Community Manager Worthless?

[philoso4]

Has anyone received any worthwhile result from the Community Manager?

Has anyone actually followed the "New Posting Practices"?

Does anyone even understand the New Posting Practices?

I have posted a couple of complaints/questions with no response.

[normysmom]

I don't imagine that the job of community manager necessarily equates to instant access tech support and customer service. I thought she described her role as trying to wade through the board topics and get information to the departments that can address the issues being discussed here, and, maybe, to moderate the forums if the posting gets abusive or out of hand. In the months I have been here, it is the community members that provide support and assistance on a casual basis. If you truly need immediate, individual tech help, you should call in or walk in as that would get you a direct response in the least amount of time. If you have complaints you need addressed, then a letter to corporate is most likely to get a response. I noticed that she does request private messages for some issues...maybe that route would be effective? I do understand that the posting practices suggested are to help direct information to the appropriate source more easily and to help with topic searches and such. Good luck to you!

[deemure]

Yes, people are following the posting practices.  At least some are and it is to their benefit to do so when an issued needs to be addressed.  The posting practices are to call attention to a particular issue that BN needs to perhaps deal with and allows an easier process for this to happen.

Sam forwards our requests, complaints, issues to the proper parties.  Sometimes answers can take awhile, sometimes there are no answers that can be given, sometimes people don't come back here and say that an issue was addressed, and sometimes higher ups won't allow answers to be given for their own reasons.  I can only assume she has been inundated with requests and give her the respect I would any person who is merely trying to help.  I don't expect immediate resolutions, because whatever I report is not necessarily widespread or of any interest to anyone else.  I assume she or someone else will reply when possible.

[roustabout]

Several people have received immediate tech support escalations via the community manager.

The community manager clarified the current state  of play of wireless device compatibility.

Last week, a fairly important product safety issue came to her attention.  She let all of us know that tech support was giving bad info (claiming that there were fans in NCs) and my guess is that right now she's actually busy working on the larger issue, that BN's current product presents a problem when charging. 

The new guidelines for posting are intended to make problem reports easier to find and track for everyone who uses the forums, including BNs internal tech folks.  The forum search function isn't very strong, so if you have a bug report, it's helpful to put certain info in your title where it's more searchable.

Despite my level of frustration with BN as a whole, I think it's valuable for all of us to try to remain collegial with the BN staff who are here.  Calling those folks 'worthless' is not going to help.  

Posting new guidelines just ahead of the holiday weekend was, granted, too bad because they are a bit confusing and Sam wasn't around much to explain them. 

[KidneyKid]

Sam is great!! I had purchased the PBA Bowling app and it stopped working. I PM'd Sam earlier today with the issue and within about 2 hours I had a reply from her and an e-mail from B&N stating that my purchase would be refunded. This was great except the problem was the gift card I had used to purchase the app was empty ans I had already discarded it. I sent Sam another message explaining this but that I would handle it myself with customer service. I thought the issue was over but then I received another e-mail from B&N saying that they will send me a gift card with the balance of the purchase on it. Sam went above and beyond to help me out. Give her some time after the long weekend and im sure she will help with yourr problem. Maybe consider sending her a PM? THANKS FOR EVERYTHING SAM!!!

[melouria]

I don't expect Sam to work miracles.  I just want to be heard.  And I think Sam is listening.  When she does not have an answer for our problem, she is sending it to those at B&N who can deal with the issue.   While I have received no fixes yet, and, honestly, there may not be a fix, I feel like someone at B&N is at least listening.

[crabbybob]

When I visualize Sam I see my daughter, a caring, well meaning person who's doing the best she can as the mediator or facilitator between B&N and it's customers.  Unfortunately, there's only so much she can do. 

[Mack_the_Knife]

some girlie men on this forum whined to her that i was a big meanie so i had to sit in the naughty chair. 

[RHWright]

In the days and weeks following Michael V's departure, we had people bemoaning the loss of an admin/moderator/official conduit to B&N corporate.

Now that we have a "Community Manager" who seems to be making a good faith effort to facilitate communication between these boards and B&N corporate, people are questioning the "worth" of the position.

Geesh! Some people are never satisfied.

[flyingtoastr Inspired Wordsmith]

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RHWright wrote:

Geesh! Some people are never satisfied.

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Welcome to the NOOK boards.

[ladytonya]

Welcome to the internet!