To think that life is all about style over substance?

[Fairyliz]

I work for an organisation that has recently revamped its website. The new website is fabulous, great visuals and easy to navigate. The firm has also had part of the building remodelled so it looks very sleek and contemporary and our stationery/branding has also been updated.
The problem is that the service we provide isn't any better. What would make thinks better is more staff rather than vast sums being spent on rebranding.
However it seems we aren't the only place to do this; there are numerous examples of firms spending millions advertising but you can never get through on the phonelines.
AIBU or just a grumpy old woman?

YABU, because they spend the money on advertising to get your business. Once they have your business, unless they are unbearably shit they are unlikely to lose you.. how many people would cancel their car insurance because they had to wait five minutes to get through to customer services for example.

Most companies now want their customers to use self service online which is why phone staff have been reduced. It makes it cheaper for the company. E.g online banking, flight booking, cinema tickets, etc etc . And now it is shifting from online to mobile. Technology has replaced people. If you have a problem it's most likely dealt with via a chat function now (eg Amazon, eBay) than by phone.
I think most companies have seperate customer service and advertising budgets. It may be that they are reallocating customer service budget to advertising if customer service costs are reduced by moving to chat functionality. Perhaps that is what you are seeing, some accountants may be along to confirm!

YANBU.

Life is all about faking it!

That's not "life" that's business and marketing - totally about faking it. But business isn't life and the "relationships" we are encouraged to have with organisations and companies are not real life.

So I don't agree with your thread title st all though I do with your OP.

Agree. If you look at the website for the company I 'work' for it employs several people. In actual fact it only has one employee, the director. The rest of us are self employed/hourly paid.

I think you're confusing Life with Advertising.

My life isn't all about style over substance, if yours is thats your own problem!

Some companies rate style over substance. Usually failing ones. Start looking for a new job.

I work with companies trying to improve their services. Most companies are desperate to improve, ideally without hiring more people. If your company is truly changing the stationery but not the services then start looking for a new job because they are doomed.

YANBU.

I worked in customer services for over 10 years for a very big company, our customer services were top notch, our training was intensive and in general, the organisation was regarded as the best in the industry (in terms of us vs other customer service setups/training/crm etc).

But behind the scenes, we were surprisingly outdated, 10-15 year old phones/computers, would use at least 30 different customer service applications in a day, and an average of 7 or so on one call/contact. Some of the systems were still even keyboard controlled (think press esc for... press F1 for...) The investment was very much in the customer experience.

Incidentally, other companies in the same area as us, were constantly updating billing/CRM platforms, opening very swish offices, one even built their system from the ground up, it caused no end of issues, bad customer services, and all in all a mess.

So whilst yes, life is generally a fake it til you make it, companies investing in the wrong things will surely encounter problems.

Your customers won't care about swish stationary/offices. They WILL care about shitty service and will go elsewhere.

I don't think LIFE is style over substance.... but advertising in the capitalist market is.

But that's a small part of my existence so I wouldn't say that it's something that my life is ruled by.