Entrepreneurial language: Publikdemand gather the interests of the

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Publikdemand four-person operations team, Ms. Coutney Bowell

Sina technology Zheng from Silicon Valley, USA

In the airport to face the delay of flights, in the operator where the terms of the Overlord, Complaints customer service department only in exchange for "Sorry, we can do nothing", "This is our rules" and so cold answer, filled with anger you are suffering from their own weak, powerless against the strong company. What to do?

Coutney Bowell, a 27-year-old girl with extensive experience in the field of marketing PR, Courtney Powell, who suffered from a disregard for cable television services, thought: "The voice and power of a person is insignificant, so how about thousands of tens of thousands of people together to deal with big companies?" This is the origin of Publikdemand.

Publikdemand, who founded her three friends this March, is hoping to provide a platform for more isolated consumers, using the Internet and social networks, to gain respect and resolve problems with groups, and to confront big companies that ignore consumer opinion. In Kootenay's words: "When tens of thousands of consumers speak at the same time, big companies have to listen and make changes."

Kootenay age, but in the marketing field has 7 years of work experience. She joined the marketing company boundless receptacle at the age of 20, responsible for marketing and PR business. 3 years ago, Kootenay founded his own marketing automation company Leedseed, which is still operating.

The 5-month-old company's mission, as its name Publikdemand: public demand. Users dissatisfied with the services of large companies can complain on the site, then invite Facebook and Twitter friends to support them, creating a certain scale effect, attracting media coverage and eventually forcing big companies to make concessions to meet the legitimate needs of consumers.

Publikdemand, in turn, plays the role of media, representing consumers and large companies. Most creatively, once big company a refuses to give in, Publikdemand will find the company's rival b directly, persuading B to offer a better plan to attract consumers who are dissatisfied with a and directly disrupt the loyalty of a user.

The At&t Online subscription package is the best case for Publikdemand to date. Matt Spacarelli (Matt Spaccarelli) is an ordinary consumer in California. At&t, America's largest telecoms operator, has launched an unlimited data subscription package for Apple's iphone users, Spacarelli.

But in practice, Spacarelli found that when its data flow exceeded 1.5GB, the internet speed of the iphone slowed down markedly. After investigation, the original at&t will be the largest number of data use of the 5% monthly package user implementation of the secretly speed limit. Angry Spacarelli feel cheated, unlimited data the monthly package actually has a traffic limit.

At&t also shrewdly banned these users from initiating class action in the service agreement. After complaining to At&t, Spacarelli will at&t to court, and through Publikdemand appeal for more users support. Eventually he reached a settlement with At&t, who paid 850 of billions of dollars in compensation and incurred 85 of dollars in litigation.

Today Publikdemand more than 60 consumer complaints a day, involving more than 2000 companies in the United States, with the largest number of complaints focused on mobile operators, financial institutions and cable television service providers. Publikdemand lists the top ten companies that have not been effectively addressed by U.S. consumer complaints: At&t, Verizon and Apple.

In May this year, Publikdemand joined the Silicon Valley incubator startups and moved from Texas to the Silicon Valley mountain city. With the help of senior PR marketers, they have learned to be more effective on Twitter to find complaints from ordinary users, and to guide those users through Publikdemand to deal with big companies.

In Kootenay's view, the power of Publikdemand comes from the Internet. Social networks amplify a single person's voice, allowing the original isolated forces to form a resultant force. Under the pressure of public opinion, big companies have to pay attention to their public image and make concessions.

A woman to the Bank of America customer service complaints several times after the failure to confide in the publikdemand of her own encounter, her vomit trough received thousands of netizens support. To her surprise, two days later, the Bank of America customer service representative on the initiative called to apologize.

On the other hand, Publikdemand as a consumer opinion representative has won the attention of large companies. Kootenay to Sina Science and technology discloses, now already had many big companies to find them proactively, understand consumer's demand, hope to improve service quality. Interestingly, these big companies are the ones with the highest quality of service.

Publikdemand is one of the most special startups to take part in this demo day, because they don't intend to continue financing. Before Demo day, Publikdemand had raised 500,000 of dollars from angel investors, and Kootenay believed it was enough to meet a period of demand.

Comments: Big companies shop bullying is a problem in all countries. Sina Weibo is also often visible consumer frustration, there are lucky to be thousands of forwarded by the Enterprise Customer Service reply to resolve, but more is nothing. In the age of social networking, Publikdemand provides another way for consumers to gain legitimate rights and interests.

Of course, this needs to be fully in the market economy to play a role: there is no monopoly and information clamping. Although the present difficulties, but I believe that the day for China, not too far.