Improving customer service can be hard and expensive, because most companies start with things like six-sigma, re-training call-center employees, or improving CRM software.

But nearly everyone has plenty of opportunities right under their nose. Take for example, the classic email address: DoNotReply@CompanyName.com. Organizations that use this address for billing, ticketing, and notifications could just as easily use the same address they use for support email. They'd be rewarded with fewer phone calls and happier customers.

I can just imagine how this started: back in 1995 someone in IT at Time Warner discovered a huge pile of email sent to a billing REPLY-TO that everyone forgot about and decided to end the problem once an for-all. Now, some of the best companies do this without even thinking about it.

The point isn't that this email address is hostile to customers. The point is that getting back to basics by imagining things from your customer's standpoint is a cheap, quick, and powerful way to improve your company.

For fun (or depression), search your inbox for 'DoNotReply@*'.