Customer service is more than answering customers’ questions and complaints.
A community of users is more than setting up a forum where they can communicate with each other.
Customer focus is more than interviewing your customers on a regular basis.
Customer experience is more than asking customers how likely they are to recommend your brand.
And yet, that’s where most companies stop.
Sometimes you listen because you want to know. Sometimes you listen because you care.
It might seem like a minor distinction, but the questions, the attitude, the subjects are very different whether it’s one form of listening or the other.
When you listen because you want to know, your questions are direct and closed. You look for easy answers, answers you can process and understand instantly. It’s usually about trivial topics, and the act of listening is in fact a way to reassure yourself that everything is as it should be.
When you listen because you care, your questions are wide and open. You are not even looking for answers. If they come, they will probably impact the person giving them much more than they impact you. It’s usually about deep change, and the act of listening is a way to unlock new potential.
Most of the decisions we take bring change in other people’s lives, jobs, situations. And they might not be just ready to accept that.
When involving people in the decision itself is not possible, you need to at least allocate time for them to digest it, settle into it, and decide whether they are going to stick around or not.
And you need to be open to both outcomes.
We wonder what is acceptable, what is right, what makes a good wife or a good husband, what makes a good parent, a good friend, a good employee, a good colleague.
And while wondering that, we often take an outside perspective, as we put most of the emphasis on what others think.
But what is acceptable for us? What do we believe is right, wrong, good, fair, worthy of respect? Where do we draw our line? And what are we going to do to make it so others will accept that?
Those are way more interesting questions.
If you approach a customer support ticket, a negative review, a cancellation request with a defensive mindset, you will always fail.
When people approach you with a problem, they are not interested in hearing that it’s not your fault. They might be seeking a solution, a clean cut, a way to rant. Never will they want to hear a closing statement from your defence attorney.
What do you want to achieve and what do they want to achieve are two important things to consider in these cases.
You have a system to monitor your customers opinions because you want to know when things go wrong and try to remedy that, possibly changing people’s attitude towards your brand. Then why is it rarely your fault, why is confrontation often the go-to tactic, why is empathy the last thing that’s being taught to your people?
And on the other hand, customers do very often reach out because they care and they want to share. They are unsure about what happened, they are hurt because things did not work out as they expected, they want to know they have not done a terrible choice.
So, when you see a customer support ticket, a negative review, a cancellation request, keep in mind you are not there to prove a point.
You are just there to help the other move forward.
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