When customers are disappointed, they also talk—but probably not to you. They will tell their friends and any stranger who will hold still to listen. Some disappointed customers will get in your face; many will sim-ply go away.
If you want to diffuse disappointment, you have to search it out. On my desk is a comment card for Sporty’s from a woman who wrote, “I was shocked to be charged for Ranch dressing . . . I do not eat Caesar.” I haven’t a clue what she is talking about, other than apparently she was
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charged for something she thought should have been included in the price. She rated our atmosphere a perfect 10. And even with her shock over something as small as salad dressing, she rated the service an 8. In other words, she liked us. Allow me to translate: “I really want to remain your customer, but you’ve got to fix this.”
The only sensible attitude to have with disappointed customers is this: If you aren’t happy, we aren’t happy. The best way to diffuse disap-pointment is to share it with the customer.
“Ma’am, I’m shocked too. We should never have charged you for your choice of dressing. If that had happened to me, I might have been more than shocked. I would have been mad as the dickens! No doubt I missed something in our training. I’ll correct that immediately. Please accept my apology and bring this letter to Sporty’s for a salad of your choice on us!”
In the first week that we had opened Sporty’s, one of our young cus-tomers wore a Sporty’s T-shirt to school. Her shirt read simply, “Meet me at Sporty’s.” Her teacher, assuming that Sporty’s was a sleazoid beer bar, demanded that the little girl go home and change her shirt.
We could have been indignant. We could have complained to her principal. We could have ignored her action entirely. Instead, we opted to diffuse her disallusion. We took menus and a voucher for her to sam-ple our service at no cost. And we made a friend. Yesterday, I was called to a table of eight teachers. Guess who was their leader? The same woman who had assumed we weren’t an appropriate place for children!
She wanted to introduce herself and her friends, stating proudly, “This is my third visit!”
Say Yes
In hospitality, there are two things that separate the amateur from the seasoned pro. The amateur sees the big things; the pro sees the smallest details. And the amateur plays defense, while the pro plays of-fense. While the amateur is creating policies and employing barriers and technology to keep the customer from getting too close to the prod-uct, the pro is looking for ways to put the customer and product to-gether. The simple premise is this: If the product is a quality product and the price is right, the sale is nearly a done deal if you can get trial.
If you are in business, you know that never a week goes by that some charity or civic organization doesn’t ask for you to sponsor this event or take an ad in its so-called fabulous program. Should you say yes? Well, maybe, but definitely not unless your participation results in trial.
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What can you do to encourage customers? How can you get them in intimate touch with your product and let them get their hands on it with-out hurry or undue restriction? Encouraging trial is just one way of say-ing yes to your customers. Essentially, all business is about problem solving. When a chef buys a food processor, he or she doesn’t need an-other appliance but only the need for chopped carrots or pureed pear cactus. When a soccer mom shops for a minivan, she doesn’t need an-other car in the driveway—she needs reliable, safe transportation for kids, pets, and groceries.
When customers make requests, they are saying, “Here is a problem.
Can you help me solve it?”
Great service organizations actively seek to identify customer prob-lems and devise ways to solve them that are better, cheaper, and faster than the solutions offered by the competition. Nordstrom is terrific about service. Their customers told us, and they tend to tell their friends as well. Enter Nordstrom with a problem and, so long as you are willing to pay for it and wait for it, you can count on having one less problem to solve.
The stories are legendary. A woman returns a set of tires to Nord-strom, where they are cheerfully exchanged. It’s interesting to note that Nordstrom doesn’t sell tires! (I assume this story is true. It is definitely an urban legend.) Another woman returns to the Nordstrom shoe de-partment, complaining that the new, haute couture shoes do not fit properly. The alert salesperson notices that she has the shoes on the wrong feet! What did he do? He apologized and offered to make an im-mediate adjustment. Taking the shoes to the stock room, he made a great deal of banging noise before returning the “adjusted” shoes, turn-ing a complaint into loyalty.
How are you saying no to your customers? How can you turn that no into a yes?
PUT THE CUSTOMER IN CONTROL . . .
. . . it makes them happy!
This principle explains the popularity of self-checkout. Coupled with the fact that 35 percent of our surveyed customers reported that rude/unfriendly/condescending clerks and salespersons are a problem, is, no doubt, the reason many shoppers are happy to avoid personal con-tact whenever possible.
Another reason for putting a customer in control is the customer. A former Disney exec, Jon Snoddy, was quoted in FastCompany as saying,
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“There was a generation of people out there who . . . had lived their en-tire lives with a game plugged into their TVs . . . that has to change the way adults view entertainment. When you’re playing a video game, you’re in control. I think that has to affect people. It makes them de-mand a role in their own entertainment.”
Today in the era of shopping as entertainment, being in control may be more important than ever.
Numerous restaurant operations and nearly every bank and service station have taken advantage of customers willing to take control of their transactions. It isn’t a matter of lower prices. Many ATMs charge a hefty premium for their use. And gas prices? Who knows what they would be without pay-at-the-pump?
Self-serve does not really equate to “cheap” so much as it means “my way on my time.”
What can you do to give your customers more control over the buy-ing experience?