Originally Posted by s0ssos

On my recent Cathay flight the flight attendant brought out a little note, hand-written, saying how they appreciated me on there. But it had no personalization (well, it had my name on it).
In many hotels I got a note from the manager in my room, saying something to the same effect. With a handwritten scrawl at the bottom.

I feel these are all the same, an effort by management to tell the customer they are special. But because they are done so commonly they are meaningless.

Thoughtfulness to me means realizing something about me, remembering it in the future, and somehow letting me know you remembered it (whether mentioning it in a chat, giving a present that I like, etc). It seems awfully hard to do if one hasn't met the customer yet, still very difficult if one only briefly met the customer, and equally hard if that just isn't the kind of thing one does.

I presume the idea is to make the customer feel as if the big corporation cares. Or make the customer feel as if the corporation cares as a friend, not as someone who is taking your money.