Matt Eventoff on Mastercard Small Business
Win Over Your Most Difficult CustomersIt can be tempting to write off your most difficult customers as impossible to please. But how you handle temperamental patrons has a big impact on the way other customers and even employees perceive your business. Learn to support your staff in difficult situations—and still win over your toughest critics.
By Tara Remiasz
….Having a live operator to handle questions and complaints is key to diffusing a difficult or dissatisfied customer, says Matt Eventoff, president of Princeton Public Speaking, LLC, Princeton, N.J. Eventoff recommends going one step further with the personal approach and giving clients your personal cell phone number. “If you run a pretty small shop, everybody should be of value to you,” he says.
Although it’s a good practice to send difficult calls up the company hierarchy, absolutely never have someone lower on the chain respond to an issue than the original person who took the complaint, Eventoff says. If a complaint is bumped up to you, don’t strategize about how to diffuse the situation while the customer talks, he says. Instead, really listen to what he or she is saying.
