Let me be clear from the outset: I like Leap Motion. They’re on the verge of launching an inexpensive, tiny gadget that will enable you to control your computer with simple hand gestures, a la Minority Report. How cool is that? Moreover, while I haven’t had the pleasure of meeting CEO Michael Buckwald, I’m sure he’s a swell fellow and I’m sure, moreover, that their PR department does great work the vast majority of the time.

It’s all the more of a shame, then, when a genuinely cool company such as Leap Motion fumbles in its communications strategy. In this case, the fumble happened with its most valuable customers: the pre-registrants, the faithful, the would-be early adopters of its (potentially) revolutionary new interface.

I’ll admit it, actually: I owe Leap Motion a debt of gratitude, not for inventing their nifty gadget (though that may turn out to be the case, once I finally have a chance to actually get my paws on one) but for giving me a prime example of how not to communicate with one’s customers. Let us learn from their mistakes!

When I first heard about this intriguing little device in May of 2012, my first thought was “Where do I get one?” I immediately pre-ordered not one, but two, and was informed (via Twitter) by their PR rep that they would be following up with me to schedule a demo in NYC:

That was the last I ever heard from them. I kind of wondered what had become of the promised demo but did not give it too much thought. Delays happen all the time in tech-land, although it would have been appropriate for them to let me know something, rather than just go radio silent.

Fast-forward nearly one year, to last week, when a cryptic-looking email landed in my in-box. Let’s unpack it and give the various elements a quick dissection:

“From”

“Do Not Reply.” Yep, that was the name of the sender: Mr. (or Mrs.) DoNotReply.

What kind of name is that, anyway, “DoNotReply”? Does receiving a message from someone named DoNotReply help you feel connected with the sender? Does it inspire your curiosity? Does receiving an email from a command make you want to read on? (These are rhetorical questions!)

So far this message said “spam” all over it, and it was only by chance that I actually took a closer look instead of just deleting it or letting it fall down my email queue, never to garner so much as a glance. I did look further, though:

Subject line

The subject line, in its entirety: “release date update”

Uh, OK. Someone named DoNotReply sent me a note titled “release date update” with no context whatsoever.

Had the iPhone 5S release date been pushed back? Had some notorious prisoner’s release date been pushed back? Who knows? This subject line is so generic, so vague, so blah, that, combined with the sender’s non-name, it’s a wonder anyone at all opened this email (and I’ll just bet the open rate was rock-bottom).

So far, so bad. No indication of who the email was from or what it was about.

This dreadfully incomplete subject line would tend to back up the spam thesis, except for one factor: spammers write better than this! Successful spammers are skilled in the art of grabbing you with their subject lines, “From” fields, etc. I hate to say it, but in this instance, Leap Motion is outranked by spammers on the communications skills totem pole.
Moving right along…

The Text

Ah, the text. The meat of the email. You’re thinking, surely it got better from here, right?

It did. Eventually.

First, in the upper-right of the note was a pale, bleached-out Leap Motion logo, which could easily have been missed (and would indeed be missed by many reading it on a mobile device, which, these days, means most of us). In my case, though, I happened to read it on my desktop PC (you know, the supposedly outmoded machine that the Leap Motion is intended for).

Nevertheless, at last! At least I finally knew what company was behind this mystery item in my in-box. Surely Leap Motion, the people bringing a Minority Report-esque interface to my office, would have something relevant to say to me.

Opening paragraph

>>
I wanted to reach out to update you on the status of our ship date. After a lot of consideration, we’ve decided to push back the date and will now be shipping units to pre-order customers on July 22nd.
<<

That was it. That was the opening paragraph. Again, no context, and moreover, frankly, nothing about the recipient.

Anytime a company is conveying bad news to a customer base, and particular a critical customer base of faithful early adopters, it’s critically important to acknowledge who they are and express sincere appreciation for their support.

Couldn’t the sender (who, one learns at the bottom, is actually Michael Buckwald himself) have started the note by simply thanking the early adopter for his/her support and patience? On a more basic level, couldn’t he have addressed the recipient in some fashion instead of just pole-vaulting straight into the message with no acknowledgement or context?

Michael Buckwald, how about instead opening your note along the following lines?

>>
Dear Leap Motion Early Adopter,

I want to start by thanking you for your interest in the Leap Motion controller and for your patience with us in fulfilling your thoughtful pre-order. Having taken the time to reach out to us and put in your order from the get-go last summer, your support is truly indispensable for us as we work day and night to bring the first-ever affordable, dedicated motion controller to your desktop. I am sorry that the promised demos never happened last summer, and I’m afraid that I have a bit of additional bad news to share: there’s been a slight delay in shipping the initial batch of Leap Motion controllers.
<<

Would that have been so hard?

The Plus Side

Fortunately, the note was mostly uphill from there. Buckwald explained the gravity of the situation, the importance of the shipment delay decision, and even went so far as to link to an upcoming Google Hangout to learn more. He even went beyond the normal call of duty and provided his direct email address. Too bad, though, that the note wasn’t simply sent from there in the first place; it would have saved countless recipients confusion and, more to the point, would have been read by many, many more interested parties.

Buckwald also could have taken this opportunity to connect directly with his customer base by providing his Twitter handle and links to other social channels he’s on.

However, it appears that the CEO of this forward-looking firm, backed by some of the best VCs in the Valley, is not even on Twitter! Sorry, I just had to point that out… and, granted, Buckwald would not be the first to miss such an opportunity.

Moving Right Along

That’s all, folks. Just a quick (or, not so quick!) lesson in communicating disappointing news to one’s customers. I’m sure the good people at Leap Motion were simply so busy working in their basement (as they like to say) that they didn’t have a chance to give this outreach effort the attention it deserved.

We all make mistakes, and I, for one, remain very excited to test out my new Leap Motion controller as soon as it arrives. Indeed, I plan to post a review of it on this same blog.

Best wishes to all,

Bill Douglass

646-504-0890
bill@gothamcomm.com
@billdouglass

P.S. The text of the email from DoNotReply, err, Michael Buckwald, CEO of LeapMotion, appears below.

>>
I wanted to reach out to update you on the status of our ship date. After a lot of consideration, we’ve decided to push back the date and will now be shipping units to pre-order customers on July 22nd.

This is not a decision we take lightly. There are hundreds of thousands of people in over 150 countries who have pre-ordered Leap Motion controllers, some as long as a year ago. These people are part of our community and there is nothing more important to us than getting them devices as quickly as possible.

We’ve made a lot of progress. When we first started taking orders back in May we were twelve (very tired) people in a basement. Now we are eighty (although still tired and possibly still in a basement). We’ve manufactured over six hundred thousand devices and delivered twelve thousand to amazing developers who are building applications that let people do things that just wouldn’t have been possible before.

These developers have given us great feedback that we’ve used to make huge improvements to the stability and polish of the product. We’re really proud of LeapMotion as both a company and a product.

The reality is we very likely could have hit the original ship date. But it wouldn’t have left time for comprehensive testing. This will come in the form of a beta test that will start in June. We will give the 12k developers who currently have LeapMotion controllers access to the feature complete product including OS interaction (today developers only have access to the SDK). We will also invite some people who are not developers to join the beta test.

Ultimately, the only way we felt 100% confident we could deliver a truly magical product that would do justice to this new form of interaction, was to push the date so we would have more time for a larger, more diverse beta test.

I really appreciate your patience. I know it’s been a long wait. Everyone at LeapMotion is working tirelessly to make sure that the wait is worth it. Thanks so much for your help and support.

David and I will be participating in an open video Q&A using Google Hangout tomorrow at 11:30am Pacific time. To join our hangout, please visit our Google+ page. If you have any questions please don’t hesitate to contact our support team at support@leapmotion.com or my personal email (buckwald@leapmotion.com). As always, we will not charge pre-order customer’s credit cards until the devices have actually shipped.

Thanks again.

Michael Buckwald