When Your Business Is Faced With a Person Complaining
A business (be it offline or online) revolves around our customers. Because, let’s face it, there wouldn’t be a business if there weren’t any buyers to begin with.
It is the customers who create the demand, and in many cases a business is born to meet those demands be it through a product or service. Bottom line, the company exists to serve the customers.
The bigger the company, the bigger the customer base, and the higher the chance they are going to have one or more unhappy customers on their hands which is not surprising since even the most favorable celebrities in the world have haters. Businesses are no exception to this and sooner or later, you are going to have an unhappy customer in your hands.
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So the big question here is… How Are You Going To Deal With It?
Sometimes, an unhappy customer may just shrug off what bothered them, or some might have the decency to personally contact your business customer support to let you know what caused his or her dissatisfaction.
Other times, businesses are not so lucky. There are unhappy customers who make it their personal crusade to voice their dissatisfaction. Be it either to defame the company or just a desperate effort to be heard by the offending business or company or just to be taken more seriously.
Either way, these kinds of unhappy customers cannot be left unattended. They should be given attention as soon as possible to resolve the matter and situation before it spirals out of control.
In this digital age, news gets around fast, far and wide. Millions of people can be informed of companies’ wrongdoings in just a matter of seconds, and at the ease of a single mouse-click.
So when a company is faced with a negative comment on your website, or social network site, it is in your best interest to attend to the matter as soon as you find out about it.
Things can easily get out of hand and escalate beyond your control if not deal with at soon. It’s always better to deal with situations like these sooner than later.
Dealing With It Head On – Professionally
Okay, now you can see the negative comment posted on your company’s blog or Facebook wall. You are the admin of the page, and marking it for deletion is all too easy. And it is certainly tempting. But professionally, it is not the right thing to do.
If you do delete it, it will only act as a remedy and the underlying problem will still persist. Plus, many eyes would have already seen the complaint before you deleted it.
When they see your company has a tendency to deal with less-than-desirable situations by simply sweeping it under the rug, it can affect your company or business reputation in a negative way. It says a lot about your company, and unfortunately, not in a positive sense.
You can’t simply turn a blind eye and just ignore the comment either. You have to deal with it by showing a person you are actually dealing with it which is by giving what the person complaining exactly what he or she wants and that is a response.
First things first, (regardless if it your company’s fault or not) is to apologize because in the complainer’s eyes, it is indeed your fault or specifically your company’s.
And in many cases, a simple and open apology is all it takes for the person complaining to retract their negative comments or to drag this issue any further.
Next, after apologizing, address the situation by acknowledging the person complaining as well as the complaint. Remember to sound neutral and non-sarcastic. You have to sound professional at all times.
Sometimes it’s not what you say but how you say it is what matters the most. So watch your tone and language to the person complaining. Your job here is to subdue the situation, not heighten it.
Promise To Fix The Problem ? And Do It
If indeed the complaint was a real issue that your company may have overlooked, offer to fix the solution as soon as possible. Even better if you have already come up with a plan on how you are going to rectify the problem to prevent such inconveniences to re-occur in the future and then relay it there and then.
The person complaining and many others can then see that your company certainly listens to its customers by doing everything that they can to address the problem and coming up with a solution.
When you respond to a negative situation in a positive manner, this will improve the reputation of your company as many people will certainly be impressed on how professional you deal with the situation.
But if indeed you receive many negative comments regarding your business regularly, then it is certainly time to give a thorough study in the problem area. If there are many occurrences regarding the same problem then it’s something you really have to change or re-form.
Building A Positive Image
A company should also always make the effort to ask customers to provide feedback or testimonials regarding the company’s product or services.
That way, when people view the positive greatly outweighs the negative then the company’s reputation will not be severely or forever affected if the company is indeed hit by a negative situation.
Plus, a potential customer’s decision to hire a company’s service or purchasing a product from the company is greatly affected by the company’s current customer reviews.
When potential customers see that a company received a lot of praises from past customers, for their product or service, then it becomes less of a risk and therefore future potential buyers will most be likely to be buying from the said company.
Building a positive image for the company is important and has to be done constantly to seal the company’s reputation as a trustworthy and credible one.
