3 Rules for Dealing with Unsatisfied Customers:
People are people. And they come standard with emotions and egos. There’s no indictment here about you or your business. Even with the best service or most reliable product, there will be complaints. This isn’t always your fault. As an entity, business tries its best to be impartial, leaving emotion out of it altogether. But the old adage, “It’s not personal, it’s business,” works only in a cutthroat environment, which doesn’t apply in most business scenarios (at least you better hope not. We’ve seen the movies.) Sometimes, customers will become upset, unhappy, or downright resentful of you or your product. Here are 4 rules you should follow to quell your customers’ uneasy feelings and return them to a state of satisfaction.
Rule #1 – Adjust Your Attitude…
This can sometimes be difficult. After all, you, too, come standard with emotions and an ego. You are a hard worker who takes each customer seriously, so it might be difficult to imagine why a customer has issues with you or your product or service. Don’t allow this to make you resentful of your customer. Never respond with, “You don’t have a problem, everything is A-OK as I see it.” It will undoubtedly become a vicious circle of blame and ego in which everyone loses. The customer will generally be upset with some aspect of your product or service, but not with you. Instead of incredulity, use the adversity as an opportunity to showcase how much the customer means to you and to your business. Often times, angry customers just want to be heard. If they see that you’re working hard to solve the problem, they will calm down and the two of you can focus on a reaching a resolution.
Rule #2 – Always Take Responsibility…
Along with making sure you’re addressing any negative client issues with the right attitude, never, ever, even with a hint of innocence or bewildering shock, make excuses for allowing your customer or client to be unsatisfied. They simply don’t want to hear, nor should they have to. They are the customer. They are buying from you—from your company—to fulfill a specific need. It isn’t their problem that your car broke down or your worst employee messed up the ordering or you tripped in your front lawn, kind of hurting your leg… Solve the problem, apologize for any inconvenience, and spare the details.
Rule #3 – Open and Honest Communication…
When working with a client or customer who is unsatisfied with your work, the probability of him or her just coming out and saying how they truly feel is rare. They’re likely to mask their true feelings, wait until you’re gone, and tell everyone else they know how bad your service is. By encouraging your client or customer to always be open with their feelings and thoughts, good or bad, you’re promoting a healthy environment of trust which will lead to heightened productivity. Establish this practice up front and put effort into maintaining the openness. Try to minimize the periods of “unsatisfied” as best you can by requiring open communication. Remember communication is a two-way street. Listening, learning and taking action to solve the problem saves your customer and your business.
Finally, don’t make the mistake of thinking that because you solved one problem for one customer that your job of being an excellent business owner and problem-solving extraordinaire is finished. Learn from these mistakes. Use each complaint or unsatisfied customer as reference for how to conduct future business with that specific customer, and every other customer you come in contact with. It’s the nature of the beast, plain and simple. Some customers or clients are going to have problems. Accept it as a truth and never quit learning how to make your business better by making each customer as happy with your product or service as can be. When dealing with a dissatisfied customer write down some quick notes. What they were upset about and how did you handled it? Use these notes as reference for the future to see these problems don’t happen again and build your business even stronger.
