If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my News feed or get updates . Thanks for visiting!

In keeping with the spirit of giving your local customers the right impression, let’s delve for a second into a problem that many small business owners have: customer frustration. Actually, believe it or not, there are a thousand ways to frustrate a customer. However, I only want to talk about one.

Over Promising and Under Delivering

So, I take my car down to the dealership for some work to be done. I’m proud of my car; I love to drive it. I look really cool in it and it makes me feel young(er). The service rep tells me it will take a day to get the parts, then a morning to get them installed. So, if I will leave it, they can have it ready by Friday. I’m bummed, but, if it’s going to keep making me look good, it has to run good. I agree, call for a lift and I’m off. I’m a little happier now, knowing I’m taking good care of it.

Friday rolls around and I call the service office. No, they won’t get the parts until 10:00 a.m. this morning, so, they’ll have to keep it until Monday. I’m pretty aggravated at this point. I tell the guy they told me Friday. He says, “Sir, I don’t know who told you that, but sometimes it takes longer to get the parts.” As controlled as I possibly can I say, “[Mister Service Man’s Name], YOU told me that. I dropped the car off to you.” Silence.

Whatever…I was setup from the get-go for frustration. Here’s a couple of bullet point thoughts:

• If he knew sometimes the delivery for parts was not accurate, why didn’t he tell me that up front?
• If it got delayed, why didn’t they call me?
• Why didn’t he apologize or try to comp me something to make me feel better about their service?

It’s a little thing called “Service Recovery”, Mr. Service Man … you might want to read up on it. It goes miles towards keeping that customer you just hacked off.

So, how do you frustrate your customers?

Are you making them wait longer than you told them? (How much harder would it be just to change what you tell them?) Are you making your employees use a process to move the customer through that is frustrating to everyone involved? (Change it.) Does getting service from you take a lot of effort for them? (Make it easier.) Are your employees challenging to your customers? (Train them or replace them.)

Hey, they can go down the street and get frustrated too … maybe for cheaper.

I dare any small business owner in the Knoxville area (or from anywhere else, really) to click on the comments link below and share how you’ve frustrated your customers and what you’re doing to make it better. Let’s learn from each other.

Build it and they will leave you…

On a side note, when it comes to websites, nothing is more frustrating than visiting one that isn’t maintained or contains the wrong (or not enough) information. Listen, people are actually accustomed to using the web to find out LOCAL information. If your website doesn’t have the information or services that people expect, they will leave it.

Oh, and there’s a good chance they searched Google for your services and will click back to another local website for a company that has the right information on it. BOOM, you just lost a customer.

image: phunkstarr

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
What are your thoughts? Post a comment and let's talk.

Do you have questions about what how you can leverage the Internet to improve your customer experience and boost your company's performance? Just ask.