No matter how great your service is, there’ll always be clients that won’t be satisfied with it either because the client’s expectations are unrealistic or because you screwed or your team up. The point here is that you will encounter trouble or troublesome clients once in a while.
This is why this article gives you a few tips on how to handle a trouble or an angry client.
1.Demonstrate some empathy
When an irate customer begins to rant angrily, ignoring his anger will only fuel the fire. Instead, demonstrate some empathy by acknowledging his anger. Make him feel he has good reasons to be angry. This trick usually gets angry clients to calm down temporarily. A quick apology is a good way to start. However, the boring sorry about that may worsen the situation as it is riddled with insensitivity. Instead, you can say oh, am so sorry. If after apologizing, he still rants on, wait it out. Trying to interrupt him will explode because he’ll assume that you’re trying to shut him up. At this point, don’t get defensive, don’t make excuses, and don’t justify anything.
2.Jot down his grievances
You need to get down his grievances from his rants. First, this is likely to get him to calm down. When he notices that you’re writing something down, he may ask you what you are writing. If he does, tell him that you’re getting down the causes of the problem. Another reason to write it down is that asking him for the issue after his rant is likely to lead to another bout of ranting.
3.Seek clarifications
You need to be sure about the real issue. So, it is necessary to seek clarifications from the angry client. Use statements like if I get you correctly, the problem is.. The customer is likely to explain further or correct you if you got the issue wrong and will cool down in doing so.
4.Switch to possible solutions
Once the issue has been stated clearly, the next step is to let him know the steps you are planning to take to solve the problem. It will help to give a timeline if applicable. For instance, you can say something like now that I understand where the problem lies, I should be able to get it resolved within 24 hours. However, you should be careful enough not to promise what you can’t deliver as you will eventually make matters worse. Once the deadline lapses and the problem is not resolved, the client will either call you or storm your office again and this time, he’ll be even angrier.
5.Fulfill your promise
After explaining the best solution to the client and he agrees, the next step is to try to fulfill your promise. If you are able to resolve it, you have successfully handled a trouble customer. On the hand, if you need more time, it is better to contact the client to ask for more time. He is likely to get angered again but this is a better option than allowing him to storm your office before you tell him that the issue is yet to be resolved.
Conclusively, no matter how angry a client is, applying the 5 tips above will help to defuse the situation. In fact, the client may eventually become one of your biggest clients.