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April 27, 2004
One sale gained, one lost
I paid $300 last week for a new TiVo box. Now I feel less like an executioner when it comes to keeping programs stored on my TiVo for more than a few days. Perhaps I will add several more MTV marathons like my new favorite, Pimp My Ride, to my to-do list (not that I need to watch more TV).
Now my older-yet-trusty TiVo goes into another room, where it will become rather inert. The issue: TiVo does not provide incentive for ownership of multiple units. TiVo's monthly $12.95 fee for access to its monthly television programming schedules is one of the product's chief value propositions. That's $12.95 per month for each unit, whether I own two boxes or, if I owned a big mansion with multiple TV rooms, 20.
When I called TiVo to cancel my previous monthly service, I crossed my fingers hoping the customer service agent would ask why. Sure enough, with a hint of sadness in her voice, an otherwise cheery agent wanted to know why. True to TiVo's pattern of ignoring its loyal customers, the agent had no response, no cathartic sharing of acknowledgement, in my explanation that the company's incentive deficiency means a longer-term revenue loss for the company.
Nor did the agent care to consider any suggestion that TiVo structure a sliding scale of monthly service charges based on number of units owned. (The ticking clock of calls-fielded-per-hour must have loomed large, for it was a race to get me off the phone.) With more units owned and economies of scale built in to the TiVo's monthly subscription model, that should mean more short-term and long-term top-line and bottom-line revenue, right?
Apparently, not in TiVoWorld. TiVo has more of my money, but less of it.
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Why should she care if you are canceling your service? She's a $10 per hour lackey who gets paid the same if you cancel or not.
Obviously, at the employee level you were at, Tivo people are not compensated on the points you noted.
