Jean-Louis Gassée : Handling customer complaint:
A customer complaint dialogue is structured around a two-position toggle: a) it’s terrible, b) it’s nothing. The first one to grab a position forces the other person to assume the only one left. When Dear Customer calls, “Canon Law” dictates the first words out of my mouth: ‘This is terrible, how could we have let this happen to you!’. This forces the caller to concede: ‘Well, it’s not the end of the world, I just would like to…’ A cooperative conversation ensues.
I recall a recent event when one of my customer was frustrated that the project wasn’t going smoothly. Angry emails were flying around, some responsibility pushing was happening behind the scene among different vendors worsen by the lack of communications and coordination between all parties involved. But, yet the issue was resolved simply by acknowledging the issue, the terrible mistake make and how we can improve. The tone of the conversation plays an important part as well as it allows us to understand that things aren’t that bad and all we need is to keep communications and status updated.
A great lesson learnt and a wonderful reminder.