Every business wants to deliver for their clients and have satisfied customers – that turn into returning customers! But even for the most effective business, it’s impossible to always leave everyone happy. You’ll run into shipping delays, staffing issues, and unforeseen snags that make it inevitable that a client will leave unhappy once in a while. But for savvy business owners, that’s an opportunity.
How you respond to an unhappy customer expressing complaints will not only impact your future relationship with that customer – it will help you refine your business model. Your customers are giving you feedback, and you can use that feedback to create a stronger, smarter business. These four steps are the key to taking any negative customer experience and turning it into a positive.
Identify Customer Wants and Needs
The process of tackling customer pains and leaving them happy with your customer service begins before there’s a problem. Savvy business owners are conducting market research of their area and customer base even before they open and finding out what their potential customers are interested in – and what they would like to avoid.
The opening weeks of a business are incredibly key for building momentum, so getting a head start can be the key to success. So how do you do this? Social media is one of the best ways to get the pulse of your customer base. Many companies have a presence on the major sites as soon as the “Coming soon” sign goes up on their street.
Once your store opens, you can analyze your sales to figure out which products are moving and which might not be hitting their mark. When you know what your customers prioritize, it’s much easier to work out the kinks in the system.
Give Them Feedback
You’re not the only one getting feedback – your customers want to know that you’re getting their complaints and taking them seriously. That’s part of why it’s important to have a customer service team that has both a consistent presence and a personal touch.
You want your customers to feel valued; part of that is prompt responses to their questions and complaints. Customers can tell when a form letter isn’t actually addressing their points. While a kind word goes a long way, your customers will also want to know that you’re taking action based on their feedback.
You want your business to feel like a community, and that means making changes as needed. How you respond to negative feedback will play a big role in your success, and a creative ad agency in NYC that specializes in this kind of challenge can help you find the right response for any situation.
Act Based on Their Feedback
Accountability is key to running a business, and your customers will want to know you’re addressing their pain points. What is a pain point? It’s part of the process that customers find especially frustrating. If this is a non-essential part of the business, customers will start avoiding it. If it is an essential part, customers will either endure it – or seek out somewhere else to shop.
The most common pain points are financial pain points, where customers feel they’re paying too much; process pain points, where the operations aren’t efficient enough, support pain points, where customers can’t get the help they need; and productivity pain points, where the customer doesn’t get feedback or action quickly enough.
So how do you avoid this? The best way is through keeping the business accountable on social media. If you’re planning to implement changes, you’ll want to keep people updated and let the customers know when they’ll be seeing changes.
Collect Data
A good suite of data software is one of the best tools any business has at its disposal. Collecting and analyzing data is the best way to get clues about where your customers’ pain points are and how to address them. If you run a small business, you may be able to get the information you need just by analyzing sales and seeing what performs and what doesn’t.
If you run a larger business, it may be worth employing a full data team to analyze customer behavior. Who buys what, who returns what, and how many customers return for multiple purchases are all key metrics that can help you figure out where your strengths lie – and where your possible problem spots are hiding.
Pain Relief
Do you know when your business’ customer pain points are? These can not only deter customers, but they can also be hard to identify unless you’re doing the proper customer research. They can be found at the price point, at the sales process, or in the support process.
Giving and getting feedback is critical to finding this information. Your customers will respond better to any issues if they know the business is working on them. Finding and addressing these points will help you build customer loyalty and emerge stronger as a business.
