Episode Transcript
[00:00:04] Speaker A: If you want more time, money, freedom, and have a business that's not reliant on you, then you're in the right place. Each week, Mark Creedon, along with some of the very best business minds in the world, will take you through simple, practical steps you can take to create the business you always wanted. From his own practical experience, Mark will show you how to work less, make more, and get the business you always wanted, the one that you deserve.
Now, here's your host, one of Australia's most sought after business coaches, Mark Creedney.
[00:00:53] Speaker B: Welcome to the latest edition of the Mastermind for Business podcast. I'm Mark Creedon, your host. Have you ever been in the situation where you've got a client that's complaining and it just seems that you or your team can't get them happy? You know, some people just go, I just can't make them happy. Maybe, just maybe, it's not them. Maybe, just maybe, it's you or your team. And really, it's probably not that you don't deliver. I'm sure it's not that you don't deliver great service or product. It's just that you're not following a great procedure for how to resolve complaints. That's what we're going to talk about in today's episode. Let's get that underway.
So we've all been in the situation where we've had complaints, things that just haven't worked out. We've complained about something. We've had customers that are complaining. And I want to talk today about a really simple four step process that's going to help you to resolve those customer complaints. More importantly, though, is Nick is back with us. Hello, mate.
[00:02:00] Speaker C: Good morning.
[00:02:01] Speaker B: Great to have you back from holidays, having spent some time with the fam.
[00:02:05] Speaker C: Great to be here.
[00:02:06] Speaker B: Yeah. And more family on the nick.
[00:02:08] Speaker C: Yes, yes. Another one in six, seven weeks.
[00:02:11] Speaker B: Right, so we're going to get you back for six weeks and then we're going to lose you again. Lose you for a bit of think. You know, we see that some people always complain, right. There's this thing about Karen's and all that sort of stuff. I'm going to put that to one side for a second. But some people always complain and some people you can't keep happy. But in the vast majority of cases in your business, a complaint will come and there is a solution to it. There is a way to solve it. So I read this great book called Jump Shift. So jump shift was written by Michael Sherlock and Ellen Anderson. They were the guys behind Brumby's bread chain. And there was some stuff in there that I'd kind of already seen elsewhere, but it was a great little reminder. That's what I love about these books, by the way. I love going into bookshops or jumping online. I love hearing what other people are reading and then getting some ideas from them as to what's a really good book to read. So if you want to have a look at this, it's sort of an a to z system around. Michael Sherlock and his team took Brumby's from a basket case to success over four years. So great book jump shift. Definitely worth a read. And I read that over the Christmas break while I was lying around, and it was a really good read. Love doing that, actually, you know, Nick, I was just thinking what we should do on this podcast is we should have, like, a little reading list where maybe once a month, I share with our listeners the books that I'm reading and what I think is a really good book for them to have a look at.
[00:03:43] Speaker C: Yeah, 100%. I think that would be really valuable.
[00:03:45] Speaker B: So, guys, jump shift. Now, here's the good thing. You can read it, or you can just listen to this podcast where we'll give you some of the details out of it. Let's talk about customer complaints. I remember. Can I tell a story, Nick? Of course. So I remember it's not too long. Sorry, not that long winded. It'll be all right. I remember when I married Caroline, we kind of had to cut on expenses as much as we could as you do, and we had to sort of do things as cheap as we could. So rather than hiring wedding cars, we actually hired rent a cars. And so we went to a rent a car company, and months in advance, I said, I'm going to pick these cars up at this time, and I need three white cars. And the guy went, yes, no issue. Definitely got three white cars. We'll book them. Not an issue. On the morning of the wedding, I don't know if you remember, I actually was running around buying you new shoes because you decided to tell me on the morning that your shoes didn't fit you. Oh, really?
[00:04:46] Speaker C: I don't remember.
[00:04:48] Speaker B: We had to take you out to a shoe store on the morning of the wedding and buy you new shoes. But I went with a couple of my mates who were in the bridal party to go and pick these cars up, and we got to the rent a car company, and the guy went, yeah, three cars, no worries. They're out the front there. And there was a blue one, a yellow one and a red one.
And I had actually phoned two days before and they went, yes, all good. No worries. Three white cars. All good. So a blue, a red and a yellow. And I said to the guy, mate, but do you know, like, I ordered three white cars, and I even checked two days ago, and he said to me, well, we don't guarantee it. We just say we'll do our best.
[00:05:31] Speaker C: That's not what you said originally.
[00:05:33] Speaker B: Right. It's not what he said originally. And it's not. He said two days beforehand. And he said, well, we can't guarantee things. All we do is do our best.
And I remember at the time thinking, well, that's right. But is that actually your best?
[00:05:46] Speaker C: Is that your best?
[00:05:47] Speaker B: Yeah. And if that is your best, is that good enough?
[00:05:51] Speaker C: It's pretty poor if it is.
[00:05:52] Speaker B: Right? So one of the things that I always say to people working for me is all I expect for you to do is to do your best. I don't expect anything else. I expect you to do your best. However, I do expect you to do your best.
If your best isn't good enough, then we got a problem. And that was where I think we had a problem.
What was really interesting about this is that I moved into solution mode. And so I solved it. And I said to him, well, you're not actually helping me here. Let me put it another way. Let me ask you another question. In the yard right now, do you have three white cars? Yes, I do. What's the issue? Said, they've only just come in and they're dirty. They need detailing. Great. I got three guys here. Where's the wash bay? Let's get in. We're going to wash and detail three cars, which is exactly what we did. And I have to give the franchisee of that particular car rental company credit because he went, okay, yes, that's a fair deal. And he rolled his sleeves up and got in hopus wash and clean cars.
[00:06:56] Speaker C: Nice.
[00:06:57] Speaker B: So I learned a lesson on that day and sort of got thinking about it and read more about it. And then it reminded me when I read the jump shift book of a really simple process. And that's the process that I want to talk about. And the way that I refer to it is, this is how you treat your clients, first, by treating them last.
This is how you treat your clients, by treating them last. And last is simply an acronym. And I'm going to work through that four step acronym now. And the first part is l is for listen, because Nick, have you ever been unhappy with a product or a service and you've gone in to talk to someone and you just felt like you haven't been heard?
[00:07:39] Speaker C: Like you're talking to a brick wall.
[00:07:40] Speaker B: Right? You're talking to a brick wall. They don't really care. I mean, I often say, do you know what? If you could just tell me that you don't give a damn, I'd actually prefer it. I'd prefer it. Because then at least we're being really honest with you.
[00:07:51] Speaker C: Unless you're not lying to each other anymore.
[00:07:53] Speaker B: That's right. Let's just get on with it. So it's about listening, right? And some research many, many years ago came out of the UK where it was that this survey that they did, I don't know how scientific it was, it didn't have control groups and things like that, but they surveyed a number of people and asked them, do they prefer the company of humans or dogs?
And the results were that the majority of people in that particular survey preferred the company of dogs. And for one reason and one reason only. Do you want to guess what it is?
[00:08:24] Speaker C: They listen.
[00:08:25] Speaker B: Yeah, 100% dogs listen. They don't try and talk over the top of you? No, they don't get distracted, they actually listen.
[00:08:35] Speaker C: There's also something about listening, which is there's another side to it as well. And there's people that pretend to listen where they just go silent want and.
[00:08:45] Speaker B: They let you say your piece, but.
[00:08:47] Speaker C: They'Re not actually letting what you're saying sink in. Then they might come back to you with something that's completely off from what you've just said, because they weren't actually listening.
[00:08:56] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:08:56] Speaker C: They may have been giving you the time and the space to get out. Your point? But they weren't actually listening.
[00:09:01] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:09:02] Speaker C: So there's a difference between pretending to listen and actually listening. So that makes a big difference as well. And I think a lot of you get a lot of, I guess, over the phone conversations and things like that, where you get that same sort of instance where they give you the silence to say your piece, but clearly by their response, they weren't actually listening to what you were saying.
[00:09:22] Speaker B: So, mate, you've raised a really good point and I got a task for you, if I can. I want you to remind me of that before we wrap this show up, because I want to get back to that, because there's some tricks into that. I've got a mate who I do a lot of business with and we talk over the phone and I can tell when he's not listening. Right. Because of the way he's responding. And so we'll get back to that and we'll talk about that. So number one is you go somewhere and they don't listen. The other thing they do because they don't listen is they tend to solve the problem that they think is the issue. So the risk you run is you actually solve the wrong problem. Yeah. Right. So if we go back to that car rental thing, number one guy didn't listen to me, but what I left out of the story is he said to me, we only say that we'll do our best. Look, what I'll do is I'll give you a $50 discount on each car.
Even though we were being careful with money back then, he wasn't listening. He was solving the wrong problem.
[00:10:31] Speaker C: No, that wasn't your problem.
[00:10:34] Speaker B: No. And $50 didn't mean anything to me. I know if I turned up in a blue, a yellow, and a red car, that would have meant something.
$50 wouldn't have solved that problem. Let me tell you.
Number one step is to actually listen. You've got to actively listen to the person that as they're telling the story. And you know what? I'm actually going to segue into what I asked you to remind me of now. So how do you show the person that you're listening? There's a really simple trick, and I've known this for years, but I was reminded of the other day. Yesterday on the plane I was flying back from Sydney, I was reading Matt mockery's book called I think, the great CEO within. And he was saying that when somebody tells you something, if you repeat it back to them by saying something like, okay, just let me get this right. What I'm hearing is, or can I just make sure I've understood as what I think you are saying is, because.
[00:11:37] Speaker C: Also sometimes can be lost in context and things like that as well. And you can maybe have a different perception of what someone's actually really saying.
[00:11:44] Speaker B: Yeah, you're right. It can also be lost in emotion.
[00:11:47] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:11:47] Speaker B: Because often when people coming to complain, there's emotion involved. I mean, 100%. If we go back to my little story, the guy at the time looked at my groomsman and he looked at, pointed to me and went, I guess he's the groom. Right. Because I was the one who was most vocal. Sure. And so it can often get lost in emotion. So number one step in this four step process is to listen. And the way you show that you're listening is there's a number of ways. Number one, eye contact. Really important nonverbal cues in communication skills. We call them acknowledges. So it's nodding your head or verbal acknowledgments. Okay. Yes.
Right. So you're just acknowledging the person, but then the greatest loop closer that you can bring into play is to then say, okay, just let me get this right. I want to make sure I've heard you correctly. Can I just check that?
I would use things like that. I'm picking up what you're putting down. Right. Can I just make sure that we're on the same page here? It's just going to give the person. What you're going to do is you're going to remove a good part of the emotion, you're going to level the playing field, and you're going to get them feeling like they've actually been listened to. And that's vitally important. Yeah.
[00:13:05] Speaker C: And I think it's obviously one of those things where that's probably the main issue, where they probably feel like they haven't been actually listened to or they haven't been heard properly. And that's only going to raise those emotions, isn't it?
[00:13:15] Speaker B: Yeah. And sometimes people try and throw something at it. Oh, let me give you a value add, a bonus or a discount.
I remember giving feedback at a restaurant once and the guy went, oh, well, I won't charge you for it. I went, no, I actually want you to charge me for it. That's not what it's about. I'm giving you feedback about something that I reckon you could do a whole lot better.
[00:13:37] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:13:38] Speaker B: So number one is, listen, the second trick, or the second step in this four step process is to ask questions. So we go, lasta is for ask questions.
What you've got to do is narrow down what the real issue is.
Right. And the only way you can narrow down what the real issue is is by asking questions. So you've listened to them and you've closed that feedback loop by going, just let me get this straight. Let me make sure I've heard you correctly, et cetera. And now you need to ask some questions. Okay. What would you like to see as the outcome here? What are you looking for? What can I do?
What would be an appropriate solution?
You can jump to those questions, or if you're still not sure, if you're still not absolute, crystal clear on what the issue is, then you have to ask permission. You got to say, look, do you mind if I just ask you a few questions? Right. Yeah. When did you buy this thing? How did you use it? What is it that you're not happy about? The service, whatever it might be. So you've got to narrow it down. The more questions that you can ask without them feeling like they're being interrogated, so you don't sort of throw a spotlight on their face and start poking them in the chest, that's probably not going to work either. But number one, you ask for permission. Nick, do you mind if I just ask you a couple of questions? I really want to help here. Can I ask a couple of questions? So I'm really crystal clear.
And if somebody said that to you, you're going to feel at least like you are now being heard.
[00:15:08] Speaker C: Well, at least they care. And I think that's one of the big things when you may have an issue or a complaint, is that you struggle to find that they care to the same level that you care.
[00:15:20] Speaker B: Yeah, you're 100% right, Matt. And that gets back to what we said at the very beginning. Sometimes when there's been an issue with a service that I've got, and you phone someone or you speak to someone and you just sort of think, do you know what? I'd rather if they just said, okay, yeah, look, I got to be honest. I don't give a shit.
[00:15:38] Speaker C: And it even makes it worse when they use industry jargon and things like that, saying, know, we're trying to help you is we're trying to do our job, which is to help you, or whatever it is. And that's actually not.
[00:15:51] Speaker B: No, I guess the other thing that you're sort of referring to there is if it sounds really scripted.
[00:15:57] Speaker C: Yes, that's right.
[00:15:59] Speaker B: Yes. Well, here at ABC, we are incredibly customer centric.
[00:16:03] Speaker C: We understand you, sir.
We appreciate your point.
[00:16:07] Speaker B: Or we appreciate what, clearly you don't.
[00:16:09] Speaker C: No, not at all.
[00:16:11] Speaker B: Right, so number two, ask some questions. There's two parts to that. One, you're asking questions to try and narrow down what the real issue is, but then you're also asking questions so you can see what would actually go about solving it. Step number three, la S-T-S is for solve it. Now, that's where you go into solutions mode. Even the very best intentioned people in business can get this wrong, not because they don't care, not because they don't want to solve it, but because they do it in the wrong order. So if you go to a business that you bought a product or service from and you're not happy with, and they go straight into solution mode before they've heard you.
[00:16:59] Speaker C: The solution is not going to be right.
[00:17:01] Speaker B: No, it's not going to be right. And you're just not going to feel like you've got your pound of flesh, if you like, because you just haven't been heard.
[00:17:10] Speaker C: No.
[00:17:10] Speaker B: Right. So the reason that we put this into an acronym is because it's got to be in that order. So we've got to think the last principle. Last. First thing you do is listen. Then you ask some questions, and then you move into the solution mode and you've got to get it that. Yep.
[00:17:32] Speaker C: Not the other way around.
[00:17:33] Speaker B: Not the other way around. There's one of the ladies in metropolitan I do a lot of work with. If I go to her, not with a complaint, but with an issue or a question, she jumps and answers the question before I finished it. But the problem is, it's not like radar on mash.
She's not predicting what I'm going to ask. She actually answers the wrong question.
And so I have to go. Stop. Just listen to me first, so you can get to understand what the actual question is, then answer. And it's out of a big heart and a genuine desire to help me.
[00:18:07] Speaker C: Yes, but jumping the gun.
[00:18:09] Speaker B: Yeah, but what it does is it actually adds to my frustration rather than taking it away. So we've got to have this thing where we're running it, I think, in that really simple la s t process, let's get step number four, which is the t.
Any idea what the t is for? I haven't shared this with you. Let's put you on the spot. So it's thank you. Got to thank them. Because one of the things as a leader in a business, Nick, I always say to people, is, I can't solve what I don't know.
So I had a meeting with some of our team a week ago, and they were having a complaint about something that happened. Happened two months ago. Okay. Well, number one, I apologize on behalf of the company. That should never have happened. But number two, why didn't you tell me?
[00:18:52] Speaker C: Wasn't brought to my attention.
[00:18:53] Speaker B: Yeah, I can't. Because it was like you didn't do anything about it. I didn't know.
[00:18:57] Speaker C: Can't fix something I don't know about.
[00:18:59] Speaker B: Always say that I can't fix what I don't know. So the fact that somebody comes to you with the complaint or the issue and you help them to solve it is actually worth your gratitude because it's.
[00:19:14] Speaker C: Valuable to your business, isn't it?
[00:19:15] Speaker B: Well, it is. It's a learning to. I can talk about that now. In fact, one of the things that we often do within the metropole group is we look at issues we've had and we take them and use them as a case study in our know. You often hear know. This call may be recorded for training purposes. I don't know if it ever is, but certainly for us, we take things that have not gone the way they should have and it doesn't happen that often. But when it does, we document it, we use it as a case study and then we use it in training. Let's pull this apart, guys.
Where did it go wrong?
What could we have done differently? Could we have handled the complaint better? Could we have got a better outcome? Did we follow the last principle?
[00:19:56] Speaker C: Because positive reviews and positive feedback and things like that are fantastic, but they're not going to progress you any further, are they? It's the constructive, I guess, negative reviews. Negative is probably not the right word, but that are actually going to help you grow.
[00:20:14] Speaker B: I often say I've learned in life the most from my toughest taskmasters, people I've worked for over the years, that some of them have just been complete pricks, but I've learned the most from them because they've picked up what mean the best people I've ever worked for have had this balance of picking up what I'm doing right and what I'm doing wrong.
[00:20:33] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:20:34] Speaker B: Right where they go. Mark, that was great. Fantastic. You know what? You could have done better on that. They're the best. But if all you get is positive feedback, it's like having acolytes around you. I mean, as a leader, there's that real risk that people keep bloody kissing your ass and get lazy. Yeah. And telling you how great you are. Well, you start to believe your own bs in the end and you're right, then you do get lazy. So the fact that they've brought it to your attention is a really positive thing and you've got to thank them.
One of the mistakes I often see is people think that giving them a discount or giving them a value add is thanking them, but a thank you is actually a thank you, not giving them something right. So you can give them something by making them feel special afterwards. But that's the last part. So once you've gone through that four step process of last la s t, you got to listen to them, you've got to ask them, you've then got to solve the issue and then you've got to thank them. And then if you want to make them feel special by giving them something.
[00:21:35] Speaker C: You can.
[00:21:35] Speaker B: Yeah, 100% then you can. But you've really got to say thank you. So it's. Hey, Nick, I understand that you came with this issue. I just really want to thank you for giving me the opportunity to solve it and for working with me to solve it. Because the truth is that, particularly these days, if people have an issue and they don't bring it to you so you can solve it, they just vote with their feet.
I remember having a conversation with a client a number of years ago, and I said, what do you have in place to be able to make sure that people are happy and your clients are happy? And he said to me, oh, if they're not happy, they'll tell us. Well, the truth is, they won't. No, in the vast majority of cases, they won't. They'll actually just vote with their feet by going elsewhere.
[00:22:20] Speaker C: Even long term customers may be of the point. Well, they're waiting for you to contact them.
[00:22:25] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:22:25] Speaker C: They're waiting for you to go and ask them the question. If they're all right, they probably feel like they shouldn't have to come to you and tell you that things aren't going well.
[00:22:33] Speaker B: Correct.
[00:22:33] Speaker C: That you should know that you should be following up and checking in with them.
[00:22:36] Speaker B: Correct.
[00:22:37] Speaker C: That's business management 101, sort of account management.
[00:22:41] Speaker B: We've spoken about that in previous podcasts. We talk about traffic light. So within mastermind, we traffic light all of our clients on a monthly basis. And if we haven't seen somebody on any of the sessions or they haven't been participating or they've not been on our closed Facebook drive, they're just not participating. Then they've become up as a red, and we reach out and go, hey, what's going on? What's wrong? How can we help?
All right, so let's wrap it up. The last principle, L-A-S-T. Listen, ask, solve, and thank. And you've got to do it in that order. You've got to do in that order after that, if you want to make them feel special, by all means. The only addition I'd add to that would be, it would be great, as these things come up, for you to capture that information and use it as a training tool.
And it's great when you're inducting new people and you say to them, hey, this is how good we are as a company, and these are the great things we do for our clients. But you know what? There was an episode two months ago where we got it horribly wrong, and I want to share that with you. I want to share the pro process that we worked through and how we got it right in the end. I think that's a really important lesson to teach as well. 100% all right, that's a wrap on another episode. If you are in a small business or you're in a professional practice and you like what you hear, please like the podcast, share it. If you've loved what you've heard, please share it. If you haven't liked it, share it anyway. Why should you be the only one? We'd love you to subscribe because that actually helps other people to find us on our mission to help average australian business owners to get more time back so they can get more time in their life and less time in their business. This is Mark Creedon signing off from the Mastermind for business podcast. Please, whatever you do between now and when we next connect with each other, make sure you spend time with those who matter most.
[00:24:37] Speaker A: Thanks for joining us on the Mastermind for Business podcast. If you're ready to have a business that you're not a slave to, check out metropolemastermind.com au or have a chat with Mark and the team at all the w's. See what's possible today.
