How do some companies turn customer problems into lifelong loyal customers?
Today, we are diving into my transformative five-step framework that is designed to turn customer problems into opportunities to create raving fans for life.
The Importance of Customer Experience
When you to think about brands or companies that you have shopped from and purchased from in the last couple of years, why do you go back to these brands and buy from them time and time again?
If I venture to guess, or I know why I buy from them time and time again, it is because of the customer experience that they have created.
And I will actually recommend these brands and rave about them to my friends and family because of the experience that I have when shopping at these companies.
So, for example, I love shopping at Nordstrom. It’s not that they have better products than other department stores, but they have a great return policy that I love.
And now that I no longer live near a Nordstrom, it’s even more important that I can return and have free shipping for up to a year when I shop at a Nordstrom store.
Another example is Trader Joe’s. If anyone has ever shopped at a Trader Joe’s, from the time you walk in the store, people that work there are so helpful. But, also, when you go to check out, the people that work at the checkout, they are the nicest people. You can tell they enjoy their job. They engage in conversation with you, and you genuinely leave the store feeling better. You just feel like you had a great shopping experience inside Trader Joe’s.
How I Handle Customer Problems in My Own Business
I’m going to give you one specific example from my candle company and how I handle challenging customer problems and then walk you through my five-step framework.
And, hopefully, this will help you in your business. And next time, when you come across a customer satisfaction problem then you will know how to stop and assess the situation and how to handle it.
A few months ago in my candle company, Hart Design Co, I offer exclusivity.
Now what exclusivity for my retailers means is that if they spend a certain amount of money in carrying my products in their boutiques then they will be guaranteed that they are the only boutique or retailer within a certain geographic area that will carry my products.
And so, what had happened is that this retailer’s exclusivity, the thresholds had not been met, so they no longer had exclusivity for my brand.
She then reached out to me because another brand nearby had bought my products.
And this particular retailer was very upset, sent me an email, and was very hot about it from a competition standpoint.
She wanted to understand why I had sold my products to the retailer down the street and what I was going to do about it.
It would have been very easy to respond back immediately being defensive about it and tell her, hey, you no longer have exclusivity with me.
You should have checked this. And I had every right to sell to them, and that would have immediately put her on the defensive.
I’ve never would have gotten another order from her, and that would have been the end of that long standing retailer relationship.
Step 1: Calm Your Emotions
Instead, what I decided to do was take a step back and let my emotions calm down after receiving a very heated emotional email from my customer.
So, that was step one is I let my emotions calm down.
You never want to respond when your emotions are up.
You always take time to let your emotions calm down before you respond.
Often, we want to take care of the problem right away, but always walk away and calm down before you respond.
Step 2: Remove Defensive Language
The second thing I did was remove my defensive language and used phrases in my response to her like we instead of using phrases like I.
So, it would be easy to say, I did this, I did that, but I changed those phrases and instead utilized phrases like, let’s work together, and we will figure this out and move forward together.
And that really created a team mentality and partnership between myself and the retailer that had sent the email.
When you replace that defensive language and you really position yourself as an ally, it helps create a partnership team mentality that you are on their side and you are not looking to cast blame.
Step 3: Ask Open-Ended Questions When it Comes to Customer Problems
The third step is you want to ask questions that really get to the heart of the matter.
So, I always encourage asking probing and open-ended questions to really understand what the customer wants and needs out of the situation.
Often, all the customer wants is to feel heard and understood.
It’s human nature to want to fix things and correct the situation.
However, we really need to ask questions so that we are making sure that the customer feels understood and heard and that they are making sure that we are listening to them.
because they may not need us to fix anything at the end of the day, especially when they understand that we’re on their team and we want to work with them.
Right? So, you can listen actively and ask open ended questions like what would make the situation right for you?
When you ask questions like that, instead of just offering a solution, especially when you did not cause the problem in the first place, that really creates an opportunity for the other party to maybe just say, I just wanted you to hear me out, and thanks for listening.
That is an opportunity for them just to feel heard.
Step 4: Avoid Self-Serving Solutions
Now they may come back with some outrageous request, and so that is where we move into step four.
Once you really ask questions to get to the heart of the matter, we want to really address what solutions we can provide that are win-win solutions.
And by that, I mean, often, I see brands will come back with something that will be more of a win for themselves instead of the customer.
So, they’ll say, here’s a coupon for your next order.
And that’s necessarily a bad thing to offer down the road, but what that means is that the retailer has to spend more money with you in order to benefit from what you’re offering them.
And so, you don’t necessarily want to offer an upsell as the primary solution.
You want to focus on solving the problem rather than pushing additional sales that don’t address the core issue.
Offer genuine help that builds long term loyalty rather than a quick monetary win.
Step 5: Think Creatively for Win-Win Solutions to Customer Problems
In my customer scenario with my retailer, when I shared with them in that non-defensive language what had happened, and I asked those open-ended questions, I came to understand that this other retailer had had a pattern of other businesses copying her products over and over again.
And so, they just needed to be heard.
They didn’t need me to do anything to fix the issue.
They just needed someone to hear them because they were frustrated and they knew it was not my fault.
But asking those questions allowed me to get to the core and the heart of the matter.
And it helped me avoid offering a solution that would just push additional sales and help me move into step number five, which is thinking outside of the box and creating a high value win-win solution that really changed the game.
So, this is what I offered to my retailer that really helped solidify a long-standing partnership and created excitement for her and a raving fan for life.
I offered her a custom candle for her shop that is not sold anywhere else.
And now, not only does she not have to worry about exclusivity anymore, but she also doesn’t have to worry about any other boutiques copying her candles.
Now, she gets a custom candle that she can brand with her own branding and her own shop name.
And she was thrilled with the idea.
So, it just took me asking the questions of what was really the heart of the matter.
Instead of me jumping to conclusions of how I could solve the problem, I was able to think outside the box and create a win-win solution that helped both of us.
And now I have a raving fan for life.
I want to encourage you to truly see every customer interaction, even the challenging interactions as opportunities to build trust and transform customer problems into loyalty.
I’ve seen it work time and time again in my own business and in my career.
No matter what I am selling services or products, it works time and time again, this five step framework. So, implement it in your business, and send me a DM on Instagram and let me know how it works for you. I guarantee you, it is proven, and you will be amazed at the transformation and the response from your customers.
