How to Handle Difficult Customers by Shep Hyken

Photo by ahmad gunnaivi on Unsplash

Not long ago I covered six ways to handle angry customers. Often an angry customer and a difficult customer are the same. But that’s not always true. Sometimes difficult customers aren’t angry. They are just tough and demanding. That said, the techniques I cover in both of these posts can work, with a little tweak or variation depending on the situation. So, after you read this, I urge you to go back and read the original article. This is a follow-up with another half dozen techniques to manage angry and/or difficult customers.

 So, here are six ways to handle difficult customers: 

1. Avoid acting indifferent toward your customer. Customers want your attention, and they want to feel as if the relationship you have with them is important. Indifference is apathy. That will never make a customer happy. 

2. Ask the right questions. These are the appropriate questions that give you the answers to understand the situation. But be careful about interrupting with questions. That can frustrate the customer. There may be a time you need to interrupt, but just go about it the right way. Cutting the customer off could end up escalating the anger or problem, when it’s your intention to do the opposite.

3. Empathize! This has become a very popular word. Customers want you to empathize and understand their situation. The old expression about putting yourself in the customer’s shoes comes to mind. Saying something like, “I know how you feel. I would feel the same way if that happened to me,” could help customers know you’re on their side. 

4. Don’t tell the customer he or she is wrong. This isn’t about who is right or who is wrong. This is about getting the customer to say, “Thanks for taking great care of me.” You’re not going to get there if you’re accusing the customer of being wrong. Remember one of my favorite sayings: The customer is not always right! But when they are wrong, let them be wrong with dignity and respect. 

5. Don’t blame others inside your company. Never make anyone in your organization look bad. When a problem comes your way, you own it, regardless of who is at fault. 

6. Focus on a positive outcome. Instead of focusing on what you can’t do, focus on what you can do. Customers want to know they are talking to someone who can solve their problems. 

So, there are six more tips on how to handle difficult and angry customers. In any given situation, one or more of these tactics may come in handy. Remember, you’re trying to get the customer to come back. As you interact with them, ask yourself, “Is what I’m doing right now going to make my customer come back the next time they need what we sell?” 

Shep Hyken is a customer service expert, keynote speaker, and New York Times bestselling business author. His latest book, I’ll Be Back: How to Get Customers to Come Back Again and Again, is available now from Sound Wisdom. For information, contact 314-692-2200 or www.hyken.com. For information on The Customer Focus™ customer service training programs, go to www.thecustomerfocus.com. Follow on Twitter: @Hyken. This post originally appeared here on Shep Hyken’s Customer Service Blog.

Customer Service versus Customer Experience…What’s the Difference? by Shep Hyken

Photo by Christiann Koepke on Unsplash

It is one of the most common questions I’m asked in interviews: What’s the difference between customer service and customer experience (also known as CX)? 

While I’ve written about this before, my original article about customer experience was more about how to create a more interactive experience. The example I used was how Home Shopping Network (HSN) incorporated gamification into the customer experience. It offered games and puzzles on its website. The prize for winning the game or solving the puzzle was in the form of discounts. That’s a great—and even fun—experience, but there is much more to it than that. 

First, a little history. I remember the term “customer experience” being used as a fancy phrase to describe customer service. Many years ago, that’s all it was. Some smart person was trying to give a facelift to the term “customer service.” Not long after that, however, other smart people started using the term “customer experience” to describe every interaction with a company. That included customer service and much more. 

This is where it confuses some people. Customer service is part of customer experience, but customer experience goes to a much broader level. Some of the obvious experiences include navigating a website, reading promotional emails and text messages, watching the brand’s videos, and much more. Even opening a package is part of the customer experience. Think about how cool it is to unbox an iPhone or iPad. Back in the day, Steve Jobs was very specific about how he wanted the unboxing of the company’s products to be an amazing CX. 

“Customer service is not a department that deals with problems and complaints. It’s a philosophy to be embraced by every employee.” 

Some say that customer service is what happens when the customer experience goes wrong. 

That’s part of it, but it’s not the whole picture. If you’ve followed my work, you know that customer service is not a department that deals with problems and complaints. It’s a philosophy to be embraced by every employee, from the CEO or owner to the most recently hired. It’s how you interact with people, both your internal and external customers. 

The customer support department deals with questions, problems, and complaints. Of course, their customer service skills must be at the highest level when dealing with unhappy customers and solving problems. 

So, a short definition of customer service is all of the interactions that customers have with the people in the company. We can even broaden that to digital interactions, which now include chatbots, interactive experiences on a website, and more. Just to emphasize, these interactions include, but go beyond, the interactions for customer support. 

Customer experience includes customer service—and everything else a customer might experience when doing business with you. 

Shep Hyken is a customer service expert, keynote speaker, and New York Times bestselling business author. His latest book, I’ll Be Back: How to Get Customers to Come Back Again and Again is available for preorder at www.IllBeBackBook.com. For information, contact 314-692-2200 or www.hyken.com. For information on The Customer Focus™ customer service training programs, go to www.thecustomerfocus.com. Follow on Twitter: @Hyken. This post originally appeared here on Shep Hyken’s Customer Service Blog. 

The Most Important Measurement in Business by Shep Hyken

Photo by Blake Wisz on Unsplash

This is the first of a number of lessons I’ll be sharing from my newest book, I’ll Be Back: How to Get Customers to Come Back Again and Again. A few years back I wrote about the idea of measuring customer satisfaction versus customer behavior. We’re revisiting that topic with a fresh point of view. 

Today’s lesson is about the exciting topic of measurement and data. Okay, maybe not that exciting, but how about very important? You know it is! Business management guru Peter Drucker said, “You can’t manage what you don’t measure.” 

So, what should we be measuring? What’s the best metric? Why do our customers come back? There are a number of ways organizations measure customer satisfaction. By the way, I don’t like that word, satisfaction. The word satisfactory implies everything is okay, average, or fine. If you asked someone to rate you as either poor, satisfactory, or excellent, you can see that satisfactory is in the middle. Again, just average. But, back to the point. Call it customer satisfaction, customer happiness, or anything you want. The important idea to remember is that we’re looking at ratings. 

As an example, two very popular measurements are NPS (Net Promoter Score) and CSAT (Customer Satisfaction). Both give you an idea of how happy the customer is. But, you need to know more. When you ask marketing and customer service experts what they monitor, you’ll likely hear about similar satisfaction or happiness measurements. You’ll also hear them talk about sales numbers, profit, revenue, and other indications that the company is doing well—or not so well. 

But another measurement I suggest companies pay close attention to, in addition to those just mentioned, is this one: Does the customer come back? 

That’s not a rating. That’s behavior! Big difference. Your customers can rate you five out of five stars and give you glowing reviews. But what if they don’t come back? The ratings and reviews were nice, but the opportunity to do more business vanishes if they don’t return. 

It’s important to know how customers feel about the experience they just had. We should always be looking at those experiences and finding ways to make them better. Feedback and ratings will help drive that effort. But in the end, knowing what percentage of customers come back, how often they come back, and how much they buy when they do come back, is a metric to pay close attention to. 

If getting your customers to come back, again and again, is important to you, and you know it is, you’ll love the book. Just go to www.IllBeBackBook.com. 

Shep Hyken is a customer service expert, keynote speaker, and New York Times bestselling business author. His latest book, I’ll Be Back: How to Get Customers to Come Back Again and Again is available for preorder at www.IllBeBackBook.com. For information, contact 314-692-2200 or www.hyken.com. For information on The Customer Focus™ customer service training programs, go to www.thecustomerfocus.com. Follow on Twitter: @Hyken. This post originally appeared here on Shep Hyken’s Customer Service Blog.

Here’s How to Get Customers to Say, “I’ll Be Back!” by Shep Hyken

Photo by Patrick Tomasso on Unsplash

Many companies think they have to compare themselves to their competition. They want to know what the competition is doing that they are not. And when they figure it out, you know what they do? They copy them.  

It’s not a bad idea to do that, but it’s not the best idea either. If all you do is compare yourself to your competitors, you may be missing your best opportunities to create the best experience for your customers. 

In my newest book, I’ll Be Back: How to Get Customers to Come Back Again and Again, I cover a six-step process to getting your customers to say, “I’ll be back.” I’m going to summarize the process here. It’s not complicated. It’s actually pretty simple, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy. So let’s jump right into it. 

 Start by calling a meeting. In all, it will probably take at least two or three meetings. Leadership should be there, along with other employees with varied responsibilities, from sales, support, finance, and more. 

Step One: Ask yourself and the team, “Why should people do business with us?” Answers like, “We have great customer service” are too vague and also something the competition is likely to say. Get specific and think of what you offer that makes you unique. 

Step Two: Check out the competition. What do they do that you don’t? Is this something you could be doing? Look for ways they differentiate themselves from what you do. 

Step Three: Keep pace. If you discover things that the competition is doing that you’re not, and you decide you want to do something similar, don’t just copy their ideas. Give them a twist and make them your own. If you copy them, you’ll be just like them. And if all you are is a copy of the competition, you are a commodity. 

If all you are is a copy of the competition, you are a commodity. 

Step Four: Move beyond your industry. Ask the team, “What companies, not including the competitors, do you like doing business with the most, and why?” Any type of company counts small, big, recognizable brands, and more. List reasons you like them and get ready for the next step. 

Step Five: Borrow from the best. Looking at the reasons you like the companies listed in Step Four, make note of what these companies do that you don’t, but could. This is a powerful way to create even more distance from your competition. 

Step Six: Revisit your value proposition. After you’ve built the ideas in Step Five into your customer experience, go back to the question you started with in Step One: “Why should people do business with us?” You should have some new answers. Even better answers will help you create a better customer experience. 

Repeat customers are gold. Loyal customers are sacred. Do it right and your customers will come back again and again. Put this six-step process into action, along with other ideas, strategies, and tactics from the book. This is exactly what it takes to get your customers to say, I’ll Be Back!

Shep Hyken is a customer service expert, keynote speaker, and New York Times bestselling business author. His latest book, I’ll Be Back: How to Get Customers to Come Back Again and Again is available for preorder at www.IllBeBackBook.com. For information, contact 314-692-2200 or www.hyken.com. For information on The Customer Focus™ customer service training programs, go to www.thecustomerfocus.com. Follow on Twitter: @Hyken. This post originally appeared here on Shep Hyken’s Customer Service Blog.

Ten Questions Every Business Owner Should Ask Themselves (but Probably Don’t) by Steve Miller

As marketers, we’re often reminded of the important basics: What are our objectives? Who is our targeted customer? Where can we find them? What need do we fill for them?  

As a Strategic Marketing Gunslinger (OK, I’m a consultant), my experience, plus the education I received through the “School of Hard Knocks,” has pushed me to go deeper. I’ve advised corporations and trade associations for 33 years. When I consult, I ask my clients the following questions, and the vast majority can’t answer them.  

Guess what? This creates an opportunity for YOU. Being able to answer the following questions gives you a leg up compared to your competition. Focus on these, think carefully about your answers, and you’ll enjoy an unfair advantage. Commit to conquering them, and they’ll make you Uncopyable.  

So here you go—ten questions every business owner should ask themselves (but probably don’t). How many can YOU answer? 

1. How would you sell against YOU? 
   What gives YOUR product or service the advantage? What gives THEM the advantage? Think about it: if you switched sides, what would you attack/avoid? What are the weaknesses you could go after? This can be a big eye-opener. When you put yourself in the competition’s shoes, you might find some real gaps in your offerings. If so, pay attention to and fix them. 

2. What is your closing rate? 
   If I gave you one hundred new leads, do you know how many customers your company would generate on average? You don’t? Then how can you possibly set annual, realistic, fact-based revenue goals? You can’t. Your projections are just WAGs (Wild A-- Guesses). 
   Unfortunately, you’re not alone—over 95 percent of my consulting clients were unable to answer that question when we first started working together. 

3. Who is your BIG MOOSE? 
   In the language of Uncopyable, we call your Target your “Moose.” But not all Moose are the same. If you’re like most businesses, 80 percent of your business comes from 20 percent of your customers. Basically, if you’re generating $10 million in revenues from 100 customers, then $8 million is from 20 of your customers. These are your BIG MOOSE. 

   
   Who are these people/companies? How can you analyze them to find some type of commonality between them? Are they in a specific industry or specialty niche? Do they all belong to the same country club? Do they have a common unique challenge? Your objective, naturally, is to be able to look for more of them! 

4. What is the long-term value of your average customer? 
   Most businesspeople see a customer from a transactional perspective. How big was the last order? How big can I make the next order? How many orders can I get from them this year? It’s unusual, however, for businesses to see customers from a lifetime-value perspective, but that’s exactly how we should see them! 

   
   I learned this lesson years ago from Stew Leonard, owner of Stew Leonard’s, an east-coast grocery store. Stew told me that he pictured each of his regular customers with a $50,000 label on their forehead. He explained that his average good customer spent $100 per week at his store. He figured if he took good care of them, they would shop once a week for 50 weeks out of the year (two weeks off for vacation). 

   
   He then figured if he took VERY good care of them, they would shop at his store for at least ten years. One hundred dollars per week for 50 weeks for 10 years equals $50,000! Stew went on to say that a $50,000 customer is very different from a $100 customer! Figure it out. How much is the lifetime value of a customer? Then figure out the lifetime value of an average customer. How much would you spend (invest) to generate a customer?  

5. What is your formal referral marketing strategy? 
   How recommendable are you? How many recommendations have you received in the last three months? Almost every business owner I’ve met will tell me their company gets most new customers from referrals. Yet almost every one then admits they don’t have a formal referral marketing strategy! Does this make sense? Our #1 tool for generating new business and we don’t give it our highest priority? We don’t move heaven and earth learning how to build this strategy and we don’t crawl over broken glass to implement one? Here’s a huge tip—be recommendable first and then help facilitate that recommendation. What’s worth talking about GETS talked about…but you also want to help it along! 

6. What marketing tools do you use regularly to fill the funnel? 
   What new tools have you tested in the last three months? The first question may be easy to answer, but not the second. We ALL develop habits and routines. It’s only human nature to get into our comfort zone and want to stay there. If we learn how to use direct mail, what tool do we use over and over? Direct mail! Do we try other new tools? Sometimes, but we often only give them cursory effort. Hey, we tried video marketing once, but it didn’t work! So we go back to the comfort zone and use direct mail. It may not always work, but we have confidence in it and are comfortable with it, so we stick with what we know and keep on keeping on. 

   
   New communication tools are being developed all the time. And our customers develop their own preferences for being communicated with. Some people like to just get e-mail. Some want phone calls. Some want to do Zoom. As we recover from the pandemic, some do, and will, want face-to-face communication. Our job isn’t to expect customers and prospects to bend to OUR personal preference. Our job is to make it as easy as possible for our customers to hear from us.  

7. What business are you in? 
   What business do your customers want you to be in? Say you make widgets. Who cares? Here’s the thing: you might think you’re in the widget manufacturing business, but you’re not. You, my friend, are in the customer satisfaction business. Your customer wants to be satisfied. They want problems solved, challenges met, and sleep uninterrupted. 

   
   Your goal is to have long-term relationships with your customers, right? What are your special abilities and competencies? How do your customers WANT you to use them?

8. How many new customers did you attract in the last three months? How many customers did you lose?  
   You might know the answer to the first question, but what about the second? Look, NOBODY keeps all their customers forever. You will lose customers. This is important to track because you must make sure you've got a funnel filled with quality prospects to replace those you lose. 
   

   The other reality is that you will also occasionally lose a big customer, and that hurts. Big customers are tough to quickly replace. Yet most businesses get caught off-guard when this happens. Developing a strategy that takes just such an occasion into account is critical to your long-term success. 

9. Are you a transactional supplier or a transformational supplier? How do you know?  
   Transactional suppliers are focused on the next sale, the next quarter’s revenues. Transformational suppliers are focused on helping their customers be more successful as a result of their relationship. 

   
   Which brings me to the last and most difficult question: 

10. How much new money did your customers earn last year as a result of their relationship with you?  

    So, how’d you do? I believe the questions are ALL important. I’d suggest you take the time to think about every single question you don’t have an immediate answer to. Each one of these, answered correctly, can help you become Uncopyable.  

To learn more about the strategies and tools to make your company Uncopyable, check out the updated and expanded edition of Uncopyable: How to Create an Unfair Advantage Over Your Competition. Steve Miller is an author, professional/virtual speaker and business advisor. Since founding The Adventure LLC in 1984, Miller’s consulting clients have ranged from solo entrepreneurs to Fortune 100 mega corporations, including Starbucks, Coca-Cola and Procter & Gamble. For your FREE copy of 108 Secrets to Grow Your Uncopyable Business (ebook), go to 108Secrets.com.

Why Today’s Businesses Must Be “Uncopyable” by Steve Miller

Why do your customers do business with you? I bet it’s because of your excellent customer service, right? Or maybe it’s that innovative product you just launched. Guess what? Your competition is saying the same thing about their company.  

Businesses today need to rethink their competitive strategy in order to create a true advantage over the competition. You need to be Uncopyable. 

What does that mean? Let’s take a closer look.  

Advancements in technology have made it very difficult for businesses to create unique products. In fact, it’s getting harder and harder to differentiate, and if your competition can copy you, then you are not unique. 

Okay, so maybe your competitive advantage is the superior customer service you provide. That may sound great, but think about it. What exactly does that mean? Do you make ordering product easy? Do you deliver on your promises? Do you quickly resolve issues when they arise? Well, isn’t that what you’re supposed to do anyway? Aren’t these the basics of customer service? Plus, I guarantee you that your competitors are also touting their amazing customer service. 

And you certainly don’t want to compete based on price. That’s a losing battle. 

The good news is that it’s pretty easy to break the mold and create a meaningful attachment with your customers—in other words, to become Uncopyable. 

As I say in my book, Uncopyable: How to Create an Unfair Advantage Over Your Competition, “Developing an Uncopyable advantage requires creating a strategy with new, contrarian eyes—looking at your industry, your competitors, and especially your customers, through a different filter.” 

Uncopyable Strategies  

I believe there are essentially four strategies to becoming Uncopyable:  

• Branding 

• Stealing Genius 

• Experience 

• Storytelling 

Let’s start with branding. No, this doesn’t mean stamping your logo on everything imaginable. And it goes well beyond uniquely identifying your products and services. Branding is what makes you memorable.  

Think, for example, of Harley-Davidson. The Harley-Davidson brand doesn’t sell motorcycles; it sells fantasy and community. That’s what clearly differentiates it from the competition. Harley-Davidson has nailed a branding proposition that’s difficult for other companies to copy. 

I would argue that effective branding is not thinking outside of the box but rather building your own box. 

Effective branding is not thinking outside of the box but rather building your own box. 

Next is Stealing Genius, a term I came up with. The idea is to go out and study “alien” organizations and experiences—ones that are outside of your industry. Do not rely on internal benchmarking because you never get new ideas from your competition. If you master Stealing Genius, you’ll be hard to copy. 

There are several different approaches to Stealing Genius, including studying specific geniuses. Take Disney parks, for instance. What is Disney really good at? How does Disney enhance customer experience? Once you start to study Disney from such a perspective, you’ll start to see what it does that can be extrapolated to your business. 

Disney is obviously just one example. There are a lot of companies that you can study and a lot of genius to steal if you keep your radar up. 

Third is creating an Uncopyable experience. An Uncopyable experience is what really enables your business to build an attachment with your customers. It’s the star of the Uncopyable approach. As outlined in my book, there are a few good ways to do this, including creating an enviable club and making your customers feel like rock stars. 

Then there’s storytelling, which can be an extremely powerful marketing and branding tool. Here’s the thing about stories: People connect with stories. Stories create an invisible bond between you and your customers. The fact is that every company has a story to tell, and there are at least a half dozen different types of storytelling. Which type of story does your company have? 

These Uncopyable strategies are just a sampling of the tools and resources that your business can employ, whether you’re B2B, B2C, or a small or large company. Find the ideas that best resonate with you. 

It’s important to point out that none of today’s Uncopyable companies have achieved their leading position through superior products or customer service.  Those are easy to copy. Focus on branding, innovation, experience and storytelling to become a true differentiator. They are what make you Uncopyable. 

For 25 Uncopyable Marketing Tips (FREE ebook), go to https://bit.ly/357cVYe. 

To learn more about the strategies and tools to make your company Uncopyable, check out the updated and expanded edition of Uncopyable: How to Create and Unfair Advantage Over Your Competition, available from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books-a-Million, Porchlight Book Company, Google Play, Apple Books, and other fine retailers. Steve Miller is an author, a professional/virtual speaker, and a business advisor. Since founding The Adventure LLC in 1984, Miller’s consulting clients have ranged from solo entrepreneurs to Fortune 100 megacorporations, including Starbucks, Coca-Cola, and Procter & Gamble. To get a free copy of “The Old Rules of Business That Still Matter,” go to theadventure.com/sw. 

Are You Accountable to Your Customers? by Sam Silverstein

Accountable leadership cares less about the short-term bottom line…and more about the long-term relationship. 

 A key test of accountability comes in the form of two tough questions:  

• Can your customers count on you to act in their best interests? Do they know you’ve always “got their back”?  

• Do they know you are accountable to fulfill a commitment to provide them with full value…and to give them all the information they need to make an informed decision?  

A recent PBS NewsHour story is making customers think twice about whether their most trusted providers are offering the right answers to those questions.  

Gretchen Liu, 78, went online and paid her insurance provider’s chosen supplier a copay of $285 for a 90-day supply of some medication she needed. The price seemed high, but her condition was serious, so she simply paid the bill and trusted that her insurance company was pointing her toward the best available price. Time passed, and Liu needed a refill of her medication before going on a trip. She headed to the pharmacy at Costco…where she learned that she could have gotten the very same medication there for only $40 if she had opted to pay for the same (generic!) drug out of pocket, instead of using the online copay arrangement provided by her insurance company! 

Let’s be frank. Something went very wrong here, something that needs to be noticed not just by online pharmacies and insurance companies, but by companies operating in all industries. When we don’t tell our customers how to make the very best choice, we let them down…and we don’t fulfill our accountability to them to look after their interests and deliver full value. 

There are two places where accountability needs to show up in this kind of situation. First, the online vendor for these medications should prominently inform customers when they can get a substantial price break by not using the copay option. The online pharmaceutical vendor, and by extension the insurance company, failed this test. 

Second, the pharmacists we visit in person should also make sure we get the best price possible. The Costco pharmacist passed this test. Guess which supplier Liu trusts more? Guess which she is more likely to recommend? 

One relationship with the customer—Costco’s—was based on accountability. The other wasn’t. Can you blame Liu—or any of us who need prescription drugs—if we start assuming that we need to watch out for our own interests, rather than trust our insurance company’s chosen suppliers? 

News flash: If you’re my insurance company, I’m your customer! That means you should be looking out for my best interests. 

That’s true for any company, of course, not just companies that sell insurance.  

If a company is more concerned with its immediate bottom line than it is with the customer’s best interests, that is a short-term decision, and a poor one. That company is maximizing a short-term profit in exchange for a long-term loss. When that company stops looking out for its customers, it might maximize its profits that month, that quarter, or maybe even that year—but there are going to be long-term problems down the line…and if the company ignores those problems for long enough, its survival will eventually be at stake! 

So: How committed is your organization to always do what’s best for the customer? How likely are you to tell a customer, “You know what? You can save some money and/or time if you do it this way instead of that way”? How committed are you and your team to giving customers all the information they should be able to expect from you? 

If you hesitated before answering any of those questions, consider that the problem you just uncovered begins with your company leadership’s commitment to employees.  

When leadership is only focused on the short-term bottom line and is not looking out for the best interests of customers, that sends a message to the employees in the organization that leaders probably aren’t looking out for their best interests, either! All too often, that message is part of a corporate death spiral—poor employee morale reinforces poor customer service, which reinforces poor employee morale, and on and on. This cycle is a hallmark of unaccountable leaders—not bad employees! Wherever there is a customer service issue, that points toward an accountability issue internally in the organization…usually at the very top.  

The flip side is also true. If the people in the organization know that the leader has their back and is personally accountable to uphold a commitment to help them achieve their full potential and be the very best they can be, then that leader is building a culture based on accountability and commitment—and those employees are going to be accountable to fulfilling a commitment to the customers to deliver full value, time after time after time. 

Rest assured: If you care about the long-term relationship more than the short-term bottom line, you will build a marketplace advantage based on accountability…and you will turn your customers into passionate advocates for your brand. 

Sam Silverstein is dedicated to empowering people to live accountable lives, transform the way they do business, and create a more accountable world. He helps companies create an organizational culture that prioritizes and inspires accountability. His most recent book in the No More Excuses series, No Matter What: The 10 Commitments of Accountability, is available now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books-a-Million, 800-CEO-READ, and other fine retailers. You can follow Sam on Twitter @SamSilverstein, Facebook @SilversteinSam, Instagram @samsilverstein, and YouTube @samsilverstein. 

Enhance the Service Experience of Your Untapped Customer Base: People with Disabilities by Jennifer Janechek

* October is National Disability Employment Awareness Month. To honor this, many of the Sound Wisdom blog articles this month are meant to educate about disability-related employment issues and celebrate the diverse contributions brought to the workplace by employees with disabilities.  

The sixth Convenience Principle in Shep Hyken’s new book, The Convenience Revolution, is Access. This principle is about “removing unnecessary friction from the typical customer’s day.” According to Hyken, the three factors that contribute to it are availability, communication, and location. 

A large and growing percentage of the population has a disability, and these customers contribute greatly to the economy. However, many businesses do not make an effort to be accessible to customers with disabilities, which, on top of being unethical, can be really detrimental to their company. It’s important to consider how your business—and the businesses you support—make themselves accessible to their customers who have disabilities, whether visible or invisible, physical or mental. Using the three components of Access that Hyken mentions in his book as a framework for this discussion, let’s reflect on the various ways that companies can enrich (or harm) the customer experience of people with disabilities. 

Location 

Your company’s physical environment is likely the first thing that comes to mind when you think of access, and it is certainly a very important aspect of the customer experience of people with disabilities. Because there are such a wide variety of disabilities—from mobility impairments to visual impairments, chronic illnesses to psychological and cognitive disabilities—it’s important to utilize universal design principles as much as possible in the construction of your space. “Universal design” simply means structuring your place of business in such a way as to cater to the widest range of customers possible. According to this article in Forbes, two ways to enhance access for people with disabilities in terms of location include (1) having ramps and keeping them well maintained and (2) using “universal access” levers instead of round doorknobs for your entry/egress doors, restroom doors, and as many other doors as possible. The US government recommends that business owners who aren’t able to make the physical location of their company accessible (as in cases where a ramp isn’t feasible or is cost prohibitive) offer an alternative means of access, e.g., curb-side or home delivery for restaurants and dry cleaners, home or alternate meeting locations for appointments with a lawyer or an accountant. It’s also important to be sensitive to people with allergies, autism, and other sensory sensitivities. Unless you own a candle or perfume store, avoid strong-smelling scents (I’m looking at you, Abercrombie & Fitch). Keep sound levels to a minimum, and be cognizant of how lights, media, and other stimuli might affect customers differently. 

Communication 

Are your customers with visual and/or auditory disabilities able to reach out to you online? According to the US government, “Under the ADA [Americans with Disabilities Act], businesses are expected to communicate effectively with customers with vision, hearing, or speech disabilities, and are responsible for taking the steps that are needed for effective communication.” But how many companies actually do this? The Forbes article mentioned earlier recommends making sure any CAPTCHAs (“Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart”) have a (good) audio alternative for blind customers, designing customer service channels in such a way that gives alternatives to IVR (interactive voice response telephone systems) for those who can’t interact with them effectively, and ensuring that your website isn’t too graphics heavy, which can make a website unreadable for those with visual impairments who use screen-reading technology. And all images should have readable alt tags that give a clear description of them. 

Availability 

Are you able to meet the needs of your customers by providing hours of operation or communication (for online customer service experiences) that are accessible for the widest range of customers possible? Some people with disabilities rely on a family member, friend, or caretaker to assist them with their purchasing: Are your business hours conducive to those who might need to shop, go to the bank, etc., after the “normal” 9-to-5 workday is over? Do you have long wait times on your customer service channels that might deter neurodiverse customers from getting the answers or help they need? These are important questions to consider. 

Remember, accessibility isn’t just about the physical environment. Social barriers (including the attitudes of employees) can hinder people with disabilities from patronizing your establishment. I encourage you to reflect on how you might make your business more universally accessible to both your customers and your employees. 

How might you make your business more accessible to customers with disabilities? What businesses do you know of that excel in this area? Comment below to share!

Looking for more tips? Check out this course from the US government on “Reaching Out to Customers with Disabilities” or this Canadian guide on serving customers with disabilities. And be sure to pick up a copy of Shep Hyken’s The Convenience Revolution: How to Deliver a Customer Service Experience That Disrupts the Competition & Creates Fierce Loyalty, available now at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books-a-Million, 800-CEO-READ, and many other fine retailers. 

What Losing My First-Class Seat Taught Me about Customer Service by Simon T. Bailey

As a person who prides himself on giving great customer service, I learned three ways to create superb customer service after a recent experience I had with Delta Airlines. I made three observations: 

• It doesn’t matter what happens. It’s all about the recovery. 

• If you hear it, you own it. 

• Customer service is not a department; it’s a mindset. 

Let me explain. 

Recently, I was in Palm Springs and Los Angeles, California, with my two young adults for a week-long vacation. It was probably our last trip for a while as my children are transitioning into graduating from high school, driving, starting a job, going to college, and shifting into less dependence on me and their mother. Making sure the experience was perfect for them was very important to me. 

Our last meal was at Jean-Georges, an exquisite restaurant located in the Waldorf Astoria Beverly Hills. We were floating on a cloud of magical memories as our trip was coming to an end. 

How could this amazing time with my two favorite people in the entire world get any better? 

Well, imagine my surprise when we checked in to Delta Airlines Sky Priority Lane at Los Angeles International (LAX) for our return flight back to Orlando, and both my daughter and I were upgraded on flight #1649 to first class for our five-hour cross-country trip back to Orlando, Florida. 

Then, as the last group of passengers were boarding, the Delta gate agent came to me and told me that my daughter and I had to give up our seats in first class and move back to seats 26 A and C. This was the last touchpoint of the trip, and this moment created disappointment for both of us and a feeling that something gained was now lost. 

This may seem like a small issue, but the devil is in the details, and moments like this can often make or break a customer’s experience. Going the extra inch beyond the extra mile is what creates customer love and platinum service. 

Justin Simmons, the lead Delta Airlines agent, understood this idea. He came back to apologize for what had happened and said that when he closed out the upgrades, he neglected to see that two first-class seats were purchased at the last minute. 

I understood what happened. However, many customers take opportunities like these to turn to social media or Yelp in order to feel heard. It was significant that Justin took the time to acknowledge our disappointment and mitigate any hard feelings. 

Beyond this, when I called the Delta SkyMiles Diamond Desk and explained what had happened, the agent immediately sympathized with my situation and deposited 10,000 miles into my account and 10,000 into my daughter’s account. 

Here’s what losing my first-class seat taught me about customer service: 

It’s all about the recovery. Although Delta Airlines was unable to undo the mistake, they recovered by gifting us some airline miles. We felt like we had gained something despite our initial loss, and Delta was now assured that we would fly with them again using the miles, giving us another chance to interact with their service. 

If you hear it, you own it. Once Justin heard about the hiccup, he took ownership of the experience. He could have passed the buck or let us continue on without acknowledging what had happened. After all, we did not purchase the first-class seats; they were given to us, and it would have been easy to discount our experience. 

Customer service is not a department; it’s a mindset. Justin did not work in the customer service department, but he made sure to discuss the event with us, making us feel acknowledged and like our experience mattered. The SkyMiles Diamond Desk did not transfer us to another customer service department. They righted the wrong right then and there. 

The original post appeared here on Simon T. Bailey’s website and has been slightly modified for republication. For more inspiration from the author, pick up a copy of his books Shift Your Brilliance: Harnessing the Power of You, Inc. and Brilliant Living: 31 Insights to Creating an Awesome Life.