Developing Customer Service Skills For 30+ Years
One of the toughest tasks facing customer service representatives is dealing with angry, frustrated, and difficult customers. Fortunately, there are tried and true methods to defuse these difficult situations professionally, and in ways that save time for everyone.
This section contains tips, techniques, and principles to apply to even the toughest customers no matter what sector: retail, service, regulatory and more. Most are taken from my books. You can browse these books on amazon by clicking here.
Hashtag: #defusingangrycustomers
How you start a customer conversation often dictates how well it goes Can you suggest a way to start off conversations with customers, difficult, angry or otherwise? How you begin an interaction with a customer often determines whether the conversation deteriorates into an unpleasant situation…
Bystanders, other customers can fuel an angry person’s anger in customer situations What is “removing the audience” and why is it important with angry or manipulative customers? Some customers have a tendency to play to an audience. For example, in a bank, an irate customer…
Twelve Defusing Angry Customers Principles Summarized Can you summarize the most important principles I should apply when dealing with angry or abusive customers? In the Defusing Hostile Customers Workbook, and our seminars, we explain there are twelve important principles customer service staff should apply when…
Customer Waiting Is Most Frustrating Element For Customers – Waiting The Psychology of Waiting – Anticipate Wait Times To PREVENT Customer Anger By Richard A Stone Commentary: Customer wait time is one of THE issues customers cite as most infuriating. It’s not possible to prevent…
By Robert Warlow Summary: Handling customer complaints is one of the essential pillars of customer service and customer retention. However, it’s just smart business to try to understand WHY customers complain, so you can PREVENT complaints from happening in the first place. Understanding why customers…
S.O.A.R.I.N.G. – Acronym for seven steps to use to prevent customer service conflicts What Every Employee Should Know About How to Prevent Customer Service Conflicts By Etienne Gibbs Summary: Customer service conflicts are inevitable, sometimes because the customer is difficult, or sometimes because the company’s…
by Peter Murphy Three secrets to ensuring low stress communication when talking to difficult people. Life is all about choices. And so is the way you communicate. You can fill your days with frustrating high stress communication or you can have days of low stress effective communication with…
By David Handler Summary: Short hints for small business owners to help out when customers have complaints, or other issues. Eleven tips for retaining customers even when customer service is flawed. 1. Be Swift – When someone has an issue with your company, address it…
by Peter Murphy 1 Don´t Believe Everything You Hear! With close friends and family it is not unusual to think that you ought to take onboard everything you hear. However do not confuse caring with knowing. Just because someone is concerned for your welfare does not mean…
By Jim Masson Editor’s Note: With so much talk about how important customer service, is (and it is) and how businesses should bend over backwards to please even the most difficult customers, it’s refeshing to see someone writing about firing customers who simply are not…
