Up! Magazine - Westjet

Tyler Gompf of Winnipeg-based Tell Us About Us

Buy anything - fried chicken, a cup of coffee, a car - and you’ll have an experience, good or bad. A positive one likely means you’ll return or refer others. A bad experience may keep you from the store or company forever.

That’s where Tell Us About Us (www.tellusaboutus.com) comes in. The Winnipeg-based company - Tyler Gompf and his brother Kirby, Scott Griffith and Brent Stevenson -specializes in “customer satisfaction and business intelligence” by helping companies fine-tune their performance through analytic software, telephone surveys, mystery shoppers and a call centre that deals with complaint resolution.

What was the incident that sparked your idea for the company?

One night I tried buying a stereo, and I had a terrible experience. I literally had money in my hand, but the fellow was more interested in closing the store than in serving me. I thought that wasn’t correct, and that my message should be told to management. So, I sat down with a couple of friends and we started creating a (computer) program that quickly moves a message from a consumer to management, and managers must then provide resolution back to the consumer.

What was your big break?

We had a casino in Montana that came across our website in 1999, and referrals started coming in from the work we did with them. The casino really opened our eyes to the U.S. market, but our biggest break was (pitching to) Popeyes Chicken and Biscuits.
We put together a demonstration of a prototype - something that wasn’t quite built yet -but we won the contract and that paid the way for the rest of the work. What we had was some advanced software that allowed them to resolve issues in a timely manner. It would take them nine days with their previous system, but we took it down to 48 hours across the entire national chain.

An issue is processed through out central call system here. Depending on what type of call it is, it flags a certain type of management to deal with the issue.

How would you describe your customers?

They’re companies that have either grown quickly, or are in a state of change and need some clarity to their business plans. Maybe they’ve hit a spot where they’re on a down curve and they want to understand why they’re not hitting the mark with their clients.

What’s been your biggest challenge?

Our biggest challenge… has been being removed from our main market, which is the U.S. We’re headquartered in Winnipeg, but we’ve overcome that challenge by working with distribution partners, people that resell our software.

What’s your business plan?

Our business plan is to grow through distribution, to find research companies that can incorporate our software into their business model. That will ultimately take us international. There are existing consultants and market research companies that do traditional research, but they need an updated tool set to help them achieve their clients, objectives.

Any plans to go public?

No. We’ve been approached, but we have a strategy to keep the company private and keep growing it.

Are you getting rich?

We’re having a good time with it (laughs).

Have you ever gone back to the store where you tried to buy the stereo?

No, I haven’t. Would I go back to them? No, I don’t think so.