TomTom.com got their own forums too

[saud]

I just saw it, visit TomTom Discussions - TomTom Discussions to see it.

They have their own forums now.

 

[Andy_P]

Yes, I signed up a couple of days ago.
I started posting a few bits of advice and then suddenly realised... "Why am I doing this when THEIR OWN "experts" should be sorting out the problems posted on their own forum".

If the answers are going to be as good as some of the customer services replies we see, I think they are soon going to be flooded by so many complaints and 'insoluble problems' that it's going to end up an embarrassment.

 

[canderson]

Look at it this way ... some day down the road, most of the pre 1XXX and 2XXX models will have been washed out of the system (although we still see 6 year old units here!), and their job will be simplified considerably. Instead of "Load this file, move this, rename that" as we've learned to do here to get/keep a unit running, it will be "Let me get you an RMA for that".

 

[makaiguy]

Gotta love Oskar's dismissive reponse to the reasonable request to make recent destinations individually deletable. Recent Destinations - TomTom Discussions

With that attitude toward users, I don't think many people are going to leave there with warm fuzzy feelings.

 

[canderson]

I don't believe Oskar has any direct association with TomTom. He's a moderator at MeinTomTom | Alles ?ber TomTom GO, VIA, XXL, XL, ONE, START und RIDER, yet another TomTom user forum.

 

[mvl]

Tomtom announced on their last conference call that they are making a deliberate push into social media and viral marketing.

I think their participation on Twitter, Facebook, and now their discussion forum are all the outcome of this activity.

From what I can tell, there has been a wave of participation of user forum moderators now answering questions there (myself included). As far as I can tell, the only employee responses are those saying that "their responses are their own and not the official response of Tomtom."

 

[Andy_P]

From what I can tell, there has been a wave of participation of user forum moderators now answering questions there (myself included).

Cutting our own throats?

 

[canderson]

Cutting our own throats?

Not necessarily. We've been discussing this "under the radar" here at some length.

Since their forum does not discourage links, if we have threads here (especially sticky ones) that have dealt with questions that arise there, we can just point them here for the answer instead of endlessly typing (or even cutting and pasting) answers we've already gone over time after time. Could actually drive users here unless the folks there turn out to be very good at their jobs. I've not visited much, but from my previous visits, it appears to be operating under a single individual's efforts.

We've also tossed around ideas about the consequences of calling it like we see it on the TT site. We all know they've been shipping product that wasn't ready for prime time. We all know they've shipped large numbers of units to specific U.S. retailers (twice) that crashed and burned (a 335 model two years ago, and the XXL540 model this last year). All of us have an opinion about the EasyMenu system, and I don't think any of us have much nice to say about it. Provided they're prepared to hear these kinds of things as we try to help a user out with problems in such areas, things may work out OK. But I think we're being very fair in our assessments based upon both our own experiences with these products and real user experiences as we find them here, and if TT decides they don't really want to hear that kind of thing, I don't think any of us will remain available there.

 

[Andy_P]

Nice reply!

If I venture back there, I'll try to nake a point of offering links back to other forums for the answer rather than copy/pasting or saying it all again.