Never Explain, Defend or Justify

Posted by Kevin Stirtz on May 18, 2009

2 comments | 1266 reads

When a customer is complaining, it’s natural to want to explain why something went wrong. Sometimes it’s a defensive move; we’re deflecting the blame to the responsible person. More often though, it’s because we want to let them know we’re aware of the problem and it will not continue.

Assuring them you are fixing the problem is good. In fact it’s a must. But forget about explaining or defending or (gasp) justifying why things went splat. Don’t do it. It will not help. And it might make things worse.

Upset and complaining customers don’t want excuses. They want an apology, they want to vent and they want it fixed. So give them what they want.

As a customer, think of the last time you had a complaint and the employee tried to explain, defend or justify what happened. How did you feel about that? Did it help resolve the problem or not?

Kevin Stirtz

Kevin Stirtz is a web marketing consultant. He uses SEO, social media and local search strategies and tools to help businesses attract and keep more customers. He is a Certified Inbound Marketing Professional and has written two books about marketing and customer loyalty. Kevin lives in the Twin Cities metro area of Minneapolis and St. Paul, MN.

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2 comments »

Andrew Rudin

May 19, 2009

I Don't Care About Your Workflow

Kevin: Agreed. While it's a natural tendency for customer-service personnel to explain why a transaction went bumpity-bumpity-bump, for me the enlightenment doesn't "add value."

I don't care about what went wrong in the workflow beyond "the problem began in our receivables department," followed by "I'll get it fixed and we'll make sure it won't happen again. If it does, here's how you can contact me directly."

On the apology side, even that can be wasteful if it's indiscriminate. In a recent conversation with AT&T Mobility, the representative apologized so many times, it was sickening. I felt badly for her as the problem wasn't her fault--it was her superiors who created it through the extremely poor process design that the rep had to clean up after. It was clear that even the apologies were scripted. They shouldn't sound that way.

Kevin Stirtz

May 20, 2009

scripted apologies are indeed a waste

Andrews - I agree completely. I'd rather have no apology than an insincere scripted one. It makes the employee sound like a robot; like someone who does not care.

Kevin Stirtz
The Amazing Service Guy
www.amazingserviceguy.com
1-952-212-4681

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