Did you get personal with your customers last week? I hope you did!
Let’s face it, we all f*%k up sometimes. Surprisingly, a good f*%k up can be an opportunity to build trust and loyalty with your customers.
Let’s take a little lesson from love. If you’re anything like me, you can remember back to the last argument you had with your partner. If you’re lucky like me, you would have heard a genuine, heartfelt “sorry, how can I make it better” from your partner. If you’re anything like me you will always be right and should hear this a lot 😉
How quickly did a heartfelt apology and desire to rectify the problem make your anger fall away?
It’s the same for your customers. If you f*%k up with your customers, apologise and try to fix it. Immediately. Even if you think they’re wrong. Bad news travels fast and if you piss off an already irate customer, that news will travel faster than all f*%k to a LOT of other potential customers.
Genuinely trying to fix the problem and taking a no excuses approach (“sorry, I f*%cked up” rather than “I f*%cked up because of…..”) will help your customer see you’re human (like them), you make mistakes (like them) and you know how to make everything better. They may remember your f*%k up but how you repair it will be foremost in their mind and will be the story they tell other people.
Think about how you handle customer complaints and how you handle your f*%k ups. What do you need to change about how you deal with it? Do you need to learn to swallow your pride? Do you need to respond to them faster?
Set a plan in place about how you will deal with them in future. Make sure your team is on board with your F*%k Up Repair Strategy. DO IT!