Have you ever noticed that people tend to mirror each other’s behaviors? When a customer behaves in unpleasant ways, it’s not always easy to maintain a positive demeanor. If you get emotionally hooked, the conflict plays out much like a dance.
He snips at you. You snap back. He yells, “Yes, you can,”? and you bark, “No, we can’t.” The more charged you feel, the less control you have over the situation and the next round of the dance escalates.
By taking a resourceful approach, you can lead an upset customer back to a calmer place. Your choice of words, tone of voice, and body language can have a profound influence on the way your customers behave when they are upset.
The more proficient you are at managing your emotions, the easier it will be for your customers to calm down, too. When you are able to remain calm – not to be confused with cold or indifferent – you’ll feel better and have more control over the outcome of the situation.
Like a dance, when you change the steps, the customer will adjust and try to match your movements. Sometimes it’s as simple as reminding yourself that, “This isn’t personal,” or “I have the skills to manage an angry customer.”?
Sometimes you can stop hostile feelings before they even start by using your creativity. A small store had frequent trouble with parents leaving their children unattended. Asking, “Will you please keep track of your kids?” can come across as rude or abrasive. One clever employee put up a sign that read, “Unattended children will be given an espresso and a free puppy.” The humor of the sign got the message across in a friendly way.
While I was interviewing David Dworski from Custom Learning Systems for our soon-to-be-complete customer service book, he made an interesting observation about a giant home improvement store. He noticed that their customer service was typically low to non-existent. He explained, “You could be lying on the floor in cardiac arrest and they’d walk right over you.” The way a retail establishment’s staff behaves influences customers behavior and in this case, customer response meant finding a new place to shop. Once this trend was discovered, major changes started happening at this particular store. The last time David stopped in, he was surprised to find attentive staff approaching him to see if there was anything they could do to make his shopping experience better.
What do you think? Think back to a time when you had a rough exchange with another person, at work or at home. How might it have gone better if you had stayed calm. What can you do next time to better manage your emotions?
written by Marilyn Suttle on www.whosyourgladys.com
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