Business

Get Satisfaction. Turning customer service on its head.

In fact, Get Satisfaction’s Mac mini server has inspired the company in more ways than one. Software developer Cameron Walters fondly remembers getting the server up and running. “It was ridiculously fast,” he says. “We set it up, with all of the code and infrastructure, in just a half-day.”

Moreover, because Mac OS X Server is built on a fully compliant UNIX foundation, software development for the service is what co-founder Thor calls “friction-free.” Explains Cameron: “When we get a problem report, we can look at it in-house, screen-shot it, send it around to everyone, come up with a design solution, and push it live to the site within hours.” That means the site can be continually improved, an important advantage in the fast-moving Web 2.0 world.

“There have been times,” Cameron marvels, “when we have deployed live code to the actual web application three times in one workday.”

Then there’s IT, a notorious headache for many businesses. But not for Get Satisfaction. “We spend no time on IT,” Thor says. “We have no on-site IT manager. We’ve never even had an IT consultant in this office.” That’s because “everything just works.” The one problem they had—with a wireless router that wasn’t an Apple product—was solved with the purchase of an Apple AirPort Extreme.

The right tools for the job

Like other leading-edge small businesses that want visually compelling, media-rich documents, Get Satisfaction primarily uses the Apple iWork applications—Pages for word processing, Numbers for spreadsheets, and Keynote for presentations. And when there is the occasional need for a special Windows or Linux application, Thor uses Parallels Desktop virtualization software to run it side-by-side with his Mac programs.

“What I think is interesting is the emergence of Mac as the preferred platform for many developers,” Thor says. “So no longer can you say, ‘Well, Macs are just good for artistic work.’ If you take a tour of our office, you’ll see an overwhelming preference for Macs with 2.0 developers.”

Beyond that, thanks to the ease of syncing data between Mac computers and iPhone mobile phones, everybody has their iCal calendar in their pocket and, of course, can check email anytime. “Things are insanely easy for us when it comes to collaboration,” Lane says. “You just don’t have to think about it.”

All of which means that Get Satisfaction can keep things moving briskly, responding to their own customers with impressive speed. Because the technology works, Lane says, “We’re not wasting our time thinking about infrastructure. We’re thinking about the product.”

Cameron, too, finds that Apple products’ ease of use directly affects his productivity. “I would hate to be in a heavy-duty environment where you can’t be agile,” he says. “We’re not fighting the tools to get them to do what we want. We have a tool box with everything we need, and we use it all day.”

And that makes for a very satisfied customer. “The smoothness, the seamlessness with which I can get my work done without having to worry that something isn’t going to work,” Cameron smiles. “It’s good. Really, really good.”