 of those *are* spam. Vindictive pricks who bomb the shit out of product review scores are becoming more common. They'll negatively review products they've never seen from companies or people they've never spoken to because of the author/companies political views, PR gaffs, a nerd-o-sphere uproar like this, etc. They'll organize campaigns to bomb the reviews of every single book from an author or every product from an entire corporation for purely political or vengeful reasons. We've discussed this problem on slashdot many times before.
These self-righteous bastards view it as some kind of justice, when in fact they're just polluting the review ecosystem with lies, hearsay, and crappy manifestos. If the product or company is that bad it will become clear, from the legitimate reviews, quite quickly. No need to break out your weird brand of street justice and fuck up the system for everyone.
This time the people at Ocean Marketing are arrogant, mismanaging pricks; most of the time you can't be so certain when you see this kind of event unfolding.
Honestly, when I was reading the Penny-Arcade post I started wondering whether this was really just a vengeful ex-employee, or even corporate espionage from another vendor. It wasn't until I read multiple older reviews and forum posts corroborating this story that I became convinced otherwise.
Beware internet justice: you never really know who's behind the keyboard or just what kind of destructive, ignorant campaign they're running.
Penny Arcade told the guy it was going to be published in an article about the events, and the Ocean Marketing response was, "Great !! Love PR".
He shot himself in the foot, emptied the clip and then reloaded.
"But we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it,..." - Nancy Pelosi
Don't post negative product reviews to "punish" Paul. It won't (directly, anyhow). It will directly punish the manufacturers of the product, for which Paul is merely a third-party marketing arm. As Dave points out in his emails - the product is great and he truly feels the public should have access to the product. Trying to drive the company which manufactures it into the ground isn't going to help anyone.
Avenger has indicated they'll no longer use OceanMarketing after the events of the past day. This guy should be going down in flames on his own, not taking a great product with him. Sure N-Control, etc, made mistakes working with this guy. Sure, like most companies they saw only the $$$ but this is nothing new or unique to that particular organisation.
"The true measure of a person is how they act when they know they won't get caught." - DSRilk
Meh, if that's all it is then it's not that bad. It's obvious the guy is some sort of ADHD type guy, which a lot of marketing/business/public relations people are.
Did you even RTFA? I think ADHD is being a little generous; more like fucking retarded. I have never once in my life seen an exchange quite like that between a professional in any industry and a paying customer! They fucking train minimum-wage counter jockies at McDonalds better customer service skills than that idiot displayed. Even the most meaningless marketing double-speak is better than that shit, because at least that's polite...
Then, of course, when he realizes he's talking to Gabe, instead of that adult sense of self-preservation we so often see when someone realizes they seriously fucked up, he starts fucking arguing with him, belittling a customer to a guy with a website seen by millions of people daily.
If this is "not all that bad", I really need to see an example that fits your definition of "that bad". Does the guy have to fuck his mother? Kill his dog? How much worse can a Customer Service/Public Relations scenario get without involving direct bodily harm or, at the very least, multiple felonies?
Man, I wish I worked for this marketing firm, if only to see the shit-storm from the inside. The fact that they even hired someone that responds to a customer in such a fashion is ridiculous. I don't give a shit if you work in an "edgy" field or one that's primary demographic is children and young adults (as if that were even the case with gaming, but supposing it is); obviously the people buying the goddamned things are adults. You're not writing an email to one of your dickhead coworkers. It's not an IM. It's an official communication with a paying customer, an unhappy paying customer at that. Put on your "big boy hat" and write a professional email. Proper grammar and punctuation is not a suggestion...not unless you want to make yourself look like even more of a retard.
Just one more company to add to the "Never Do Business With These Clowns" list.
He does seem like the blowhard/BSer/sales/marketing type, but there's a big difference between being Full of S--t and being a S--thead
And there is also a power-balance issue. The big marketing cahuna should not be a dick to the little customer. Big guys stomping down on little guys is a big no-no according to righteousness 101.
If a little customer would be a dick to a marketing representative of some business it wouldn't matter. They should just reply respectfully and calmly and maybe laugh about it with the coworkers by the watercooler.
Some of my favourite people are from th US; Vonnegut, Chomsky, Bill Hicks.
People have a google doc up about his bullshit, too https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/lv?key=0AnMPztotGCGadE1sQkV4aDlOVWRFTGtkS1VzUldHRnc&toomany=true#gid=0
All your 09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0 are belong to us
THIS. He loses nothing by taking crap from a paying customer. He might well lose this contract with N-Control and rightfully so. A professional PR firm should not communicate with the public like this.
Sand's overrated... it's just tiny little rocks.
That's the thing I can't wrap my mind around; no matter how stupid you think the customer's complaint is, you treat them with respect. There is nothing whatsoever to be gained by being an asshole to a paying customer. There can be no positive outcome...at the very least, you just lost potential sales, and at worst, you just cost yourself a job. No matter what happens, you lose.
This isn't even really a customer service thing necessarily. It's simple logic. Even the most patronizing, insincere apology from a major company without a death wish is at least polite. I've gotten some politely worded 'Go Fuck Yourself' responses in the past, but I have never seen something so outright hostile, nor stupid, on behalf of an employee for a professional marketing firm in my life. Typically you have to get your hands on leaked internal emails to see retarded shit like this as regards a customer.
I've worked in Customer Service for many years, including a stint providing computer tech support to people that, if not for the accent, could have convincingly passed themselves off as recent immigrants from the Brazilian Rain Forest where electricity is wizard shit, and I have never seen or heard an exchange like that. We all think it, but we never say it.
What a fucking idiot this Paul guy is.
Yes, that is the intent. But I am a huge fan of stuff that was originally designed to help people with disabilities. It seems to me that this is the area where most usability improvements come from.
The original X-Box contoller was designed for people with two thumbs on their right hand. Apart from that I'm amazed how sturdy it is. I went through a couple of joy stick on Summer Games alone and yet this beast still keeps going on. Ezio, Batman, The Kid... it helped me see them all through.
I don't trust that new contraption to be as sturdy but they are at least trying to solve that two-thumb problem.
Next step:
-a mouse that has a scroll wheel and a middle button that doesn't interfere with it while aknowledging the fact I have a ring finger and a pinkie that are fully functional
-a game controller which does the above and also aknowledges I've got a middle finger which I'd be quite oblidged to show the fine folks of Razr, Logitech, Saitek, Microsoft and co.
-a self-cleaning litter box for the cat that doesn't scare the litter out of me
A man has gotta dream.
20 minutes into the future
Any marketer or PR person who believe the 'any PR is good PR' is not going to stay in the industry for long. It is an old trope that has sunk many careers. It might have worked pre-internet, but is a horrible idea now.
The Federal Trade Commission's Mail Order Rule applies here. It's real simple:
Staples paid a big fine for this. So did the Beanie Baby people. In the early days of the Internet, a lot of companies were hit by this, because they had web sites accepting orders at high speed, but the back end fulfillment operation was manual and couldn't keep up. Now, most serious online merchants have the ordering system tied to the inventory system, so they stop taking orders when the inventory is used up,
Yep. The only time "bad" PR is good PR is when it is outrage by a small segment or manufactured entirely. So like when some people got up in arms about the nuke scene in Call of Duty 4, it wasn't actually bad PR. While those people were complaining and the media was reporting on it, the controversy made gamers say "I need to see that!" The actual customers were interested and thus it was good PR in reality.
When you get PR for something like this, or for criminal activity or whatever it is just flat out bad PR. It scares customers away and you never want that.
I'm not really finding it funny. One guy isn't getting stuff he needed to give gifts for christmas. Other guy just lost his livelihood to a stupid and unprofessional emotional outburst.
Finally the guy who invented a harness that made playing more accessible to disabled kids is getting smeared all across the sites for things he had little to do with.
I'd say this is mostly a tragedy of how internet rage can fuck up lives of people that don't deserve it, and those who do deserve it get a whole lot more fucking up then they should (guy's wife and child apparently getting hit by internet mob now).
And in the end, the original guy is still not getting the stuff he wanted for christmas. Everyone loses, and I really find that quite tragic rather then funny.
It's not just the drugs, he really does have psychological issues. Notice how in both his apologies he mentioned making the mistake of underestimating the people he was replying to, demonstrating a total lack of remorse. He's not sorry for what happened, his only concerns are the career-ending consequences. Bullshit apologies are expected as standard procedure for damage control in situations like these, but normal people tend to adopt a stance that the public can empathize with.
I'm with you on the guy who designed the controller being unfairly caught in this, but how do you see "one guy just lost his livelihood to a stupid and unprofessional emotional outburst" as a tragedy?
That is exactly how one loses their livelihood. That's the process of screwing up so badly you get booted from the profession. That's what it entails. When your job is to work with people, and you screw up politeness as royally as that guy did, if you don't lose your job then something is very very wrong with the world. Read all the emails, to both Dave the customer and Gabe at PA, and Paul's "apologies". It's quite clear this guy doesn't give a crap until he's caught. Also this appears not to be the first time he's been called out on this type of exchange with customers. How many do-overs do you expect him to get in his professional life?
He fucked up his job about as badly as one can fuck up their job, by shitting all over the customer, and then shitting all over one of the major PR outlets in the market for the product he was representing.
In any measure of the situation, he deserves to be fired and ostracized from the market in the future for his failure. That isn't tragedy, that is justice. Let him get in the unemployment line and maybe somebody competent, worthy, and sane can step in to fill the role he obviously is not fit to handle.
Yes, but the real question is, did they sack those responsible for hiring this guy?
I suffer from attention surplus disorder.