Annoying the Customer, Twice
When something goes wrong with your product or service the only natural reaction of the customer is to get annoyed. And then when you say she is in the wrong (not you) you just managed to annoy him for the second time.
Sure, things go wrong sometimes. No company is able to envision and design for every possible corner case. So it is safe to assume that some of your customers will get annoyed by you at some point in time.
Forming the negative Word of Mouth
Any such situation runs the risk of creating one story that sheds a negative light on your brand. Like I mentioned before negative WoM correlates with a lower overall income. In other words, the more people say bad stuff about your product or your brand, the less are your chances for profitable sales. Yet, as I said before, no brand, no company is immune to failures and therefore to form a basis for a less than a rosy story.
Solidifying the negative Word of Mouth
In its own defense, many companies try to blame the customer for whatever wrong has happened. They may say that she didn’t read the agreement well enough. That she did the procedure wrong. That she could have acted sooner.
What happens in such a situation? Already annoyed customer is getting annoyed for the second time — he is not only unhappy with whatever when wrong with the product, but he also feels called a liar or a at least a sloppy creature. So, the story forming in her memory, which might have been negative but passively so, becomes actively negative. Because (like in many other cases) the engagement with the story we form in our heads has a “U” shape. Only the strongly positive and the strongly negative stories are being shared with others as they evoke chemical reactions in our brains (whether dopamine or a cortisol shot).
So, instead of remedying the situation, the defensive posture of so many brands, makes things worse. They (often mindlessly) push their customers to become active detractors of their products or services. And for what? For making themselves feel better for one moment.
Is there a way out?
Surely, there is! And it’s very simple, too. And cheap (the cheapest investment ever): it just requires to say: — I am sorry. It doesn’t mean that the company immediately needs to admit that the fault is all on their side (unless it is the case, which would be the wisest thing to do). But if the fault is sort of fifty/fifty it is worthwhile to say: — Something went wrong, we will try to fix it or be more careful next time. It’s really not that hard and the results can be spectacular. Why?
Whenever an annoyed customer reaches out to a provider, she is 90% sure she will be blamed for the situation at hand. So, the “I’m sorry” strategy has a huge chance to at least positively surprise them. Such an approach at least builds a foundation for the customer to “risk” interaction with the brand once more. And the initial level of negativity is lowered, which is likely to push the story itself into the passive negative experience — not well remembered but also not worthy of being shared with others. Sounds like common sense? I agree. It would be awesome if it was used in practice more often, wouldn’t it?
__________________________________________________________________
Aga Szóstek, PhD is an experience designer with over 19 years of practice in both academic and business world. She is an author of “The Umami Strategy: stand out by mixing business with experience design”, a creator of tools supporting designers in the ideation process: Seed Cards and the co-host in the Catching The Next Wave podcast.
