On My Blog Post, A Rare Comment From Entrecard!
Posted by
eli
on 1/31/10• Categorized as Consulting
Entrecard.com, through its director of Business Development Cindy Ung, is not and has never been well-known for making comments on the blog posts of its users, even if the posts are critical of the ad network. 
In fact, Entrecard has not interacted with its member-users, and it management even closed the Forum and comments to its blog. Entrecard admin does not also listen to unsolicited advices and suggestions from its users.
Thus when Entrecard through Cindy Ung posted a comment on my previous post titled “Two Lessons In Customer Satisfaction I Learned From Entrecard and CMF Ads”, I celebrated the moment as something memorable.
After all, it is exceptionally rare for Entrecard to make a comment on any blog post of its users.
Ciindy’s Comment
Here’s the significant portions of the comment of Cindy Ung of Entrecard:
“I was directed to your blog post so I figured I should address it here. I don’t have any disagreement with your statement about businesses should focus on customer service. I agree with you 100%.
“Entrecard customer department usually takes place between the hours of 9-5pm (PST). Our customer service department handles trouble tickets and approving new sites before entering our network.
“So, when a new user joins Entrecard for the first time, if it’s within our working hours, they usually receive an approval/rejection email within hours. However, if they join after hours, it can take until the following morning before we can get to them.
“This is why some sites can take 8 hours or longer (but not longer than 24 hours). I’m sorry, but we are not setup to have the customer service department be open 24 hours a day.
“Despite the forums being closed, we have receive many feedbacks from our users via support. They are discussed within management and we do include their feedbacks in our future developments.
“I know many of you have animosity against Entrecard and I’m not here to start trouble. Should you have any, feel free to contact me at cindy@entrecard.com.”
Conclusion
The only sour note in Cindy’s comment was her accusation that many of the users have animosity against Entrecard. There maybe users who are hostile and resent Entrecard’s policy changes, but I’m not one of them.
However, the main reason why there are many users who have animosity against Entrecard is because the management is not close to its users – its customers. There is no consultation and feed backing at all concerning the policies that affect the users.
As Sheila, whose blog The Ad Master is the most popular blog in Entrecard, commented: “EC is beyond frustrating – even more so because you know that if it had great customer service it could be a great site.”
It boils down again to customer satisfaction, the subject of my previous post that has elicited the exceptionally rare comment from Entrecard.
I think your comments are pretty much on the mark, however, I would like to add some additional thoughts. In the digital advertising and marketing world, it is recognized that building a supportive community around a brand is a cornerstone of any successful marketing or advertising campaign. I find it striking that EntreCard, which is ahead of the curve in so many ways, is so far behind the curve in this way.
From an organizational development perspective, I would suggest it may reflect issues with the leadership of EntreCard. I’m not really sure who is in charge at EntreCard, if anyone is. The About page and the Contact Us page make no reference to who the people are. This lack of transparency adds to mistrust.
At present, it appears as if Cindy is the sole face of EntreCard, but nothing is really known about her. Whether it is Cindy’s issue, or an issue of others involved with EntreCard, there seems to be another fundamental problem. That is the confusion between criticism and animosity. There may well be those with animosity towards EntreCard. I suspect many of those have moved on to other things. People that have stayed, may well be fierce critics of EntreCard, who criticize it not out of animosity, but out of a desire to make sure that any system they use is constantly improving and is best of class.
Last kicks of a dying horse! Lol!
I see you are still using entrecard so having someone from entrecard comment on your blog can be seen as an honour except for Cindy’s wording. The end result was creating another backlink for them while quietly putting you on notice through the ‘animosity’ comment. In the past and it was clearly stated that any EC member who said anything negative about EC outside of EC such as on Twitter or on their own blogs would have their EC accounts terminated. The fact they are now watching your blog could spell trouble for you if they are still following that policy. I’m not sure what kind of traffic you are getting from EC but it might be worth it to drop EC and focus on increasing traffic through other sources. That way you can say what you want about them without the threat of them terminating your account.
BTW I visit your blog through CMF just so you know your getting some traffic from them
“Animosity” is defined at dictionary,com as a feeling of strong dislike, ill will, or enmity that tends to display itself in action. If we have such feeling against Entrecard, we won’t be using it anymore. Isn’t it that you don’t like to see the persons you hate? Such is not our case with EC, I have just clicked your drop button so I used the system.
By the way, I came in from your ad in Adgitize. I never reached any EC member through clicks on their ads in the network. The EC management in their reply email to my unsolicited advice, which they never care to hear, emphasized that EC members are not encouraged to click ads in their network. Ad views and impressions are what they sell to advertisers not clickthroughs.
I definitely agree with you—Entrecard has no pleasant service or effort to closely associate themselves with their members, and that is why there is animosity. I had encountered their support staff who tried to politely tell me about what’s the problem regarding a complaint of mine, yet the statement was laced with implications of derision and brutality.
While CMF is also the same, except that CMF support staff are aggressively rude , impolite and incompetent. I have a terrible experience —–like monsters in a nightmare. Would you believe they told me after I asked to be paid, they told me, “Oh but you should pay this and pay that….” as if I don’t know, what I need to pay.
I also don’t like CMF’s policy of paying them for advertising when I already paid their service to advertise on blogs. So what’s the advertising fee for?
You rave so much about CMF probably because you did not encounter the problem I had but I tell you, they’re just evil thieves lurking that if you make a little complaint to them, they’re so aggressive to defend themselves.
I think that the underlying problem is that Entrecard hasn’t yet found a totally workable business model, and all other problems stem from that. I’m giving them the benefit of the doubt. I came forth with the money to become a sponsor, and I’m prepared to wait.
I agree with what you said that entrecard is not close to its users. They are treating us like commodities. But I still have hope for entrecard. Btw, I reactivated my widget again. Feel free to drop anytime!
it’s sad she doesn’t feel that she can comment on others blogs; or address openly any of these “Alleged” animosities. that smacks of “you betta watch ya back”. I think they know that alienating any more of their users (because we are not members anymore) would be the act of closing the doors. most people are not going to take much more disrespect from Miss Cindy and her management. management, yeah right..(side-eye)
I thought that everything Cindy wrote was fine up until the last paragraph.
Using the word “animosity” is a strong term, one that she should have avoided. Sometimes we disagree with Entrecard, but we still use it. Thus, users generally accept the problems while those who show animosity have already moved on.
I’m not having any luck getting any answers from Entrecard support for a week now on the inability to send a puzzle winner 300 credits they won. So I lokk like a jerk for not sending the credits to a winner when the problem lies with the system not allowing me to send them. I’ve sent in two requests and a third will be going in later today or tomorrow for some type of resolution. I’m not holding my breath though at this point.
Good post! Thanks for sharing with us, I’ll recommend it to all my friends!