Re: Another lousy Borland experience

In article <44cd58e1$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, RBDawson@xxxxxxxxxxx
says...
"Jolyon Smith" wrote

1 unhappy customer whose complaint is handled to their satisfaction
is worth more than 100 customers who never had to make a complaint
in the first place.

A customer who demands $500 in support for each $100 they spend is a $400
loss. And some will.

That's not a customer service issue, that's a service level agreement
issue.

If a customer _EXPECTS_ $500 in support having only spent $100, then you
have not made that customer sufficiently aware of what they are getting
for their money.

If they feel entitled to that level of support then it's your fault for
giving them that impression.

Expectation Management is an all too often neglected aspect of this
industry.



But that 1 customer who was hacked off but who had their complaint
handled and their grievance addressed will delight in telling anyone who
will listen about the way they managed to get a result in their favour -

This is the rationale for occasionally taking the $400 loss above, but it
has its limits. It may be more likely that they will continue to bad mouth
you to any one who will listen no matter what you do

Of course that's a risk, but all I can offer is empirical studies
carried out by respected and well established, large multi-national
companies who found that the benefits of treating every customer
complaint as valid far outweighed the costs of scrutinising every
complaint to ascertain validity before then dealing with those
complaints in the manner felt appropriate to the frivolity/legitimacy of
the complaint or the offensiveness or politeness of the complainant.


who managed at last to 'force'
you to give him what he wanted. Whatever accommodation you mke can be spun
either as too little, too late, or else into a tale of how he made out like
a bandit and played you for a chump--depending on how he's trying paint
himself at the moment.

Yep, and all the time he's mentioning _your_ organisation when otherwise
he would be mentioning only your competition.

Even if you believe the complainant is a chump, the chances are that not
everyone in his enrapt audience is, and some will know the chump for
what he is.

Better then, that his audience are hearing tales of your organisations
willingness to bend over backwards to keep their customers happy - yes,
even the chumps - than for them never to hear your name and only that of
your competitors.



Turning your organization inside out
in the vain attempt to satisfy everyone is a simple a waste of money better
spent on the majority customer.

You don't have to turn your organisation inside out to satisfy everyone
- most peoples level of satisfaction are generally much lower than their
own expectations.

Also, most people enter into a complaint process with no real hope of
having their grievance satisfactorily addressed, so they enter into the
complaint expecting to be met with resistance, and set their demands
accordingly.

Meet that attitude with outrageous indignation and/or platitudes
designed to educate the customer in what, deep down, they already know
(that they are not being reasonable) and you simply encourage the
customer to treat you as an adversary and entrench their position.


+0.02

--
Jolyon Smith
.

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