What Does Great Customer Service Mean To You?
January 11, 2007 by Michelle Waters
Does great customer service mean the company will bend to its customer’s will, no matter what?
Does it mean that the company is bound by “the customer is always right” — with no recourse?
I’m wondering what your thoughts are, because I recently read a thread at The Babywearer forums in which baby sling business owners discuss a particularly nasty customer service situation.
I would like to add another perspective into the pot. This situation reminds me of an entry in Seth Godin’s blog regarding the customer is always right:
Rule 1: The customer is always right
Rule 2: If the customer is ever wrong, reread rule No. 1
Rule 3: If the customer is wrong, they’re not your customer any more.
Bet you hadn’t thought of that. 
Seth gives some additional advice for handling customers who are wrong:
Fire them. Politely decline to do business with them. Refer them to your arch competitors. Take them off the mailing list. Don’t make promises you can’t keep, don’t be rude, just move on.
If you’ve got something worth paying for, you gain power when you refuse to offer it to every single person who is willing to pay you.
Now that’s something to consider, especially for small WAHM businesses who can’t afford to spend 95 percent of their time placating the 1 percent of their clients who are unhappy and always will be.
Thoughts?
I couldn’t agree with this more! It seems callous, but it is oh, so true. In my 8 years in business, I have only really had this come up three times, but you really do have to stand up for yourself when it does and just “fire them” *grin*
[...] What Does Great Customer Service Mean To You? [...]
The customer is NOT always right, but the customer is always the customer.
Find out what you can do to make the customer’s life easier, not your own. I’m sorry but Customer Service is a lost art.
“Hi. May I help you?”
“No thanks, I’m just looking.”
“Okay.”
Rinse and Repeat.
Changing just that initial first question could easily bring up sales 20% and that’s the truth.
— Some 18 yo “Kid”
Hi “Kid”!
I agree that customer service is a lost art — and I think it’s been lost on both sides of the fence.
But I don’t think the issue is failing to offer assistance upon first contact or or ask “would you like fries with that” when closing the deal, in most cases.
Many businesses have lost sight of their purpose, which should be to provide the product or service that the customer needs. But I also think that many people have lost the ability to be good customers.
I agree that businesses should do everything possible to provide the product or service that the customer needs. But when the customer refuses to be helped by the company, within the framework that the company has setup to provide said products and services, then the customer has chosen to stop being a customer.
At that point, the customer needs to find another company. And if the customer refuses to do so, and insists that the company change their entire process for the one customer’s convenience (and at no extra charge!) then the company needs to fire that customer and instead spend their time providing the best services and products to the people whose needs they CAN meet.