Yesterday, my partner got an email from Go Daddy, one of the largest domain registration and web hosting companies, telling her that they had renewed ten domains that she had registered one year ago requesting automatic yearly renewal. She was frustrated when she received the email because she had decided that she didn't want to keep the domain names any longer but she had forgotten to tell Go Daddy to cancel automatic renewal.
We were both surprised with a unsolicited phone call today from Dwayne Brittingham, a friendly customer service representative from Go Daddy, thanking us for being loyal customers. He asked whether there was anything we needed. I explained the situation of the URLs that my partner no longer wanted. Dwayne said, "No problem. I'll gladly reverse the charges on the domain renewal and cancel those URLs for you. It's the least we could do for a good customer."
Wow! Go Daddy really gets the concept of good profits built on solid relationships - quite different from the poor customer service that America Online provides to maximize short term profits that I detailed a couple of months ago.
With its focus on pleasing the customer even if it means giving up short term revenue, Go Daddy is building a sound business model that will thrive. I'm sure that Fred Reicheld, who wrote the excellent The Ultimate Question: Driving Good Profits and True Growth, would heartily agree.
