Transcripts
1. Intro to Etsy Communication Strategies: Hi, my name is Alicia and you are joining my
class on how to build and drive business by creating exceptional
customer service. I am a small business owner. By providing exceptional
customer service, I have been able
to create more of a buzz and more referrals, more word of mouth business. If you follow these steps, you will increase your
traffic and create a more steady business.
Is this class for you? Well, it is for you if
you meet three criteria. Number one, are you a small
business owner or are you looking to become a small
business owner one day? If this describes you,
then that's great. A lot of the concepts that
I will be covering are tailor made for e commerce
online businesses, but they can be applied to brick and mortar stores as well. Number two, are you looking to build a brand of excellence
and high quality? If so, keep listening. Number three, it's really only for you if you're
looking to get more business. If you're looking to get more,
then continue listening. Okay. Your class project
is to brainstorm three ways that you can delight your customers
and create raving fans. Just three. Post your ideas
under the Project tab and I'll take a look and we will continue brainstorming
together. Thank you.
2. How to Communicate with Customers Online: Welcome back. We are going
to start with the basics and cover the importance of
proactive communication. This is essential because
as the business owner, it is your responsibility to make sure that you are managing the customer's expectations
and that you are proactively reaching out to them to make sure that you are
on the same page. It is never the client's responsibility
to reach out to you. You need to proactively reach out to them and
make sure that you're good through every step of the
process. Now, I have four. Do you guys like
how I'm doing this? I have four basic rules or suggestions that I
want you to follow for this proactive
communication. Number one is that I
want you to realize that there is no such thing
as too much communication. You can never overcommunicate. I have had as many as 150
individual E mail responses back and forth to brides
when we're trying to finalize the details
of her wedding day. Look, now hopefully all of your clients won't require
this much back and forth, because that would be quite
expensive for you to do. But from time to time, for your very high end
clients or people who are investing a lot of money in something
that you're giving, you will need to have
that extra detail and that extra level
of communication. I also think that
this is especially important for an online
e commerce space store. Because if you
think about it with a regular purchase that
you make from a retailer, somebody has a physical address
that they know is there. And if they're not
happy with the product, they can just come
back in and return it. They have a place
that they can go to, but when you're doing
business online, you don't have this
built in guarantee. The fear in the back of the customer's head is
always that you're going to run off with their money
and it's a valid fear, right? You have to go above
and beyond to make sure that you are proactively
communicating with the customer. You can communicate via E mails, you can communicate
via text, phone calls. Photos are another
really great way, especially for creative, handmade businesses or something where you're doing a
commissioned piece, Send photos of progress, or take a short video of
the product along the way, and send it to the customer
to get their feedback. At that point, they're able
to make changes if needed, tell you what they like, tell
you what they don't like. Also, make sure to send an e mail after somebody
makes a purchase with you. It doesn't have to be a boring thank you for your
business e mail. You can jazz it up
a little bit by adding little bits
about your business and about how they are supporting a small business and what
makes their product unique. You can make it more
interesting than just the standard
canned responses that you see a lot of times. Okay, that was number one. No such thing as too
much communication. Number two is I want you
to have policies in place. Shop policies are essential to building trust
because once again, people have this
fear that you're going to run off their money. But if you have
policies in place, you're able to answer a lot of the questions that people have. Like what happens if I don't like the piece that
I bought from you? How do returns work? How do exchanges work? How do I care for this product? If it's a custom
piece of jewelry, how do I care for this piece? You need to answer some of
these common concerns that people are already thinking
about in your policy. This really is a great way to build trust
with your clients. Okay. Number three, I really want you to be
prompt your responses. I'm going to give
you a rule of thumb that might seem unachievable, but I promise you
it is achievable. Try your best to respond
to customers within one to 2 hours of their inquiry if they're sending it to you within
normal business hours, sometime 9-5 Monday
through Friday, Monday through Saturday, whatever your
business hours are, this is totally possible. And once again, it builds
that trust because they realize that their message
is important to you, that you value it, that
you are jumping on it to make sure that their
questions are answered. This is a great way
to build trust. You might be thinking, I can't
do this if I have to stop. Every time a customer
sends me a message, I'm not going to
get anything done. Well, you can set up systems in place that
help you with this. For example, on
my Facebook page, I have an auto responder set up that automatically replies to
anyone who has an inquiry. And it says, thank
you for your message. I want to let you know that
I received it. I got it. And I will get back to you
within 24 hours or something. I make sure to respond within that time frame
that I've given them. You can also set this up, like sometimes I'll be on
a business buying trip or maybe I'll be with
my family And I'm just not at a place
where I can go into depth and respond in
detail to a customer. Say a customer reaches
out to meet on Es, which is an online platform. You can just have
a canned response that's one or two
sentences that says, hey Jessica, I got your message. I want to let you
know that I got it. I'm not in my studio right now, but I'm going to get back to you within such and
such a time frame. That way you're letting
them know that you got it, taking the pressure
off yourself, you're buying yourself
some more time and letting them know
that you're going to take a closer look at it later. Number four. This
is my final tip. That seems like an obvious one, but it is something that
you can always improve. You are in charge of managing your customer's
expectations. This starts from the moment
that they see your website, or the moment that
they hear about you all the way
past to when they order something from you and they're wearing it or
they have questions. It's managing the
customer expectations is throughout this whole process and I can't emphasize
how important that is. You can't get inside of
your customer's head. There are so many times when
I want to, but you can't. If you're sensing that you're on a different
page somehow, then it's important for you to call that out until you can figure out and make sure that you are both
on the same page. This comes up a lot in regards
to budget for custom work. Brides will want to commission a custom veil that is really elaborate and they'll
say they want beating and Soski crystals
and French lace. They want everything. They want genuine pearls and they need
it all within a $200 budget. It is up to me to then respond
to the client by saying, I can make you something
beautiful within $200 budget. We will have to simplify in a bit to keep it
within that budget, But I will work with you to make sure that
it's something beautiful and elaborate and one of a kind up a lot in regards
to money and budget. And it's important to manage these expectations
on the front end before you've invested a lot of time going back and
forth with a person. Because if they
have expectations where you're not going to be able to fulfill
those expectations, it's better to figure that
out sooner rather than later. To sum everything up, this lesson, we talked about the importance of
proactive communication. The points were, number one, there is no such thing as
too much communication. Number two, set
firm shop policies. And even if you have
policies in place right now, take 5 minutes, go through them, make sure
that they're all up to date and they're accurate. It's worth that time. Number three, be prompt
in your responses. Always get back to customers, hopefully within one to 2
hours, but if you can't, let them know, number four, manage your customer
expectations. All right. Thank you.
3. Brainstorming how to Personalize: Welcome back. Let's talk
about personalization, the importance of
making the experience personal and customized to
that individual client. Now, why is this important? Why is it necessary to
personalize the experience? Well, in an online experience, if you have an online store, it is especially essential to personalize the experience
because they can't see you, they can't hear you, they can't see your face, They can't sense your emotions. So you need to go out of the way to create
that personalization. Your customer needs to realize that you are a real person. And I'm telling you, it
seems like in my experience, the more personalization
that I can do, the less rudeness you get in
return, if that makes sense. Have you ever noticed
that people who are in a strictly
online setting, like an online forum or
Facebook or something, have a much higher
likelihood of being rude. I have found that this is so true because people
feel anonymous. Whereas if a person
sees you face to face, it's a little harder
for them to be rude by creating this
personalization. You also have the
double benefit, not only of making that person feel valued and
important and seen, but you also cut
down on the risk of really negative
customer interactions if for whatever reason they're
unhappy with the product. And that's always a plus. Well, I'm going to have
five tips for you on how you can help build this personalization
into your process. Number one, always call
your customers by. This is so important, especially when you are dealing with e mail or some sort of
electronic communication, Whether it's text,
they can't see you, they can't hear emotion. I mean, you can have emoticons
and that sort of thing, but those get old after a while and they don't
seem very professional. But whenever you are
reaching out to a client, address them by name. Hi, Mary. Hi, Stephen. Hi, Stephanie. Whatever their name is, have it in every single
communication back and forth. Now, when you're face
to face with a person, you actually can go
overboard with this. If you keep using a person's
name over and over, it can actually seem
a little bit sleazy, a little bit salesperson like you're trying to get
into their good graces. But it's almost impossible
to go overboard on this when you're dealing with electronic
communication. Always put their name in
there. It's really easy. It's simple. Number two
is what I'm calling the importance of box in every communication
with your clients. You are not just
going to get down to business at some point
in that e mail message. You need to build that no
like and trust factor. Because people do not buy from people that they do not
know like and trust. So you need to ask a personal
question about them. You need to somehow tie in something that
you know about them that expresses your genuine
interest in them as a person. This can be really
simple because sometimes you don't know
who your customers are, you don't know a
whole lot about them. Say it's coming up on
Christmas, just say, I'm hoping that you and your loved ones are having
a very merry Christmas. Say that you know that the woman you're
talking to is a mom. Say, wishing you a
happy Mother's Day. Now, if you know a
little bit more about the clients and you've been
talking for a period of time, this can be easier to add in the box A because you
know more about them. So for example, say
that you know that the person is a student and
that they had final exams. Well, in your next
message to them, say a couple of weeks later, say how was the final exam,
you know, how did you do? And then get onto the
business aspect of it. The way you have
to think about it is if you were to reach out to a close friend
or to a family member, would you just immediately get down to business and be like, boom, boom, boom, we have
to cover these topics? No, you never would. Instead,
you would find out how that person is doing and
you'd say, how were the kids? You would bring in some sort of element that personalizes
the experience so that you're building that no like
and trust factor number three is I want you to
find a me to moment. Now maybe you're asking
what is a me to moment? Basically, that is where you're
pointing out that the two of you are similar
in some aspect. Why is this important?
Well, people like people that are like them. It creates a sense of trust. If the client mentioned
something that's similar to you, maybe you both went
to the same school, You both had the same degree, you studied the same
thing in school. Maybe you both live
in a similar area. I want you to bring this up. A way that I do this a lot
with clients that I don't know well is I'll be shipping them samples
and I'll find out that, hey, they live in Orange County, too, and I live
in Orange County. I will point that out
and I'll be like, I'm right down the
street from you. Literally 10 minutes. We're
practically neighbors. I don't want you to fake this me to moment
because I want you to be authentic and I want you to only express it if it's
actually accurate, so you don't lie about
it. It's not worth it. But what you can do is if a
me to moment presents itself, I want you to call it out. Number four, you have to
have a handwritten note. This era of electronic
communication. A handwritten note
that you put in with each order that goes out
goes such a far away. Handwritten notes are few
and far between these days. It is a dying art. I want you just to
spend 3 minutes max, on a handwritten note that
you're sending out with every order in it includes some of the box A that
we talked about in our previous message where you are mentioning something
that's personal. Wishing you the
best on your exams, I hope it's heated up over there in New Zealand or wherever
this person is from. You're mentioning something that you've already discussed in your previous conversation and you're personalizing it to them. This is a really cost
effective way of creating that
emotional connection and personalization experience. Last one is number five. You can always hop on a
ten minute phone call, a ten minute Skype message, and let your customers
know this is an option. That you are willing to
go the extra mile and Skype with them so
that you can make sure you're both
on the same page. If you don't feel comfortable giving out your phone number, get a Google voice number so that everything is anonymous. But this can really
help you when a person sees you face to
face and you talk via phone, it can smooth out a lot of the miscommunications and it makes that person feel valued, love and like they're not
just one of 1 million. They are important to
you and they really are. They are helping you
grow your business. They should feel
important. Thank you.
4. Creating Memorable Moments: Welcome back. Let's
talk about creating memorable moments or defining moments in your
customer's experience. The funny thing is your
customers are going to remember these little moments in their experience with you, rather than the end product or the end service
that you provide. Now of course, they're going to expect that the
product or service that they buy from you
meets a certain quality. But the thing that they are
really going to remember are the individual defining moments that you provide throughout
this experience. This is backed up by
research actually. There's this great book called
Power of Moments by Heath. In it they talk about
a hotel, real hotel. This is true. It's called
the Magic Castle Hotel. Apparently, it's
not the best hotel. It doesn't have the most
amazing accommodations, average, average. But this hotel has really excelled at
creating defining moments. What they do is guests at this
hotel can go to the pool, and they have a big red
phone there by the pool. At any moment during the day, guests can go over to
this big red phone. They can pick it up, and on the other end
they'll hear hello, Popsicle hot line.
How can I help you? At that point, the guests can put in their order for any flavor of popsicle
that they'd like, whatever is their favorite. And a few minutes later, one of the hotel's employees will come out with
white gloves on carrying a silver platter with the popsicle
of their choice. Now, the most amazing thing is this hotel is just average. It's not like it's
so exceptional, but what they do excel at
are the small moments such as the popsicle hot line
that exceed expectations. And that have their
guests talking about them for months
to come and guess what it is that they talk
about when the guests go home and their neighbors and
relatives say, how is the trip? Well, they talk about
the popsical hot line. This is what I want you
to do in your business. And this goes along with
what your project is. You need to create a project where you are starting
to brainstorm three ways that you create defining moments
for your customer. And these are the
moments that are going to build word of mouth and
really give you more business. Now this goes along with
the quote by Maya Angelou, which says that people
will forget what you said. They will forget what you did, but they will never forget
how you made them feel. So how do you want your
customers to feel? For me at one blushing bride with my custom wedding feels, I want my brides
to feel beautiful. I want them to feel
gorgeous and valued. In a culture where women are told that they're not beautiful and
they're not valued. That is my goal. What is
the goal in your business? What do you want your
customers to feel? And what are the small
defining moments that you can do to create
that experience? Now keep in mind this does not have to be something
that breaks the bank, the popsicle hot line. I mean, they're paying hardly anything at all for these popsicles that
they're giving out. It doesn't have to be
something that is expensive. In fact, I would recommend not
doing something expensive. We don't want to break
the bank with this. It is more about the
thought that goes into it. So I want you to start
brainstorming ideas. We live in such an experience
based culture these days, Even for businesses that are
providing an end product, such as clothing, jewelry, or a service, such as web design,
accounting or something. All of these
businesses still need to provide an experience because people expect to have an experience whenever
they work with a business. And this is what's going to make you stand out from the rest of the businesses just to kind
of get the juices flowing. I'm going to tell you
some of the things that I have done in the past. I continue to experiment
with this and try to get better at it because there's
always room for improvement. But this is just to kind
of get you thinking. And the things that I do is if I'm meeting with
a client one on one, say they're coming to
me and we're meeting at a coffee shop to talk about
her vision for her wedding, I will surprise her. By stopping at the local French
bakery that we have here. They have these delicious
filed pastries. They're absolutely heavenly,
they're to die for. I'll just pick up
one. I pick up one. I have it in the nice
little French packaging, and I give it to her because
she has taken the time to meet with me and
Bride's time is valuable. And it's amazing how
this $2 pastry can go a long way to really creating
that exceptional moment, even if the bride doesn't
really have a sweet tooth. Just the fact that I
would think of her and go to that extra work
really makes an impact. Something else that I
do is I try to create a defining moment with the packaging that
I do for my veils. So I have nice white boxes with white, sturdy tissue paper. I have beautiful double sided, kind of a pinkish satin
ribbon and custom logos. I have veil care instructions and a beautiful handwritten note that ties in whatever
that bride and I have been talking about over
the past few months, or however long our
correspondence has been. And this is supposed
to create a moment that she remembers,
that defining moment. I've even had brides
put the elements of the packaging of their veil
into their wedding scrapbook that shows you how
important that moment is of when she's opening her box and it's the anticipation of
what is going to be inside. How can you incorporate that in your own packaging and doing it creatively so that you're not breaking the bank for me. I have lots of extra scraps
of Tool lying around because Tool is the fabric that is used for wedding veils. So I have so much tools. So Tool is part of the packaging that I use to wrap up my veils. Actually, it creates
a really nice bow. So what do you have laying
around that can create a really nice experience and
package for your clients? Now, I want you to brainstorm in some ways
that you can do this. And I also want you to remember
that this is a process. I remember back when I was first starting my business and I
was even more on a budget, I didn't understand this at
all, and I thought, well, as long as the veil
is beautiful enough, good quality, then my
brides will be happy. That's not the case. So
I had this one client. I was fresh out of boxes, and so I went to my
garage and I picked out a nice clean dirt
on it, a nice box. The problem was that
it was a shoe box. And I packaged the veil
up inside the shoe box. And I sent it to my
bride. And guess what? She was not happy that her veil was packaged
in a shoe box. And understandably so, I
wouldn't want to receive my veil in a shoe box even
if it is a clean shoe box. So the reason I'm sharing this fail story of mine is so that you know that you're not going to get it
right all the time. But just being aware
of how you can create these experiences will help you. And I want you to start
thinking about how you can implement this into
your own business. Maybe it's even
with something like a sign off that you do at the end of every e
mail, for example, a lot of people just sign
off their e mails by saying best their name, It's a little boring, it's a little generic. Maybe you can come up with
something that's special, something that's unique for me. I have a couple of
different sign offs, but what I use a lot is with anticipation for
your special day, Alicia, which is my name. You can also start to brainstorm different sign offs
that you can use, something that makes you stand
out and shine. Thank you.
5. Rule of Reciprocity : This lesson is on
the power of free. There is so much power in
offering something for free. It makes people get all
excited and jump up and down, and feel like they're
getting a bargain. In this lesson, we're going
to learn about something called the Rule of reciprocity, which you can read more about in the book by Robert Cialdini. It is called Influence the
Psychology of Persuasion. But I'm going to give you
just a short summary of what this is and how you can
apply it to your business. The rule of reciprocity says that whenever somebody
gives you something, you feel a need to
pay that person back. If somebody gives you
something for free, you have this desire and this urge to do or give
them something back. It's like they have
indebted you in some form. The funny thing is
that this applies even if you don't want
what that person gave you, even if you never asked
for it, it still applies. Now I'm going to go over a
couple examples of how people have used this in
business so that we have a clear idea as to how it works. So for example, you are
looking to buy a car. And you go into the car
salesman and take a look at their fancy red
porch, I don't know. The salesman offers you a soda and some refreshing and
light snacks for free. Why do they do this? It's
because they're hoping that by giving you this
free snack, this free soda, they are playing on the rule of reciprocity and that you are going to feel indebted
to pay them back by, hopefully, in this
case, buying their car. Another example, in the mail. Do you ever see those
charities who will print out free return address labels for you with your
address, your full name? They're laminated and
they're completely free. Why do they send these
to you for free? It's because when they do so, the rate of people who
will then donate to the charity goes way
up like skyrockets. I mean, it's just a smart
move to incorporate something for free for your
potential customers. So I want you to be the
first to give something in this relationship with
you and your customers. You don't wait for your
customers to buy from you. You are going to proactively offer something for free for me. I offer free samples. My brides don't pay for the
shipping of the samples. They don't pay for the material. It's completely free of charge. And I tell them that there
is no commitment involved, because there is no commitment. They can just have the samples and not ever purchase from me. But the hope is that I am
building on this rule of reciprocity so that the bride
then will gift me with the, with their business basically
by purchasing from me. I want you to think about
how you can in your business build on this rule of
offering something for free. Now, this can be
even in the form of a personalized
consultation of some sort. Maybe you offer 1 hour
of free services. Maybe you offer free
samples like I do. Maybe you offer some
sort of free advice. Or if you have a
subscription service, first month is free. You're trying to build up that rule of reciprocity
in the relationship. Now some of you are
probably thinking, well, how am I going
to budget for this? I don't, I don't have
the margins to pay for these free services
or the free products. This is something you have
to factor into your budget, put into your marketing budget, because it is a
form of marketing. Another thing that I've seen
people do is to include a free gift that is above and beyond what the customer
purchased in their order. I do this from time to time, but not as often, and you can personalize
this for your own business.
6. What to do with Negative Feedback: What do you do
with bad feedback? This is the horror of horrors
for small business owners. For me, when I was
just starting on Ets, I put so much pressure on myself to always get
five star reviews. I had built up over
405 star reviews. And I was getting more
and more pressure like I have to maintain this. But the truth is, if you are
in business for long enough, eventually you're going
to run into that client who cannot be satisfied,
who is unreasonable. And you just have
to let it roll off your back and accept that
you tried your best. Now, there are some steps
that I want you to take. If somebody does leave a
negative review for you. These are steps that I think
can prevent a lot of issues. This is what I do to this day. Something you must
keep in mind is that true customer service is shown when the
client is not happy. It is easy to be gracious and generous with clients who
are grateful for your work, who appreciate your
time and investment. But your true test as a
business owner and a person of exceptional customer
service is when a client is not happy and
when they are being rude. If you think through
these steps and what you're going to do ahead
of time, it can help you. Now I have a template that you will see in
the resources tab for a preset E mail that I sent to clients who have indicated that they
are not happy. You can customize it. And I customize it
for every person that expresses any
sort of unhappiness. But this is a good
starting point because it's professional, it's well laid out, and it's going to save
you a lot of time. So make sure to download that in addition to my other
resources that I have. Okay. I have a
three step process. If you log on to your site and you suddenly
see that somebody has left a negative review
and they don't like the product or they didn't like your service, what do you do? Well, the first step,
number one, always, always give yourself an hour
or two to think it over, to think about the situation, and to think up some creative
options or alternatives. Oftentimes, if you
respond right away, you might respond in
a way that is curt, that is unprofessional,
that is rude, and you never want to do that. Clients can be angry. But you as a business owner
must always be respectful. Must always be generous and
gracious in your replies. That is the mark
of a professional. I recommend giving yourself at least an hour or
two to think it over, to try to formulate your
response in your head. Number one, after you
give yourself some time, it's time to move on
to step number two, which is you need to
reach out to the customer who was unhappy and
offer a phone call. This can go a really long way. Give your phone number and say, I'd like to talk this
over with you in person. Sometimes people don't
want to do that, they just want to do
it electronically. And in that case, it's okay. Sometimes, especially people who are on a tight time frame, they really want to just jump
on a phone call with you. And you can alleviate a
lot of their concerns. You can allow them
to feel heard, You can allow them to vent. If they need to vent, it's just really important
that you reach out with a professional manner and offer to resolve
this with them. Number three, in your
response to them, you need to have
several options. You need to offer options for your customers to choose from. Because this makes them feel like it's more
in their court, like they are in control. You are still, you're not giving the customer
everything that they want, but maybe you can think of one or two creative options that will hopefully solve the issue. Oftentimes, this
can be an exchange. This can be a return with some sort of additional
credit to their account. Or perhaps you just
need to explain to the person how to appropriately use the
product that they bought. But if possible, you need
to formulate at least two, hopefully three,
creative solutions to the problem that
they're experiencing. And then you leave it
in their court and allow them to choose
which option they prefer. The most important
thing that you can do on certain sites like, I don't know if sites like ebay or websites
also offer this, but you can offer a
rebuttal to a client who offers anything below
a certain star level. Say somebody only leaves three
stars on C for your item. You're then able to leave
a rebuttal where you respond to the
customer's complaints. I never recommend
doing this until you try to reach out to the
client personally first. If at all possible, you want to resolve it directly
with the client. But if you are
unable to do that, eventually you can leave a rebuttal where
you leave a very professional well thought out response that is not attacking, but that sets the record
straight after you do this. I know after I had
my bad experience and I felt like none of it was my fault that it was totally the other
person's fault. I still want you to
take some time and to think about how you can take
this and learn from it. Even if you were only 1% at fault and the customer
was 99% at fault, how can you take this and
improve your system or improve your communication so that this doesn't
happen in the future? For me, my issue was that I
had for the length of veils, They are pretty standard. But after I had that issue
with that one bride, I now require my brides to give me their
own measurements. I don't make the veil based
on photos they send me. They have to tell me how
long they want their veil and then I make it according
to their specifications. So what is a change that you can make and how can you
learn from this experience, even if it's only that
you're learning to get a thicker skin and to
have more backbone. What did you learn
from the process? But 99% of the time you'll
be able to work it out with the client and come to an agreement that
works for both of you. That is a win win for both
of you. Just hang in there.
7. Final thoughts: What do you do
with bad feedback? This is the horror of horrors
for small business owners. For me, when I was
just starting on Ets, I put so much pressure on myself to always get
five star reviews. I had built up over
405 star reviews. And I was getting more
and more pressure like I have to maintain this. But the truth is, if you are
in business for long enough, eventually you're going
to run into that client who cannot be satisfied,
who is unreasonable. And you just have
to let it roll off your back and accept that
you tried your best. Now, there are some steps
that I want you to take. If somebody does leave a
negative review for you. These are steps that I think
can prevent a lot of issues. This is what I do to this day. Something you must
keep in mind is that true customer service is shown when the
client is not happy. It is easy to be gracious and generous with clients who
are grateful for your work, who appreciate your
time and investment. But your true test as a
business owner and a person of exceptional customer
service is when a client is not happy and
when they are being rude. If you think through
these steps and what you're going to do ahead
of time, it can help you. Now I have a template that you will see in
the resources tab for a preset E mail that I sent to clients who have indicated that they
are not happy. You can customize it. And I customize it
for every person that expresses any
sort of unhappiness. But this is a good
starting point because it's professional, it's well laid out, and it's going to save
you a lot of time. So make sure to download that in addition to my other
resources that I have. Okay. I have a
three step process. If you log on to your site and you suddenly
see that somebody has left a negative review
and they don't like the product or they didn't like your service, what do you do? Well, the first step,
number one, always, always give yourself an hour
or two to think it over, to think about the situation, and to think up some creative
options or alternatives. Oftentimes, if you
respond right away, you might respond in
a way that is curt, that is unprofessional,
that is rude, and you never want to do that. Clients can be angry. But you as a business owner
must always be respectful. Must always be generous and
gracious in your replies. That is the mark
of a professional. I recommend giving yourself at least an hour or
two to think it over, to try to formulate your
response in your head. Number one, after you
give yourself some time, it's time to move on
to step number two, which is you need to
reach out to the customer who was unhappy and
offer a phone call. This can go a really long way. Give your phone number and say, I'd like to talk this
over with you in person. Sometimes people don't
want to do that, they just want to do
it electronically. And in that case, it's okay. Sometimes, especially people who are on a tight time frame, they really want to just jump
on a phone call with you. And you can alleviate a
lot of their concerns. You can allow them
to feel heard, You can allow them to vent. If they need to vent, it's just really important
that you reach out with a professional manner and offer to resolve
this with them. Number three, in your
response to them, you need to have
several options. You need to offer options for your customers to choose from. Because this makes them feel like it's more
in their court, like they are in control. You are still, you're not giving the customer
everything that they want, but maybe you can think of one or two creative options that will hopefully solve the issue. Oftentimes, this
can be an exchange. This can be a return with some sort of additional
credit to their account. Or perhaps you just
need to explain to the person how to appropriately use the
product that they bought. But if possible, you need
to formulate at least two, hopefully three,
creative solutions to the problem that
they're experiencing. And then you leave it
in their court and allow them to choose
which option they prefer. The most important
thing that you can do on certain sites like, I don't know if sites like ebay or websites
also offer this, but you can offer a
rebuttal to a client who offers anything below
a certain star level. Say somebody only leaves three
stars on C for your item. You're then able to leave
a rebuttal where you respond to the
customer's complaints. I never recommend
doing this until you try to reach out to the
client personally first. If at all possible, you want to resolve it directly
with the client. But if you are
unable to do that, eventually you can leave a rebuttal where
you leave a very professional well thought out response that is not attacking, but that sets the record
straight after you do this. I know after I had
my bad experience and I felt like none of it was my fault that it was totally the other
person's fault. I still want you to
take some time and to think about how you can take
this and learn from it. Even if you were only 1% at fault and the customer
was 99% at fault, how can you take this and
improve your system or improve your communication so that this doesn't
happen in the future? For me, my issue was that I
had for the length of veils, They are pretty standard. But after I had that issue
with that one bride, I now require my brides to give me their
own measurements. I don't make the veil based
on photos they send me. They have to tell me how
long they want their veil and then I make it according
to their specifications. So what is a change that you can make and how can you
learn from this experience, even if it's only that
you're learning to get a thicker skin and to
have more backbone. What did you learn
from the process? But 99% of the time you'll
be able to work it out with the client and come to an agreement that
works for both of you. That is a win win for both
of you. Just hang in there.