Registering for an account: some things I have observed

So the day jobs online store is up. We provide some of the information openly, and some information, specifically pricing, is available to people who register for an account. Why do we do it this way? I’ve found this to be a good way to distinguish between people who are merely curious, but wouldn’t consider purchasing, and people who want information for a potential purchase. If you are serious about something, you are going to be willing to dig a little deeper. And it allows us to establish something of a quid pro quo. Information for information. We do not use this information for any other reason than servicing orders, providing additional information and quotes if requested. We don’t sell it, don’t share it, don’t loan it. We don’t even ask for very much. Just a real name. A real contact phone number. A real email, and a real mailing address. Thats it.

Which is why I wonder something. What does it say when a person takes the time to fill out forms with obviously false information? The quid pro quo is all about establishing a dialog with a level of implicit trust. You provide (minimal) information you believe has value (e.g. who you are and how to contact you … which curiously, we only do if you ask us to), and we provide you additional information on pricing and other things. Sort of tosses cold water on a nascent relationship. We don’t automatically grant access to the data. We do a quick scan to see if the information provided is real (incorrect email addresses guarantee that the user will not be able to log in, as their password will never reach them). If everything looks in order, we unblock them and generate a random password. Has worked for quite a few users so far. Only one real complaint, from a user who sent me more information in an email than it would have taken to register. He was simply opposed to registering. I found it amusing that we received a long tome on the evils of registration and why he wouldn’t register. Yet he could have provided the 5 requested pieces of information far faster, and with less bile than the long tome. I know, some people are opposed to registering. It is simply against their nature. You can always contact us directly, and we will provide information without requiring registration. But I want to make sure we are speaking with the right people. I should also point out that this is a part of our online store protection mechanism. Security in layers. You can’t place an order on the store without an account. So we have less concern over fraudulent orders from bots, because we don’t let orders even begin until a login has occurred. Well, we don’t enable accounts for fake users. Saves us pain later. If you don’t want to register, email us, and we would be happy to provide service this way.