T-Mobile Credibility and Leverage… Again
You may recall our October article about T-Mobile’s Sidekick user data loss problem, or may have read some of the 25 or 26 million references available via a search for “T-Mobile data loss”. It is a simple, real-world example of how loss of credibility can hurt your business.
T-Mobile’s public statements allow us to make some estimate of the business value of this temporary service loss, and the long-term credibility loss that goes with it. Add these up:
- The estimated cost of lost business in sales of Sidekicks and the far larger long-term loss from sales of service plans when T-Mobile temporarily suspended sales of the Sidekick after the outage.
- The cost of the $100 “service vouchers” that were offered to users inconvenienced or impacted by the outage.
- The 14% price reduction that T-Mobile has made to the price of the Sidekick LX model ($175 to $150), now that sales have been restarted.
It’s a big deal. Next time your credibility is on the line, remember what’s at stake, and protect it. How quickly you respond, and how effective you are, can add up to a lot. (td)