If You Read A Single Newsletter Of Mine, PLEASE MAKE IT THIS ONE
If you are here, you are early
Hi Team!
I read something this week that should have made me sick, but somehow, it did the opposite…?
Cory Doctorow wrote about his experiences with customer service chatbots in his Pluralistic newsletter. Three attempts to get help that ended up in three different flavors of useless.
One chatbot refused to waive a $10 cancellation fee even though the situation obviously warranted it. Another kept insisting that a replacement suitcase was on its way, even though it hadn’t been shipped yet. The third accidentally helped by breaking its own rules and spitting out information it wasn’t supposed to share.
He refers to these bots as “accountability sinks.” They exist to absorb blame without solving problems. Companies surveyed customers after switching to chatbots during COVID. The feedback was overwhelming: people hated it.
And the companies’ response was basically, “What I hear you saying is that you hate this, but you’ll tolerate it.”
The piece is about how customer service has been deliberately designed to make you give up. The offshore call centers with terrible phone quality. The hold queues that drop you back to the start. The policies are written specifically to exhaust your patience until you just eat the loss and move on.
Class, we’re still in the very early innings of CX.
Zappos was decades before its time. As CAC continues to climb, brands with “media buying savants” are learning that this only works for the first purchase. And product + CX really does matter.
So this week, I’m writing a love letter to CX. Not because everything is great. Because the bar is still so low that there’s never been a better time to give a sh!t.
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THE BAR IS SO LOW IT’S PRACTICALLY UNDERGROUND
I can’t tell you how many times a week I’m anxiously typing into a chatbot, getting nowhere closer to a resolution, and then just ending the chat because what else am I supposed to do???
And this is by design.
Companies discovered they could make customer service so terrible that people simply give up, and we’d all just tolerate it.
The chatbot that can’t help, the call center worker who’s punished for actually solving problems, the call on hold that mysteriously disconnects after 45 minutes.
It’s not broken, it’s working exactly as intended.
And instead of this making me depressed beyond belief, it invigorates me that the opportunity is still massive.
If you’re providing decent CX right now, you’re ahead of most brands. If you’re providing great CX, you’re basically in the top 1%.
The bar is so low that just being a functioning human who gives two sh!ts makes you exceptional.
If I were to share with you the stories I've personally had in the last few weeks alone, it would fill a short 150-page book.
We are still in the very early innings of CX. Zappos figured this out decades ago, and everyone looked at them as if they were insane for investing in god-tier customer service.
Now, CAC is climbing, and retention matters; brands are slowly realizing that media buying savants and dropshippers taught us we could get away with less.
It turns out that less is not actually fine.
CX GAVE ME EVERYTHING
If you had told 20-year-old me in the early 2010s, making ~$33k a year answering emails for a struggling ecommerce brand, that customer experience would become my entire career, I would have laughed at you.
I thought it was a stopgap. A job I’d do for a year or two while I figured out what I actually wanted to do with my life as a young 20-something degen without a college degree.
Ten-ish years later, here we are.
CX gave me everything. My career, my network, every opportunity I’ve had. I’ve built teams, launched programs, and worked with brands I actually respect. I’ve written short books and 175 newsletters, because apparently, I can’t stop thinking about this stuff.
And the thing that kept me going all those years was realizing something simple: you can make someone’s entire week just by being human and providing a great experience.
That’s it, that’s the whole job.
Someone’s frustrated; something went wrong. They contact you expecting the usual runaround, the chatbot that doesn’t help, the policy that makes no sense. And then you just solve it without making them beg and scream.
The fact that this is remarkable says everything about our current state.
HOSPITALITY ISN’T ALWAYS EXPENSIVE
There’s a story in “Unreasonable Hospitality” about Eleven Madison Park that stuck with me.
A guest mentioned they were rushing to make a show after dinner. The team noticed their parking meter was about to expire. So they sent a runner outside with quarters to feed the meter.
It costs maybe two bucks, and it bought them a customer for life.
That’s the thing about great CX: It’s not always expensive. It’s not about sending everyone a gift basket or offering 50% off refunds. Sometimes, it’s just about paying attention and deciding that someone’s problem is, perhaps, worth solving. (!)
The greatest restaurants have great food, obviously. However, it is the hospitality at Eleven Madison Park that people remember. The meal is excellent. The experience is what brings you back.
Same thing with brands.
Bombas has great socks. But I’d venture to say anyone who interfaces with their CX team increases their LTV significantly, because the experience is just as good as the product, if not better.
Same with Tommy John. Same with Figs. The product gets you in the door. The experience determines if you come back.
And right now, most brands have decided the experience doesn’t matter. They’ve outsourced it, automated it, or just made it so painful that you give up before you get help.
YOUR JOB ISN’T GOING ANYWHERE
Every few weeks, someone posts on LinkedIn about how AI replaced their entire CX team. I then make it my business to visit their website, ask a silly question, and receive an answer that is so far from reality, it makes me question my own existence.
I’ve been hearing this for YEARS. First, it was outsourcing. Then chatbots. Then, machine learning. Now it’s AI. Next year it’ll be AGI, and after that, I don’t know, sentient holograms that apologize for the inconvenience.
And every single time, the pitch is the same: this technology will handle 80% of tickets, freeing your team to focus on complex issues.
Here’s what actually happens: The bot handles maybe 40% of tickets if you’re being generous. It pisses off the other 60% so badly that by the time they reach a human, they’re already furious. And now your team is spending twice as long on each interaction because they have to undo whatever the bot said before they can actually help.
It’s like hiring someone to greet customers at the door by punching them in the face, and then wondering why your team is dealing with so many angry people.
The thing nobody wants to admit is that you can’t automate the part that matters.
You can automate information. You can automate routing. You can automate repetitive tasks.
But you can’t automate the decision to give a shit.
That’s the job. That’s what separates good CX from the chatbot that tells you to check the FAQ. Someone has to look at a situation and decide this person is worth helping, even if the policy says no. Someone has to read between the lines and realize the customer isn’t asking for a refund; they’re asking to feel heard.
A bot can’t do that. It can only enforce rules. It can only say, ‘Computer says no.’
And that’s why your job isn’t going anywhere. Because the companies that replace humans with bots end up with customer service that technically functions but feels like talking to a wall. And customers notice. And eventually, it catches up to you.
IF YOU’RE HERE, YOU’RE EARLY
I know how it feels right now. You’re reading articles about how AI is taking over. Your boss is asking if you really need that many agents. Every budget meeting turns into a conversation about how to do this cheaper.
And meanwhile, you’re just trying to help people. You’re trying to build something that actually works. You’re trying to prove that customer experience matters in a world that’s decided it doesn’t.
You’re not late. You’re early.
We’re still in the very early stages of brands figuring out that CX matters.
Zappos knew this decades ago. Now, the rest of the industry is slowly and painfully catching up.
If you’re providing decent customer experience right now, you’re ahead of most brands. If you’re providing great CX, you’re practically mythical. The bar is so low that just being a functioning human who cares makes you exceptional.
That’s the opportunity.
Most companies are still racing to the bottom. They’re still designing systems to make people give up before offering them a $10 refund.
The brands that actually invest in this, empower their teams to solve problems, and treat customers like people instead of just tickets to close, are the ones that are going to win.
And you’re the reason they win.
THE THING ABOUT THIS WORK
I can’t stop writing about it. I can’t stop thinking about it. I can’t help but care about whether brands are doing this right.
Because this work gave me everything. It gave me a career I actually care about. It gave me a way to think about business that makes sense. It taught me that you can build something valuable just by deciding people are worth helping.
And I know that sounds dramatic. I know that customer service doesn’t often feel like world-changing work. You’re just answering emails. You’re just processing returns. You’re just trying to keep your head above water during peak season.
But every time you solve someone’s problem without making them beg for it, every time you stay on a case until it’s actually fixed, every time you decide this person matters even when the system says they don’t, you’re doing something that matters.
You’re proving that companies can choose to care. That business doesn’t have to be a race to the bottom. That customer experience is the thing that determines whether someone buys from you once or keeps coming back for years.
The world is full of chatbots that don’t work and call centers designed to make you give up. Be the person who breaks the pattern.
Your job isn’t going anywhere. The bar is still incredibly low. And if you’re here, you’re early.
Don’t let anyone convince you otherwise.
That’s it for this week!
Any topics you’d like to see me cover in the future?
Just shoot me a DM or an email!
P.S. If you want to figure out how to get your brand to rank high in LLMs and show up in ChatGPT, Gemini, and more… check this out.
My very best,
Eli
Links:
Pluralistic: A tale of three customer service chatbots (12 Nov 2025)
