Facebook Makes Customer Service Very Difficult for Developers

June 3rd, 2008

By Adam Lovallo

facebook customer service Responsive customer service is of great importance to Facebook and app developers alike. However, the inherent limitations of the platform make establishing channels for user feedback an unnecessarily difficult task.

Unsurprisingly, given Facebook users’ familiarity with wall-to-wall communications with friends, for most applications the wall is the most active channel of user feedback. Most users post on application walls with a question or piece of feedback and expect the developer to reply. Responses can of course be posted directly to app walls as well, but without a means of notifying users, more often than not replies go unread.

One solution to this problem would be to use private messages to directly respond to individual wall postings, but Facebook’s messaging limits make this approach unworkable (the exact caps are unknown). In my experience, being able to communicate through this channel has been valuable, particularly when compared to alternatives like support email and the Reviews wall. The reward was not worth risking my account, however, as I frequently hit the message limits – and in one instance, actually had my account disabled entirely.

The addition of the Reviews app to application pages has been a source of some controversy, as fake reviews have popped up with some regularity. While planted posts were certainly not the most desirable side effect of the Reviews wall, spam is a more serious problem. Spammers openly adopted the Reviews wall, and today their posts litter most application pages. Spammers add five star ratings to encourage developers to not delete their posts as those ratings can drive up an application’s average rating, while undermining the validity of the entire rating system in the process.

Additionally, for applications focused on product reviews and ratings (like Flixster, Visual Bookshelf, etc.), the reviews wall is a source of confusion for some users, as individuals write and post reviews of books or films and mistakingly confuse the Reviews wall with the actual applications. Finally, some Reviews merit a developer response, but as with the wall the only means of truly replying is via private message. Given these problems, it comes as no surprise that many developers take steps to reduce the Reviews wall’s visibility, usually by moving it to the bottom of the page beneath the wall and discussion board.

Not all is lost, however, as the discussion board is a useful channel for user feedback. Replies to posts generate notifications that ensure that conversations remain open. The discussion board is evidence that workable tools can facilitate meaningful customer service which ultimately benefits both users and developers. Why can’t Facebook make customer service easier for developers?

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7 Responses to “Facebook Makes Customer Service Very Difficult for Developers”

David Says:
June 4th, 2008 at 4:21 am
Firstly, developers can’t delete spam on the review wall, so it’s not a case of developers actively trying to keep the spam just for higher ratings. I report the reviews as spam to notify Facebook, but more often than not they take a few weeks before anything happens.

Concerning customer support, Facebook provides a form in the help section for users to fill in to contact developers directly. It is this form that I use for allowing users to send comments to developers (I just provide a link to it). The comments are sent as e-mails, but the developer’s e-mail address is not revealed until a response is sent. (my page is: http://facebook.com/help.php?app&app_id=2490151219 )
adam Says:
September 12th, 2008 at 12:00 am
i had a bad experience on the speed date site yesterday. someone came on and their name was SarahB, 18 from some place. right about at 3 minutes they then said gotchya fucker and said they had my ip address. what is that about? I dont even know what that means. Please reply so i know if i am at risk of being hacked or virus sent. I dont know much about computers.
john Says:
September 19th, 2008 at 5:31 pm
hahahahah.. gotchya fucker… funny
otg68 Says:
October 4th, 2008 at 8:30 am
“gotchya fucker and said they had my ip address. what is that about?” Very helpful John, NOT!

It means that some lowlife with alot of time on their hands tricked you into send in your IP address (the [unique] home address of your computer) to them via a piece of malware (intentionally dangerous software). If they are serious, they can hack into your machine, steal info off you or worse (like set up a mini webserver on your machine and serve up [child]porn…don’t laugh..seen this happen)

Solution: 1) don’t click on things that are not familiar, 2)get a good firewall product 3) at worst, switch on windows firewall.

HTH,

otg68
Beverly Anne Padagas Says:
January 29th, 2009 at 5:10 am
my account has been disabled without any notification why. I was really disappointed, at the same time, sad because Facebook has been a part of my everyday life. I met a lot of new friends in Facebook from different parts of the world. I enjoyed designing my house in Pet Society, after I got tired of collecting MegaMinis in fluff-friends. Those were the only reason why I became loyal to Facebook.

I am posting my address and my real name just in case someone from Facebook would care to respond to my e-mails. Even put my cellphone number on the subject in one of my emails because i’m now so desperate. I keep on thinking what I have done wrong but couldn’t pinpoint anything. I wouldn’t have get to know a lot of friends if i was a scammer or something.

To Facebook Team, I would really appreciate anyone of you to please respond to my e-mails. I don’t know what to do now. I’m from the Philippines, I was browsing sites to know how else I can contact you, even if that means talking to you at my expense, but I found only addresses and I also sent a copy of my e-mails to these.
gerry collier Says:
July 13th, 2009 at 9:16 pm
have tried to join.facebook is too duffucult.
gerry collier Says:
July 13th, 2009 at 9:24 pm
why does facebook make it difficult? I simply want to advertise selling bonsai trees on facebook.how can I do that?