Four weeks after my Hail Mary operation, I was still in pain. A lot of it.

My pelvis had taken a beating over the last year—first with radiation, then the operation, and then bed rest. I was tight, sore, and in constant agony in my tailbone and hips.

I found Dr. Rob on YouTube. He had some great videos on hip and back pain. When I visited his website, I was thrilled to see that he had a community.

Pay attention to the six value props below.

I joined. It was 12 bucks (not a great sign), but I was in so much pain that the idea of instantly accessing more tools and direct help gave me naive hope.

You can probably guess the rest. I was dumped into a strange, outdated WordPress membership site. There was no onboarding. I couldn’t find the "mobility training." The “priceless” community support was apparently busy elsewhere—there hadn’t been a real conversation in months.

I never heard from anyone. I couldn’t make sense of the platform.

When I canceled, I gave honest feedback and even offered to help—for free. The canned, Zendesk-like reply didn’t acknowledge anything but the cancellation.

This wasn’t uniquely bad. It’s pretty par for the course. And since customer experience scrutiny is a glitch in my brain I can't turn off, I can rattle off five other brands that have been equally disappointing in recent months:

• Eventime

• Oura

• Aful (lolz)

• MassGen

• Thorne

Now, you may be thinking I’m just a picky broad. And you’d be right. But also—we all should be.

When companies market themselves as customer-centric and mission-driven—and sometimes charge premium prices—the experience inside should match the one they're selling outside.

So what's going on here? Is everyone just full of crap?

Sort of, yes. But nine times out of ten, I think it’s accidentally crap.
(I’m really resisting the urge to go full poop-joke here.)

There are voices and brands out there that deliver on their promises. But across the board, disappointment still outweighs delight.

And I think there are three main reasons why:

1. Wins: As much as I’d love to say short-term hacks and smarmy marketing don’t work—they do. Just ask everyone pulling this "comment below" crud on LinkedIn.
   
   

Sidenote: this is a satirical post. Kevin gets it.

This kind of engagement bait is exhausting and pure vanity. But it works, so people keep doing it. Doesn’t matter how it makes people feel—just that it converts. The system rewards the wrong things.

2. Blindspots: You can’t see your own brand clearly. None of us can. We all think our newborn babies are beautiful—they probably aren’t—but we’re too close to see it, and no one’s going to tell us otherwise. Your customers won’t either. You need someone with fresh, neutral eyes. Get proxy vision. Get someone else to see it for you.

3. Scale: Most companies outgrow their systems fast. If you’re focused on acquisition without revisiting every moment of the customer journey, you’re likely leaking trust somewhere. And it’s usually not the big, obvious stuff—it’s the small, irritating, overlooked things that slowly kill retention.

This newsletter could read like one long marketing plug for what I do—and maybe it partially is. But it’s also a statement of why.

Why I said goodbye to Wondry.

Why, in the fog-clearing aftermath of cancer treatment, this was one of the few things that stood out as worth pursuing.

The bar is low, but that doesn’t mean we should keep stepping over it.

If I could leave you with one tactical takeaway, even if you're running something you feel great about, it's this: pick an area of your work and run a Give-A-Damn Audit.

You'll likely find a broken touchpoint, but if you're one of the few who don't, you get to move on to the fun part: finding a way to make interacting with your brand just a little more wonderful. An unexpected bonus or clever little pun. Replace the templates emails with something personal.

Care a little more, and I promise you, people will notice. 

I believe we can build companies that earn trust—and keep it. That starts by actually seeing what customers are going through, and caring enough to fix it.

I’m chasing fewer, better things now. This is one of them.

If that strikes a chord, stick around.

(and if you're ready, let's talk)

April