Vendor relationship Management

http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/research/projectvrm

This is an interesting idea that is about to find its time.  I have been thinking about the evolving relationships between vendors, consumers and how the immediacy of feedback will expand the definition of a transaction and re-balance the power relationship in the consumer cycle. 

Currently if someone sells you something that's crap (which is happening with increasing frequency now. I had to return two things over the weekend that were not fit for purpose) you have limited comeback. There is still inertia in the transaction that puts the cost of returning and complaining onto the customer.  The retailer will get a certain amount of transactions where the customer does not want to carry the cost of returning the defective product, and so rubbish products remain in the market place.

What if the cost of returning a product and complaining about it was reduced to almost nothing?  If the online review sites were maintained and linked with the ombudsman?  If the cost of purchasing and importing goods that were defective could be pushed all the way back up the chain, it would reduce the value of making cheap rubbish and increase the value of producing quality products.

This would need better labeling laws and better warranty enforcement mechanisms.