Manual: LEARN TO IDENTIFY WHAT IS TRULY ANNOYING THE CONSUMERS IN YOUR BUSINESS. YOU WILL SEE THAT CUSTOMERS ARE ALWAYS RIGHT.
'I am the owner of a small shoe store in Mexico City. I am aware of the great competition that exists and that if I do not give good service, my business will not prosper. However, I am concerned that I don't know what to do to satisfy some customers who come to my establishment. '
Although I instill in my staff that The customer is first and that The customer is always right, I do not know what to tell my collaborators when the buyers are somewhat exaggerated and do not understand that we ran out of a model of shoes, for example, or that we do not have this model in a certain color.
Why are some clients so demanding and difficult? What can I say to my staff so they don't get confused and continue to show interest and respect for the customer?
Although sometimes I feel that the clients are not right, I think that if I comment it to the buyers, they will think that our service is lousy. What should I do in these cases?
TERESA ESPINOZA, MEXICO, DF
REPLY
You are already one step ahead of many of your competitors when you are aware that good service will set you apart from other shoe stores.
I can also assure you that your confusion is very normal. Many entrepreneurs consider that -sometimes- customers are not right.
However, after so many years of dealing with clients, surveying them, listening to their disagreements and knowing better how they think; I have come to the conclusion that 99.9 percent of the time they ARE correct.
What's more, I venture to assure you that when we are customers we think the same as our consumers, but we are the providers we want a little more understanding, and when this does not happen, we feel that they are insensitive, rude and even exaggerated.
Normal customers do understand problems such as lack of inventory, lack of personnel, errors, etc. What happens is that we are not fortune tellers to know what happens.
Remember that customers buy the service against the expectations we set, often influenced by the same provider.
According to our research, most expectations are not adequately managed by us suppliers, so we allow the customer to imagine something that we cannot offer, and when realizing it they are disappointed.
We call these expectations that the client imagines Indirect Promises, because we do not give any information to the client but he has already generated one or more expectations.
Just over 60 percent of customer dissatisfaction problems stem from indirect promises; that is, those that are generated by lack of adequate communication.
In your case, you generate expectations in your customers with the display of your shoes at the counters (the display of the product is called Direct Promise, and it is what sets an expectation).
It is highly unlikely that any customer will ask for the shoe model that is not on the sideboard, because its display is a suitable model to communicate what it offers.
However, what would a customer who goes to a shoe store and observes the entire exhibition think? You would imagine that the store has all the shoes you can look at.
You would never think that a store exposes shoes that it does not have in stock (Indirect Promise), and upon learning that they do not have the model that they liked, they would be disappointed and say goodbye to this business.
Your shoe store could experience the Ambiguous Indirect Promise problem, which generates an expectation by not confirming, but also not denying the customer the information they want.
If a customer arrives at their shoe store and does not specify the available colors and sizes on display, the customer will assume they have an inventory of everything they see.
When you begin to evaluate the model you like and think about what clothes you will wear them with, how you will pay for them, when you will debut them; The expectation that you will make the purchase is already being generated.
If after deciding on the purchase, you approach the staff and request them, knowing that there is no such model, I assure you that the client is going to be upset, because he already lost 10 minutes of his valuable time and had already generated a expectation.
Doesn't it bother you when after meditating several minutes of selecting a dish from a restaurant menu, the waiter informs you that they are finished or they no longer handle it?
For something you asked for that dish: It was what you wanted most! And now you will have to settle for another less appetizing option than the first.
When you receive the letter, you take it for granted (Ambiguous Indirect Promise) that all the dishes contained therein are available.
Even though you think this behavior is from an exaggerated customer?
But the annoyance is not caused by the fact that there is not a certain dish, but because he learned that there was not after several minutes of meditating and deciding, mainly, after having created an expectation.
So, customers do understand that there is no product in stock, as long as we find out in a timely manner.
Very few customers will bother in a restaurant that when delivering the menu, the waiter informs them that certain dishes are not available.
Your customers don't bother because they lack inventory, but because they didn't find out on time.
A customer who comes to his shoe store and selects the model he likes, but realizes that there is no inventory of the color he is looking for or the number that fits, he will not bother anyway, and he can choose:
- Find another model that you like in the rest of the models on display. Measure yourself (if possible) half a smaller or larger number to see if they fit you. Until you ask when they will have the model you like in the desired color or number.
This will surely increase your chances of selling, even if you don't have it in stock.
All thanks to the fact that it adequately and timely controlled the expectations of its clients.
A good service does not require more investment, but it does pay off for you.
Isn't it true that the clients are right? '
