This is how Cafe Coffee Day packed my sandwich once. While it was delicious, this is not how a higher-priced cafe packs its take-away food. It uses butter papers and tissues, not common newspaper. Experience has taught me that arguing with CCD staff never helps, because the manager fails to manage and their social media team effectively deletes complaints from the feed. As a result, I ended up posting about it on social media.
While I (being an unhappy customer yet a potential evangelist) ensured that the unfavorable word spread, this is horrible for the brand image. If you’re a growing small business surviving on word-of-mouth, it matters even more.
What does a customer want?
- To be served well – respectfully, while keeping the promises made.
- To be heard – patiently, with genuine concern.
- Not perfection – but accountability and sincerity.
You don’t do the above and the customer gets angry. The last thing you want is a social media rant, it is something you can neither delete nor control. And a rant usually spreads like wildfire.
How to salvage this situation?
- Do NOT delete the post (if made on your page, the screenshots exist and it will only get worse for you if you scamper away, nitwit)
- Do NOT be rude, defensive and critical of the customer (because the customer is ALWAYS right, especially on social media, and it will only get worse for you)
- Address the customer respectfully, acknowledge the mishap, offer to fix the situation, be genuine.
- Be prompt, show the world that you’re accountable and willing to face the complaints.
How to train your field staff?
Yeah well, “they don’t listen much”, do they? 🙂 But are you, as an organization, doing enough? I’m not well placed to advise CCD on what their action plan should be, but here are a few basic tips which should help companies having up to 50 employees.
- Focus on Basics – what to wrap food with, what not to wrap food with.
- Focus on Communication – how to address customers, how to address non-customers (beggars & non-paying visitors) in work premises, how to smile.
- Focus on Money – how to handle money, how to hold money.
- Focus on Feedback – how to handle feedback, what to do with feedback
Customer service above all.
No amount of money and fat brand image can survive an onslaught of angry customers. It is crucial for us to focus on quality of the service/product delivered and serve our customers well. The smallest things matter, and it’s best not to learn this the hard way 🙂
Aaaaand we have an update!
