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THIS WEEK
Taking Responsibility for Customer Complaints
ALSO IN THIS EDITION
Taking Responsibility for Customer Complaints |
No matter how hard you try and no matter how brilliant your service, at some point in your business life you will have customers that you have failed to satisfy. That is an inevitable fact of doing business.
The challenge is in a Web 2.0 world, they won't just tell their immediate family, they will usually post it to their Facebook friends, Tweet about it on Twitter and possibly complain in a forum about you in the process.
Your one unhappy customer has suddenly told a few thousand people.
If they are really ticked off you can expect a You Tube Video or an email that could go viral – and suddenly one bad experience has been seen by millions of people.
Far fetched? Well Virgin Airlines experienced this with one bad meal served to a passenger who emailed in his complaint to Virgin – and cc'd his list in the process. This complaint email was forwarded to their friends, who forwarded it to their friends until ultimately it made front page news in most of the main papers and TV shows around the world ... All from one bad meal.
This is not the time to be complacent in business. Old customer complaint strategies just don't cut it anymore. Gone are the days when people will send you a nasty letter or complain in person. With Web 2.0 the world is now their complaints department and the person concerned may or may not actually tell you directly about their issue.
 So, knowing at some time you will tick a customer off - what can you do about customer complaints in a Web 2.0 world?
1. Make it easy for them to complain directly to you. Sure keep some of the old traditional paper forms, but extend your website so people can contact you via the web. Angry people want instant responses – anything that takes time increases their anger level.
2. Make responses public. Many people try to sweep complaints under the carpet. In a Web 2.0 world this is the worst thing you can do. Allow comments on your company blog or newsletter – and resist the temptation to delete negative posts. The trick in managing customer complaints in Web 2.0 is how you respond to the comments.
Make sure every negative comment is replied to. Show active listening skills by validating their emotion "Yes, I can understand why you would be angry about xyz". Then move into problem solution mode. "We would like to correct this for you – I will contact you to discuss how we can fix this." If you have a contact address then follow up with them. If you don't have a contact address then ask them to contact you and give your contact number or address. If they don't respond, repeat your offer of wanting to resolve their issue. Be friendly, courteous and respectful in your response – do not get into the blame game in any public forum!
If the complaint is on a forum – respond on the forum and then also reprint the complaint and your responses back to your site and ask others views on how to fix the issue, or include your response to the concern. It is likely your raving fans will add in their positive comments and outweigh the negative ones. That way people see your official response and all the positives and this will lower the negative returns in Google search results.
3. Go hunting for feedback. Set some simple scans in place to find feedback on forums etc. Setting up a Google alert for your company name and your name is the start. Make sure to also set up alerts for inurl:forum "company name" and Powered by vBulletin + "company name" to track for comments in forums. Set up a Tweetdeck Twitter search for Twitter comments about your company name, your name or websites.
4. Respond quickly to comments. If you get negative publicity generally the worst thing to do is ignore it or wait for a few days. Respond within 24 hours (ideally within the hour) in a positive helpful way, in the same medium the complaint was made. For example the head of Domino's Pizza in the USA uploaded a film on You Tube to counter negative press about a few of his employees You Tube video clip. You may need help from a copywriter or other specialist to help you frame the best response.
5. But what if it goes viral? This is where you need to have the phone number of a good PR company that understands and handles Web 2.0 on speed dial. There are lots of PR firms out there – but not all "get" Web 2.0. Take the time now to track one down and form a relationship with them. Disaster recovery PR is a unique skill so you need to have someone on board just as you have disaster recovery plans in place for your computers and offices.
Customer complaints in a Web 2.0 world means you need to take greater responsibility and ownership of finding and responding to issues. Sure, bring your toolkit of complaints resolution skills and training with you – but in this era you need to include a few extra tools and a few extra specialists such as copywriters and PR agents into your mix.
| HR Tip of the Week - Having the right people handling customer complaints |
Let's be blunt - not every employee you have on your books currently has exceptional complaints handling skills. Some of your team will have great natural ability - they have the knack of dealing with people and seem to always be able to handle any situation with tact and diplomacy. Others are like fuel to flame - add one angry customer and you have an explosive mix.
The ones who explode, you may need to consider if you roster them anywhere near customers (or if you should retain them at all). The ones who are brilliant - you need to look at them for further development and promotion into supervisory roles.
That said, all employees need to be trained in handling customer complaints - this is as essential training as fire drills. During your performance reviews, make sure you include planning for how your team can gain customer complaint handling skills. You also need to ensure you have some internal guidelines and policies drafted on what is an acceptable response and how issues are to be escalated within your team.
Within your organisation you may decide that one or two people will handle the more complex complaints as part of their work role. They need your support and additional compensation for this skill. After all - they are on the front line of PR for your company and need to be treated accordingly.
We have had an amazing response to our free performance review templates and training MP3's with quite a few hundred people downloading them since they were released. If you haven't already downloaded your templates and intro to performance review training session go to
www.heartharmony.com.au/free-performance-review-templates.php
Once you have listened to the intro session, you are likely to want to take your performance review skills further and learn how to deal with tears and anger during reviews, communication tips and a how to set up your reviews for maximum success.
Our Employee Performance Reviews: Tips, Templates & Tactics comes with eight bonus MP3 training sessions to help you implement effective reviews for your organisation.
"It was fabulous" Roslind Brown
So check out our Employee Performance Reviews: Tips, Templates & Tactics eBook and MP3 training sessions today.
Last week many people asked me why Susan Boyle from the show UK's Got Talent was such a hit. In this post I looked at the link between archetypes, fairy stories and Susan Boyle ... and why telling stories is one of the most powerful marketing tools you can have.
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Drop us an email or call Ingrid on +61 7 3351 8844.
The Art, Energy & Science of Writing for the Web
exuberantly yours
Ingrid
Heart Harmony
PS: This week's Small Business Tips blog was very busy with other posts including Calling Brisbane Tall People, Logos through History, Using Stats in Your Marketing, Aussie Celebs on Twitter, More Cool Toys for Business & Debt Relief - When Words don't match Reality.
Legal stuff: This newsletter is intended to provide you with general guidelines for your business. You should seek specific advice for your situation rather than relying only on this newsletter
Earnings disclaimer. Some of the content may include advertorial information, which means I may receive financial compensation for the products I recommend. But - unless I know and trust the product, I will not recommend it.
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