Why can't all software companies follow Stardock's lead...

or why Scansoft will never get my business again....... ever.

Published on December 24, 2004 By Grog In Personal Computing

About a month ago I had an urgent need to update some PDF files, we have a couple of machines with Acrobat installed but only a couple. I was faced with a choice of completely retyping the files or tyeing up one of these machines for hours or days. I found a solution in a product from Scansoft called PDF Create Professional which is a combination of two other products PDF Convert and PDF Create, I figured it was a good solution to my problems. Convert the PDF files to Word, Edit them, and then back to PDF with all of the formating. Since it take forever to get new software from the Company, I reached into my pocket and bought it myself, the amount of time and Stress it would save was worth it. Well as a software review, it is a 98% solution, or enough that I could get by. It is a little steep at 100 dollars but not prohibitively so. Everything is fine till I'm on the road a couple of weeks later and I go to convert a document from Word to PDF, all of a sudden I get this notice that since the software can't verify my serial number on-line (I was not connected to the Internet) it would write the PDF in demo mode only (which watermarks the heck out of the file). I hooked up to the Hotel internet and tried again and everything was fine, even when I was disconnected from the net. Fine not a problem, I forgot about it. Then a couple of days ago I was at work and needed to convert another file...... well you can guess what happened.

Scansoft software installation goes like this,

1) Download Software
2) Install Software, enter Serial Number.
3) Software generates a unique key for your computer and serial number.
4) Mandatory Registration with serial number and generated key.
5) Finish Installation
6) Run Software for the first time, has to go to Scansoft's servers to see if it is really a legal version.
7) Works.

Well I went to Scansofts website to see if there was an answer to what was going on, nothing there. Look at the Tech support section, guess what the only way to get support for free is to send them a Snail mail letter, 9.95 for E-Mail support or 19.95 for phone support. I sent a note to customer service and guess what..... canned responses. How can a company survive with this type of attitude. They have lost any further business from me. I know that me not being a repeat customer will probably not hurt their bottom line.

Anyone who thinks that Stardock's Support team is anything less than Stellar, should try dealing with Scansoft sometime. Stardock will always get my money without a second thought, and if they ever make a product that plays with PDF's I'll uninstall Scansoft's 98% solution and never look back.

Thank You Stardock for the best products and support, please do not ever ever change your business model.

Merry Christmass to All, and a Happy New Year!!!

Chris

Comments

Jafo

on Dec 25, 2004

Much of SD's success is through the accessibility of its 'people'....with various avenues of access.

It's not uncommon to be able to resolve some 'issue' by direct contact with the person who actually coded the product.

A lot of this stems from the early [-ier] days of Skinning where both the program and its 'users' were cutting their teeth at the same time.....and the concept is still there....where users can have the option to get into the alpha/beta vers of the products to provide 2-way input.

It's probably the case that skinning as an entity will never necessarily be a 'finished work'....there will always be scope for advancement/improvement...

werewolf

on Dec 25, 2004

Nice post Grog...I think there are a lot of folks here who would agree, probably some who wouldn't, but I suppose you can't please everyone. Stardock is a model of what customer support should be.

GreenReaper

on Dec 25, 2004

Stardock does well. But I think we could do better. Documentation-wise, in particular - there are a lot of questions that get asked that shouldn't need personal answers (and not always because the user didn't look

). Some things are still hard to use, too. This is the sort of thing where you can make gradual improvements, though, so I suspect things will change as time goes on.

Grog

on Dec 25, 2004

Jafo,

I fully agree, but it still just kills me that other companies (read most of the others) think that their customers are just a necessary Evil that they have to put up with to get a pay check. Then again if there were more companies with service like Stardock's, I would have a lot less money in my pocket.

Have a wonderful Christmas down under Jafo.

Chris

Grog

on Dec 25, 2004

GreenReaper,

What you say is true about the documentation, but you have to admit it has come light years from the early days. One of the things that has always impressed me about Stardock was the amount of effort that I have seen time and time again over on the message boards to help fix a problem that just one customer was having.

Chris

TasT

on Dec 25, 2004

Documentation, Documentation, Documentation
Ask froggy about that some time I spent 3 years beating him up weekly over documentation. And yes it has made leaps and bounds from where it was at just a year ago.

I have seen time and time again over on the message boards to help fix a problem that just one customer was having.

I remember one problem that actually led into special builds of WB for a customer to test so that the problem on his computer could be figured out when no one else was having a problem.

Gene Nash

on Dec 27, 2004

Have you tried GhostScript? It can convert PostScript files to PDF and vice-versa. And it's free.

I also found this on Google: http://site4.pdf995.com/download.html. The site for this one says: "The free versions of pdf995 products will display a sponsor page in your web browser each time you run the software." Hmm, I don't know about that. Check out GhostScript first.

joeKnowledge

on Dec 27, 2004

I think when it comes down to it, is that companies do not have a solid idea of what it is to interact with human beings. The interaction becomes secondary or worst and the once small company who made time, now is a mid to large and is too busy making money.

This is why CRM (customer relationship management) is becoming so hot. If you can have a comstomer base that is loyal to you product, the turnover rate is smaller. Out of thwe 100% of people who view your product, you actually get the 5 to 6 percent to buy it (maybe more) and out of those who buy it, over 70% keep it or renew.

Its not an exact science (which is why some companies use CRM but it doesn't work) and sometime to employ CRM you have to re-engeneer your whole business structure and internal rules (change priorities and operation relationships). That can be a big deal.

Scansoft probably emplimented this program without fully thinking about issues that would come up and made no fallback on user inquiries.

Not good.

But some companies are really thinking more about sales than customer service. The product is the service to them instead of the product being the product. To change that way of thinking cost money, which is why some companies don't bother. Others use CRM with the promises of bigger revenues but then see how much change they have to make or how much probability of it not working and the CRM fails.

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