Evelyn Rodriguez pulls out the stops and writes a gorgeous piece on her recent experience at The Market Grill in The Pike Place Market in Seattle. Here’s a taste:
“I’m reminded of chado, the Japanese tea ceremony, in the way he slides open the drawers, turns over the salmon, and deliberately spreads every inch of the bread evenly with the rosemary mayonnaise. His companion worker’s movements are just as fluid…Everything is fresh. And they let you know it if the time is right. Slicing the bread: ‘We baked it this morning.’ The emphasis wouldn’t work if every bite didn’t salivate wholesomeness…”
No one on the planet would connect with that description of The Market Grill if it were written by a copywriter, and pushed out through the traditional channels. It has to be external, unsolicited, authentic to ring as truly as it does.
Although a great deal of attention is cast on the less-than-perfect customer experiences that can be highlighted through blogs, it’s also true that happy customers blog, too. Shel Holtz points out the RedRoomChronicles, Marriott hotel stories as they are told by Rob Safuto (who has racked up over 350,000 awards points in their perks program). Safuto writes:
“For all the time we spend in these hotels it’s important that we’re in on every perk possible that might make our business travel just a bit more tolerable.”
These aren’t just blogs. They are links to active, vocal, social communities.