I ordered and received new printer cartridges.  I installed them and they worked.  I did this over two weeks ago.  I got this email survey from HP yesterday.

I guess it’s asking about my purchase experience.  I can only guess because it’s hard to decipher.  This email created its own experience and if HP were to ask, I’d give them feedback on it.  But, since you’re reading and they aren’t asking that question, I’ll share with you.

Where to start?  Three main critiques,

• I got this email two weeks after buying the ink.  If you want to ask someone for feedback about an interaction – and you should if you want to raise more money – you need to do it within 24 hours of the interaction and preferably sooner.  We humans don’t encode and store memories of unmemorable events.   Buying printer ink should be unmemorable.

• We wrote a post recently talking about ad effectiveness going in the toilet over the last 10 years as we’ve apparently become lobotomized from simple, clear and interesting stories to gobbly gook abstraction and mindless repetition.  This copy is case in point.   How exactly does HP, the corporate entity, from whom I very occasionally buy printer cartridges fit into Covid?   It doesn’t.  Not today, not tomorrow, not ever.  They could have launched into a diatribe about flat bottom trucks and it would be just as relevant to me.

I don’t know anyone at HP nor do I need to.  Even if I loved HP this feels gratuitous, reeking of platitudes and corporate speak.  And it’s their lead-in message no less.  I’m not looking for the next great American novel as replacement copy; rather,  focus on the job to be done with this request for feedback and get on with it.

In a prior life I did research work for Kinkos.  We found out two things mattered to motivate repeat purchase: 1)  was the order correct? and 2) was it on time?  That’s it.  Nothing else matters.  They ask those two questions.  In contrast…

• HP’s first question is Likelihood to Recommend and it’s awful.  It has many flaws and some readers may know it as Net Promoter Score (NPS). They are one in the same.
  • Let’s start with the literal interpretation problem.  Am I supposed to interpret this question by envisioning myself in a conversation about printers, or worse…printer cartridges?   And, if in that seventh level of Dante’s hell, do I feel competent and confident enough to suggest a friend, colleague or a complete stranger buy HP?  Or, is this more a proxy for how much I like the brand or the product?  The most likely outcome is I won’t  answer at all because it’s confusing and it’s of low import to me.   Or, I answer in a way that is misinterpreted by whoever is reviewing my response.

• •  Even if that weren’t an issue there is the death knell fact that this question is awful at predicting customer behavior, which is the only reason to ever ask it.   Research was done with actual customer recommend behavior and this question asking about intent to recommend was horrible at predicting the very thing it’s asking – recommend or not.  It’s equally horrible at predicting repeat purchases.

Why the heck is all this in a blog about fundraising?

Feedback from your donors/customers is a good–actually a great idea.  Make it a business process as HP has done.  Kudos.  But, Don’t do anything else HP has done and that business process may be worth having.

Kevin