Robert Bacal
Robert Bacal
Robert began his career as an educator and trainer at the age of twenty (which is over 30 years ago!), as a teaching assistant at Concordia University. Since then he as trained teachers for the college and high school level, taught at several universities and trained thousands of employees and managers in customer service, conflict management and performance appraisal and performance management skills.
The Church of Social Media
Oh, that IS funny. I've long been saying that what is driving business use of social media is a combination of "hype and hope",...
The Coming Social Media Crash: Similarities With the dotcom bust #3 – Addiction To Growth
Recently Twitter announced it's plans to build its own brand new data center to address various overload problems resulting from torrents of tweets, particularly...
Dangers of Customer Service For Simpletons – Boo On Oversimplification #1
The easier access that social media affords anyone who can make it work is both a plus and a minus. The downside is that...
Why Am I Angry(?) About Social Media?
It's fitting that we start off this blog with this questions, since I've been asked it a few times, and Social Media meets Customer...
Social Media Accounts Abandoned – Twitter
I've talked a number of times about the rate of abandonment of Twtiter accounts being exceedingly high, particularly when it comes to businesses. Some...
Facebook’s Q&A Initiative – Nothing New Here. Is This Desperation?
In an article written earlier, The Coming Social Media Crash: Similarities With the dotcom bust #2, I mentioned that one of the indicators (viewed...
List of Sixty Customer Service Tactics: Which Ones Would You Like More Detail On?
Excellent customer service book for a tiny price Need some input, so I can put up relevant material here. Below is a list of 60...
The Coming Social Media Crash: Similarities With the dotcom bust #2
In The Coming Social Media Crash: Similarities With the dotcom bust #1 I suggested that there are amazing parallels between the rise and subsequent...
Social Networks Get Uglier and Uglier and Spammier
I get a little bit of flack for pointing out what I seem to find is obvious, but others seem to either not see,...
Twitter In A Corner – Facing Huge Challenges
It's easy to consider Twitter a success, particularly if you don't look at it as a business, but it's facing some critical issues and...
Sneaky Preview: Perfect Phrases For Customer Service 2.0 Preface You May Never See
Perfect Phrases For Customer Service V1.0 This might be the most boring book on customer service you will ever come across. And if you are...
When Customer Service Advisors Become Advocates
Perhaps some of us have become so selfish as customers that we expect everyone to subjugate their needs and wants to ours. That's...
The Coming Social Media Crash: Similarities With the dotcom bust #1
Philosopher Santayana said: "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" but surely he was referring to history from the long...
Leaving Social Media Still Planned
Q: In April you announced that your company will be leaving social media by the end of 2010. Are you still going to do...
More Evidence Supports Predicted Social Media Collapse
If you are sceptical that we will repeat the 1999-2000 type collapse re: the Internet, only with social media, here's some sobering data. Users...
Is it Time To Rethink Customer Service So We Stand For Something? #custserv
I've often wondered why at least some customers think that their fellow human beings, who just happen to work for companies the customers visit,...
The Big Social Media Lie: If You Disagree, You “Don’t Get It”
Came across a post on socialmediatoday (which has some thought provoking material) plus comments. The general drift was expressing frustration that businesses "don't get"...
How MUST Social Media Evolve To Be Effective As a Customer Service Tool? (Part 1)
I'm starting from the end of the progression, since this is clearly the question that you would find at the end of a book...
How Often Should I Blog?
On the surface, it's a good question, and one that is asked often. Yet perhaps it's true that if you have to ask this...
Customer Service Techniques: Acknowledge Without Encouraging (book excerpt)
As part of our commitment to help you provide better customer service we are releasing excerpts from Perfect Phrases For Customer Service via our...