You know who we trust? Our friends. Our families. Our respected peers.

You know who we don’t really trust? Faceless companies.

Yet the vast majority of marketing campaigns are less than personal and follow the traditional model of companies pushing the discussion in one direction.

I can’t be the only one having an issue with this.

So how might the opposite of this look?

Let us use as our example the evil entity known as Rogers Communications. The parent company of everyone’s least favorite wireless brands Rogers and Fido. Now I could write a whole post on all the horrible things that Rogers/Fido do to their customers, but for the sake of brevity do a search on twitter for #rogers and #fail…case made.

Is it just me that sees a massive opportunity for Bell and Telus to not only steal some customers away from a rival, but also to tap into the voices that those around us trust?

If I were Telus and Bell, I’d be searching on Twitter and making a list of say 10-20 people who are extremely unhappy with Rogers/Fido. I’d then go to these people and explain that you would like to take care of them, get them on better packages, with better customer service, better phones and get them away from the evil Rogers/Fido.

I’d go all out. I’d offer to pay their contract cancellation fees, give them their pick of new phones including iPhones and Android devices, counsel them on which packages would be best for the life they lead, hell I’d even give them the phone number to a personal customer service rep…I’m talking all out.

The end result? You’ve now created 10-20 loyal evangelists willing to spread the gospel for Telus/Bell and their services. Folks that will tell everyone who will listen how well they were treated, how they were saved from the clutches of the evil Rogers, how they’re loving their killer new smart phones and the custom wireless plans chosen with their input. They’ll do this on Twitter, on Facebook, but more importantly they’ll do it in real life, to their friends, family, and peers.

Want to make it even bigger? I’d record every minute of the entire process and I’d put that content, even in rough form…EVERYWHERE. I mean everywhere, all over twitter, Facebook, the Telus and Bell websites, on YouTube and Vimeo. I’d create an entire blog around the process, allow the Telus/bell employees to talk about how great it is to give customers what they want ( also bringing a human face to the process ), to follow the process as it unfolds and to very likely provide a venue for others to vent at how they also dislike Rogers/Fido and wish they too could switch.

The final piece of the puzzle. The sheer moxy of the concept would get a tonne of traditional press, newspaper stories, magazine profiles and blog posts and all that mainstream press for free.

If nothing else, Telus could at least stop running those inane animal commercials.

This is a guest post by Kerry Morrison of Reason Intelligent Design, a Vancouver based Web Marketing company.

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