Sonos todayissued a insistence releasethat details the company ’s ongoing footmark following acatastrophic overhaul of its wireless music platformin May . The fellowship is stool seven commitment to customers as it continues to recover at both the diligence storey and the platform level .
The bound update was to be a gravid one , add up just ahead of the await launch of theSonos Ace headphones , the company ’s first launching into that multibillion - dollar market . But it did n’t take long for customer to realize that something had gone very haywire . wampum - and - butterSonos feature were miss . Connectivity job abound , and for some they still persist today . It was a pretty major loser of a program that for years allow drug user to wirelessly play euphony from nearly any source in any room of their home — even outside . It had done so seamlessly , and not inexpensively . A Sonos system could be a very expensive investing .
Now , more than four months after the drubbing began , Sonos is detailing its manner forrader .
“ Our priority since its release has been — and continues to be — fixing the app , ” Sonos CEO Patrick Spence said in the press release . “ There were missteps , and we first went deep to understand how we got here , and then move to commute those learnings into action . We are committed to making change to get us back to being the brand masses love by offering the ripe audio system for the home and beyond . We must always do decently by our customers , and I am convinced that , with these commitments , we will . ”
In summation to the mechanical press handout , I spoke with Sonos master scheme officeholder and chief effectual officer Eddie Lazarus ( he previously was Sonos ’ primary financial officer ) for a half - 60 minutes about what encounter , and how the fellowship is move forward . He echoed Spence ’s point , as you ’d anticipate . But I did get the sense that the company was blindsided by the scale of the problem .
“ I really think it was that we just got taken by surprise,”Lazarus said in our audience . “ If we had known that we were go bad to have these stableness and performance payoff , we never would have launched this app . But we did n’t , and now we ’re just heads down to fix it . ”
Sonos’ commitments to customers
Sonos has been extremely transparent about the unconscious process of fixing things at the app and platform level , update customers on its website and in Reddit threads . Here are the seven dedication Sonos says either are already underway , or are being implemented before the final stage of the year . These are in Sonos ’ own lyric :
Unwavering focus on the customer experience . To ensure that we present the highest level of client experience , we will always constitute challenging character benchmark at the outset of product development and will not set up mathematical product before meet these touchstone . We will also heighten the pecker necessary to measure the lineament of the experience in reality being delivered to customers to see to it that we maintain the standards our customers expect .
Increase the tightness of our pre - launch testing phases . Our genus Beta testing course of study will include more types of customers and more diverse setup for a long examination menses . This will let us to notice , diagnose and solve customer concerns more quickly before get to market place .
certify humbleness when introduce modification . In line to the all - at - once automated app loss we issued in May , any major variety to the Sonos app will be released step by step , allowingcustomers to adjust and allow for feedback before it becomes the nonpayment . For new features small in scope , we will stick in an opt - in data-based features option in the app for client who would like to participate in testing them .
charge a Quality Ombudsperson . This new office will insure our employees have a clean itinerary to escalate any concerns in term of quality and client experience . This person will be consulted by executive leaders throughout the development cognitive process and before any product launches . In this role , the ombudsperson will insure transparency and print a report card to management and employees twice per class , and will present regularly to the Sonos panel of director .
In plus , we are also committing to the followers to begin to retrieve the cartel of our customers :
Extend our plate verbalizer warrantee . To shine our strong notion in the quality of our product , we will lead the maker ’s warrantee by one year for all home theatre and plug - in loudspeaker system products presently under warranty .
Relentlessly improve the app experience with even software upgrades . We will roll out updated mobile software versions every 2 - 4 weeks to optimize and enhance the package experience , even once this issue is resolved .
Establish a Customer Advisory Board . To ensure we never lose flock of the voice of the client , this board will provide feedback and insight from a customer perspective to help shape and improve our software and products before they are launched .
What’s next …
Press releases andexecutive mea culpasonly go so far . That does n’t mean you do n’t do those things , and I get the sense in talking with Lazarus that the caller genuinely understands that . It has to set up the app — and make it better than it was before . It has to solve the problem at the program level . And because Sonos is a complicated ecosystem , one side of that equation greatly affect the other . Sonos ’ new feature of speech were going to be escape from the app and appeared to be quick to weather that tempest . What it did n’t expect was the larger problems at the system level — connectivity and phlegm , if the organization work at all .
“ This is about making trusted that our customers know we ’re never going to go through this experience with them again , ” Lazarus differentiate me . “ Because we ’ve seem profoundly at what caused it . We are setting out some very specific measures where we ’re taking to make certain it does n’t happen again . ”
