DellCares on Twitter: As Long As You're Within Austin, Texas Working Hours

By On · 10 Comments

Unintentional Trolling 4-3-12: Oh sorry, I tweeted with @dellcares included and the "staff" arrives shortly thereafter.

Screen Shot 2012 04 03 at 12.31.43 AM DellCares on Twitter: As Long As Youre Within Austin, Texas Working Hours

Update 3-30-12: At end of page, DELL goes 24 x 7 on Twitter. It's big news. And this from my web analytics a minute ago, gives me grins.

Screen Shot 2012 03 30 at 6.46.01 PM DellCares on Twitter: As Long As Youre Within Austin, Texas Working Hours

+++ original post +++

It's bugged me for a long time. Since Dell changed their support ID to @dellcares I've been interested to see what was up. Well this is the Twitter page as of today, 3-22-12.

Screen Shot 2012 03 22 at 12.57.43 PM DellCares on Twitter: As Long As Youre Within Austin, Texas Working Hours

At a social media breakfast meeting this morning, Peter Kim was talking about social media experiements that tried to keep the conversation within working business hours. He called it, "Wells Fargo Hours," as WF was used as an example of a business trying to constrain social media outreach to working hours.

I spoke up about @dellcares and their posted hours. A Dell-io in the audience spoke up that they were now 24/7 on Twitter.

A quick pull of the @dellcares page shows that… um… no they're not. At least not "as advertised."

So how does Dell, one of the biggest brands working social media for all it's worth, try to post their "working hours" on their Twitter account? This is the company that has spent a good deal of money, and created a good deal of fanfare around their Listening Center. So how is it, @dellcares, that you post your HOURS? For Twitter? For a global company? Dell knows better.

I'm guessing that someone from Dell will see me posting this story and attempt an answer. The better answer, Dell, if you are "listening" is to remove these silly CST hours from your Twitter page. The internet doesn't run on CST, no matter how badly Round Rock would like us to think so.

Thank you for listening to my rant about Dell trying to have "Wells Fargo Hours." I hope we can make some changes in the system both for Dell and for business in general. It all begins with awareness. So, good afternoon, @dellcares, you are now aware that there is a problem. (IMHO)

UPDATE 3-30-12:  Dell twitter support updates their hours. YAY!

Screen Shot 2012 03 30 at 1.13.44 PM DellCares on Twitter: As Long As Youre Within Austin, Texas Working Hours

@jmacofearth (also seen on Google+: jmacofearth)
permalink: http://uber.la/2012/03/sure-dellcares/
Note: Once upon a time, for about two hours, my Twitter name was @jmacofdell
Screen Shot 2012 03 30 at 6.54.51 PM DellCares on Twitter: As Long As Youre Within Austin, Texas Working Hours
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  • http://uber.la jmacofearth

    Indeed they must've. Welcome to the 24 x 7 web @dellcares. We knew you'd get here sooner or later.

  • http://twitter.com/virtualTodd Todd Muirhead

    It's good to see that DellCares

  • http://uber.la jmacofearth

    Celebration! Yeah, Dell!

  • http://cathcam.wordpress.com/ Mark Cathcart

    Well they've listened…

  • http://cathcam.wordpress.com/ Mark Cathcart

    Well here is something we agree on. I thought I had a slide in this 1999 presentation that covered this, but I guess I decided to drop it as it identified an actual company. 
    http://www.slideshare.net/cathcam/digital-prisoner - My point was then, a someone based outside the US, customer service from a website(way before twitter) that was only based on a US timezone was going to cut you out of a slice of business or alienate customers, who already feel they've been over charged in most cases because they either paid locally, in which case the price was greater than the US$ price; or they paid online in the US, in which case they were mostly hit by big CC charges.

    Since the twitter account is no where in my sphere of influence, I've no idea why it is like it is. One can speculate that this is either an ownership issue, a staffing issue, a cost issue, or more likely a combination of all three. 

  • http://uber.la jmacofearth

    Well clarified Peter. Thanks.

  • http://twitter.com/peterkim Peter Kim

    To set the record straight, I did not characterize Wells Fargo as an "example gone wrong." In response to an audience question about SMB use of social media, I raised the example of Wells Fargo and operating hours to set public response expectations and help manage support staff scalability. Full disclosure: I am not a Wells Fargo customer and they are not a client.

  • http://uber.la jmacofearth

    Well said, Mr. McGirr. Well, said.

  • http://twitter.com/joeymcgirr Joey McGirr

    Not to mention CST ended two weeks ago when we entered CDT…

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