If you’ve been in business long enough, there will come a
point in time when you or an employee will “drop the ball”. Mistakes happen and
not every situation will benefit from further reprimanding after the mistake
has been made. While your ultimate goal
is to avoid making the same mistake in the future, there are always new mistakes
to be made. In the meantime, you have to resolve the current problem if you
except to keep the customer. It’s a good idea to have a set of actions in place
to recover from this “ball dropping”.
First, own the mistake. If you made the mistake, admit it
and don’t pin the blame on someone else. If another employee made the mistake,
they should do the same. Customers and
supervisors alike respond better and recover more quickly when you skip all the
excuses and move on to solving the problem, which shows sincerity.
Next, ask the customer what you can do to make up for the
mistake. There are limitations to what you can offer them (one free meal is
reasonable, but you can’t hand over a $100 gift card), but work within those
limitations to give them something to show them you appreciate their business.
Finally, the hard part comes in—making the situation right.
You have to deliver on your promise, even if it means you are late or over
budget. Then go the extra mile to not only reassure them that his won’t happen
again, but make them feel like you can trust them. People remember bad service,
but they also remember excellent service. Mediocre, run of the mill service is
what will be forgotten. So chase down that ball, pick it up, and score some
points to get your team and your customer back on track. Make it happen!
© 2014 eMarketing 4 Business LLC
