Midpoint Social Media Monitoring Project

I chose my company based on my own personal experience with their products and their customer service. The company that I decided to profile is Skullcandy. They manufacture high quality headphones. The company was founded in 2003 and has a long history of being uniquely dedicated to their customers. The company’s policy of a free, no questions, 100% refund on broken or damaged products has earned it a good review as far as most customers are concerned.

As a Skullcandy customer, I can attest to the brand’s desire to please customers and deliver a good product. While some clients have questioned the quality and durability of the product, Skullcandy markets itself to an active individual… which is really ironic because unfortunately, their products break pretty often.

Although their demographic widely covers anyone who has a particular interest in music and good sound quality, Skullcandy specifically markets itself to sports enthusiasts and those interested in living an active lifestyle. The brand sponsors professional athletes and offers a line of headphones with professional sport team logos. They commonly market their brand at extreme sporting events, but can also be purchased at various retailers and online.

An example of some of the stats on Skullcandy. Provided by SocialMention.com

Examples of the related material: Flickr photos, Twitter posts, and Wordpress feeds.

They have great web presence: Twitter, website, Facebook, etc. Highly updated and are constantly trying to reach out to customers and create a sense of community.

Here are some examples of my findings:

2/9/12

First glimpse:

Users enjoy sharing that they got Skullcandy headphones. It’s cool and shows they’re into music, but there are issues.

Lots of word-of-mouth engagement.

Problems:

Twitter: “SkullCandy headphones died already. Not even 3months old. This has put me in a bad mood!!”

“Back to my broken @Skullcandy's … #musicismylife”

Graph of their hourly Tweets

2/22/12

Same issues:

People enjoy posting on Facebook and Twitter about getting them and receiving them in the mail. They’re excited, but then later post about having malfunctions with the product. “So pretty much.. Skullcandy's are the shitt! until they break.. and they ALWAYS break right at the plug in thing.. hahah, like if you agree”

Users are also having problems cashing in their points to purchase their new headphone – new online system needs work?

But customers are still excited to flaunt the product: “Bought my skullcandy

headphones today everybody hatin :p hahaha” and “Thanks Skullcandy for the SWAG”

3/12/12

Blogger talks about how Skullcandy is increasing its customer service with live chat.

In conclusion, Skullcandy’s decision to unquestionably fix its customers’ broken headphones was a good decision and shows how customer service means everything. If they broke as often as they do, although Skullcandy makes the best earbuds I’ve ever listened to, they probably wouldn’t be in business today. I’ve been using them since freshman year, and have gone through more pairs than I can remember, but to have them free and such good quality, it’s worth it.

A graph of Skullcandy's web use

The goal for Skullcandy should be to acknowledge that some of the lower end models do break occasionally and to supply better service online. When users struggle to get their rebate that they feel they already deserve, this creates a lot of frustration. They should also market to another branch of consumers – the hipster. Hipsters love music you’ve never heard of and love wearing huge headphones. Skullcandy could really benefit by tapping into this market.