As I wrote about in Part One of this mini series, customer complaints can be great opportunities for you and your team to learn and grow.
As promised, here are five more reasons why you should look at customer complaints as a good thing.
Learning the value of customer complaints is an important step in taking your company to the next level.
Leading organizations in many industries have sharpened service recovery into a potent competitive edge. They understand the power of effective recovery as a customer retaining and employee engaging technique.
Too often, organizations promise satisfaction to external customers and then allow internal politics to frustrate their employees’ good intentions to deliver. It’s important to remember that your customers aren’t the only ones who come through your organization’s door every day seeking quality service. Your coworkers and leaders also need to be served. If they’re not happy, it’s not likely they’ll deliver stellar service, and the same goes for you. Inevitably, “difficult people” will creep into your work life, disturbing your, your colleagues’, and your leaders’ workflow and negatively affecting the service you all provide your customers.
The last thing a customer with a complaint wants to hear you say is: “You’re wrong.” What they want to hear is that you understand them, appreciate them, and agree with them on the importance of the value they have cited in their complaint.
No one has a perfect record when it comes to delivering service. You will have unhappy customers, and you will receive complaints. With social networking, viral videos, and bad news traveling fast, one angry customer can leave a lasting stain on your reputation. Your recovery policy and practices should be ready.
A client recently asked: “When we make a mistake or fall short of a client expectation, how do we go beyond just fixing the problem and recover “the great customer experience” we worked so hard to create?”
This is an important question as clients and customers have a choice of products and services, and an ever increasing voice in the market of social opinions. A successful and creative recovery can be a unique pivot point in a customer relationship, actually building greater loyalty.
Generally, companies try to stay on their best behavior all year long by applying these Customer Service Tips. But during this holiday season—with decked halls, crowded malls, shrinking bank accounts, and frayed nerves—providing great service is even more critical than usual. Much like Santa, customers have their own “naughty or nice list,” and they won’t hesitate to give you the business equivalent of a stocking full of coal (i.e., taking their business somewhere else) if you make your way into the wrong column.
Struggling with bad service? Yeah, us too. But before you unleash on the next bumbling waiter or clueless salesclerk, hear the words of RON KAUFMAN, a global service consultant who has been on a 20-year crusade to improve service standards in Singapore. Here he tells Monica Pitrelli that getting good service in Singapore is not only possible – it’s easy – as long as you check your attitude at the door.
Many of us can recall a story about poor customer service that went viral on the Internet. (Think United Airlines and guitars, or Federal Express and computer monitors.) These negative stories have become legends. Unfortunately, we don’t find as many stories going viral about outstanding quality service.
Here’s what’s next…
Check your email for the welcome we just sent – and reply to let us know you received it!
We’ve included some useful resources
for you to explore…
…and we’ll be in touch to share more ideas
and invitations for you.
Here’s what’s next…
Check your email for the welcome we just sent – and reply to let us know you received it!
We’ve included some useful resources
for you to explore…
…and we’ll be in touch to share more ideas
and invitations for you.