Things happen. In fact, sometimes things go wrong in a very bad way and in a hurry. All around us today we see examples of people and companies that flat out mess up and everyone knows they messed up. Examples include several of the large banks that scammed people out of money through the housing mortgage fiasco. If you’re a baseball fan you see examples of this in the steroid allegations, where some people handled their apology nicely (Andy Pettitte), some horribly wrong (Roger Clemens) and others, well, the jury of public opinion is still out on them (Alex Rodriguez, “A-Rod“).
Even if the problem wasn’t your fault, as the business owner you have an obligation to apologize for it and make it right. As owner, you are the Captain of the ship. As such, it’s important to know how to handle a mini-crisis, or even a very large crisis, because as this blog post opened, things just happen from time to time. The way you respond to a problem can go a long way towards how you’re perceived in the public’s eye for a very long time.
One incident took place today with an entrepreneur colleague and he immediately handled the response perfectly. Here was the scenario: Peter Shankman is a prominent star in the PR world. He is an entrepreneur with his own consultancy and also provides services to PR professionals and the media. Today he was scheduled to host one of his regular conference calls with members of the media. Technological problems plagued the call in a significant way, ending the call very early and upsetting thousands of listeners. Peter took quick action:
- He immediately used social networking and Twitter to keep his listeners updated
- He apologized throughout the entire ordeal (even when the problem was via his technology service provider)
- He continued to apologize and make necessary explanations
- And he has since worked with his IT service provider to work out the kinks, reschedule the call and communicate the rescheduled call to all of his listeners
Here is the blog post Peter Shankman wrote explaining the problem, the situation and how it has been resolved. This communication is how every small business person should take ownership, quick action and provide resolution as soon as possible.
Make sure you read the comments at the bottom of his blog post. These comments are testament to how Peter has handled the situation. In the world of blogging and 2.0, you can no longer go and hide when bad things happen. You must take ownership of the problem and work towards a resolution, all while providing constant communication and updates to your customers and stakeholders.
In your world, lots of things can go wrong. Bad food in a restaurant, the wrong colors in wedding invitations, a rude employee at a dentist office - these are all examples of how situations may adversely affect your customer service.
Have you encountered a problem that recently affected your customer service? How did you handle it and what kind of communications did you utilize?
