The Customer Isn’t Always Right

We’ve all heard the mantra the customer is always right, but what if they aren’t. And, not only that but what if the customer being “wrong” is affecting your ability to support the customers who are right and need your support? I grew up in the business world in the retail industry. It was in the days of the dinosaurs so the internet didn’t even exist, literally. In those days local or regional retailers lived and died by their brand reputation which was largely spread through word of mouth. So it was not uncommon to hear every good retail manager to reiterate the famous saying “the customer is always right”. The truth of the matter, even back then, the customer wasn’t always right. The tricky part is what to do when they are not.

In today’s highly connected world things will happen and a customer will get upset. It’s also likely they’ll tell their friends and their friend’s friends and so on via social media. It’s important to realize that this will happen and you need to have a plan to deal with it.

I also think it’s important to realize too that the customer won’t always be right and when they aren’t and they are actually hurting your ability to service your other customers or clients then it’s time to cut them loose. I don’t mean be disrespectful or unprofessional, but it is better to retain those customers that want to work with you through the issues than to have a customer that demands results on only their terms.

How will you deal with those sometimes unruly customers?