{"id":11225,"date":"2013-02-20T07:00:33","date_gmt":"2013-02-20T14:00:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/?p=11225"},"modified":"2013-01-14T14:22:45","modified_gmt":"2013-01-14T21:22:45","slug":"what-to-do-when-you-cant-say-yes-to-your-customer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/?p=11225","title":{"rendered":"What To Do When You Can\u2019t Say Yes To Your Customer"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Moments<\/a>One of the most negative situations one can create with a customer is to say \u201cno.\u201d In general, people hate to be told \u201cno.\u201d\u00a0 It starts when we are little kids and our parents constantly scream \u201cNO!\u201d at us. But sometimes saying \u201cno\u201d is unavoidable. In Karen Leland & Keith Bailey\u2019s excellent book, Customer Service for Dummies<\/i>, they cover a number of reasons you would have to say \u201cno.\u201d Let\u2019s cover some major reasons why we would have to say \u201cno,\u201d and what we can or cannot do about them.<\/p>\n

It is the law<\/b> – Sometimes you are asked to do something and agreeing to do it would break a law. This one is simple. Most customers should be comfortable with the reason.<\/p>\n

It is company policy <\/b>– I hate being told someone can\u2019t do something because of \u201ccompany policy.\u201d\u00a0 One Saturday evening my wife and I ventured to a restaurant known for great food at reasonable prices. I decided to try the pork special, which included potatoes and vegetables. I asked what the vegetables were. The waitress told me string beans and corn. Well, I love corn, but hate string beans, and I asked if I could have extra corn instead of the string beans.\u00a0 The waitress said they do not substitute.\u00a0 So, I asked her just to leave the string beans off. She told me she couldn\u2019t do that either. I asked why. She said it was their policy. I told her that at McDonalds if I don\u2019t want a pickle, they leave off the pickle. She looked at me like I was nuts! The dinner came with the string beans and we never went back.<\/p>\n

We are out of it <\/b>– A company can be out of a part. The book store can be out of a best selling book. A movie theater can be sold out of seats. It is all the same. You have to tell the customer you don\u2019t have any more. So, what do we do? Let\u2019s take a lesson from Nordstrom\u2019s. Legend has it that a customer wanted something that Nordstrom\u2019s was out of. The employee asked the customer to come back in fifteen minutes. Meanwhile the employee ran to another store in the mall, paid retail for the item and brought it back to Nordstrom\u2019s where it was sold to the customer as if Nordstrom\u2019s had the item all along. Great solution when you can do it, but sometimes it is not that easy.\u00a0 One of my retail clients will actually send the customer to the competition, but not before they call the store and have it held in their customers name. Most of the time the customers are appreciative, seeing that the store is more interested in taking care of the customer than making sale. In the long term, the store gains the customer\u2019s loyalty and trust. Sometimes you just have to resort to telling the customer when the item will be back in stock. Just make sure you honor your promise. If you say it will be in next Tuesday, it had better be in.<\/p>\n

It just can\u2019t be done<\/b> – Sometimes a customer wants something that just can\u2019t be done or is impossible to get. It is that simple. Your goal should be to educate the customer why you can\u2019t get them what they want. However, if you are really good, you could try to help find it somewhere else, or maybe find a replacement.<\/p>\n

Yes isn\u2019t good enough<\/b> – Sometimes giving the customer what he\/she wants doesn\u2019t ensure the customer will be happy with you. I remember pulling into a parking lot which had some open spaces I could see from the street only to be told they were full. I argued that I saw open spots. The attendant argued that there weren\u2019t any. He refused to look, even though I told them exactly where they were. After five minutes of arguing, he finally agreed to look. Sure enough he saw the spaces I had seen from the street. He angrily waved me in. Even though I got my parking space, I was mad. He \u201cgave in,\u201d but he did it too late.<\/p>\n

Saying \u201cno\u201d isn\u2019t so bad <\/b>– No, might not be so bad.\u00a0 One day I went into one of my favorite places, Baskin Robbins, the well known ice cream parlor. I was excited to order my favorite flavor, Quarterback Crunch. To my disappointment, they were out of that flavor. The girl dishing out the ice cream told me what her favorite flavor was and asked if I wanted to try it. I did and guess what? I now have a new favorite flavor! Substitution is a viable alternative to many situations. Sometimes it may be obvious, while other times you may have to take a creative approach. With the right attitude, you may find that saying \u201cno\u201d is an opportunity to show how good you are.<\/p>\n

So the next time you are forced to say \u201cno\u201d to a customer or client, think of the above.\u00a0 Delivering great service and creating Moments of Magic<\/i> have always included common sense thinking and flexibility.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One of the most negative situations one can create with a customer is to say \u201cno.\u201d In general, people hate […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1542,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"give_campaign_id":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[124],"class_list":["post-11225","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-miscellaneous","tag-customer-service"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11225","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1542"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11225"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11225\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11240,"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11225\/revisions\/11240"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11225"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11225"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/svapm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11225"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}