5 Tips for Dealing with Difficult Customers

By Sharon Lee

With the good comes the bad and, in business, this sometimes means having to deal with difficult customers.

"The customer is always right" is a common adage but, as any experienced vendor knows, perhaps as the consequence of a painful experience, is an adage that’s untrue—your customers can be wrong and, indeed, can be wrong often.

What is true, however, is that the customer is always the customer, even if they are ill-informed, inexperienced or downright deceptive. And their status as customer, and source of your livelihood, dictates that you try your best to interact effectively with them.

But even simple personality differences can cause friction that, over time, risks destroying business relationships. And keeping a positive attitude when you must overcome feelings of frustration, dislike or distrust, can be especially challenging.

In this post I’m going to examine five communication skills that can enhance relationships with even your most difficult customers.

1. Listen

True listening is a disappearing art but, in order to communicate effectively with anyone, it's an imperative. 

Although the ear is only the organ that delivers sound waves to the brain, a good listener also engages their heart and mind. They do not allow themself to become distracted, but focuses on the speaker. 

They don't formulate answers before the speaker completes a statement. Nor do they give the appearance of being defensive.

2. Accept

Accept what the customer says at face value, even if you think they are wrong. They think they are right, and perception is the most important thing. 

If they perceive that you accept and believe them, they will be more likely to relax and get to the point. 

A common hallmark of strained interactions is that the main bone of contention is saved for last. The complainant will build up to their real issue by talking about the peripheral ones first. And that also allows them to build a mountain of anger out of their molehill of frustration.

3. Respect

If the customer receives respect from you, they will likely return it. If they feel disrespected, it will be perceived as a personal attack. 

Remember, you can learn something from anybody, regardless of education level, financial situation, or physical appearance. Everyone deserves respect simply for being human.

4. Empathize

You can offer sympathy to someone who is having a problem, but empathy will go much further toward achieving your goals. 

Put yourself in the customer's place - wouldn't you be disgruntled or angry, or even fearful, if a product or service didn't perform according to its advertising or worse, caused some type of damage or injury?

5. Negotiate

If you successfully employ listening, accepting, respecting and empathizing, you will pave the way for negotiating. 

You will have put the difficult person at ease and they will be better prepared to drop their aggression and enter into negotiations, more confident of being treated with fairness, honesty and integrity.

Summary

Always try to resolve a customer's issue with one conversation—the quicker the issue is resolved the better the customer will feel about the interaction.

The reality is that problems will occur. Allow yourself to learn from difficult customers in a way that helps strengthen your business and increases the probability of your overall success.

You just may begin to be grateful for the difficult customers out there every now and again.

Thank for reading. 

What are your tips for dealing with difficult customers?