This is not news to real bloggers, but it struck me a couple of ways what it’s like out there.

First, it’s tough to be #1. Dell has been number one for a while in the PC space. It’s tough to get to be #1 at anything, then it’s tough to stay there. Everyone shoots at #1, from football to business to retail. Those shots come in the form of paradigm shifts to sniping. Worst of all, it can come from within….What’s the saying? A house divided against itself can’t stand? Think it goes something like that.

Here’s a paradigm shift. Blogging. Jeff Jarvis BuzzMachine talked about his tech support nightmare with Dell. It then goes all over the blogosphere and Dell has a customer support perception problem. As we know, perception is reality in a lot of cases, so they have support and perception problems to deal with.

To properly navigate the stream of the business world while pleasing your customers is very tricky. Not that customer support took down every company, but I’ll be everyone knows a company they don’t buy from anymore ’cause they made you mad. Customers vote with their money.

Do I think this will take Dell down from their top position? No way. Not on this by itself, but big companies (and number 1’s) have to fight a lot of battles to stay on top, internal and external…real and perceived.