We all know bad customers are unpleasant to deal with. You might have found your own share of bad customers while reselling, who are unfair and exploiting your services. In such scenarios, you must take action without any further negligence and put an end to such behaviour. One way to improve your service in a timely manner is to identify the qualities of unfit customers and discourage them at early stages.
How to identify and discourage a bad customer?
Bad customers may be a fact of life, but there’s plenty you can do to keep a bad experience with them from ruining your reselling business. Only by identifying those bad apples, you can deal with them effectively.
- High Contact Frequency: Customers who devour too much of your time by contacting you at a higher frequency are not worth keeping, especially when the profit from them is negligible.
- Confirmation Issues: Refusing to confirm or trying to postpone the order confirmation with silly excuses are sure signs of a problem customer. Be open about the situation with such customers and do not let them sway their way into convincing you.
- Defensiveness: Customers who are defensive might give you a hard time dealing with them. Avoid long conversations with such customers and get straight to the point.
- Changing or Vague Demands: Customers who are unsatisfied even after you have delivered what they have asked for, can only mean they are not truly interested in doing business with you. Ask them what exactly they are looking for and make a decision.
- Bullying or Taking You for Granted: Customers who yell, take advantage of your kindness, or are difficult to reason with, can bring down your motivation levels. In such cases, politely decline and send them on their way.
- Unavailable: Customers who won’t return your calls or text messages, like ever, are not your ideal customers. So, do not waste your time tracking them down.
- Deceptive: Some customers may lie to you on purpose, claiming you promised to deliver things you never promised. It is okay to give them a benefit of doubt once or twice, but if it becomes a pattern you must let go of them.
Recognize unfit customers before they harm your reputation. Once you are done with that, assess their value and have a real conversation with them to figure out your next step. If you decide to prune the bad customers, just be honest with them and tell them why it is not working anymore. Likewise, nurture and wow your existing satisfied customers, so that they can’t help but tell others about their experience.
