Chris Collins and Christian Lafferty explain how to handle angry customers by letting them vent, apologizing, then asking for time to investigate before following up. The pause often defuses tension and leads customers to propose smaller solutions than you'd offer.
February 1, 2023.
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Okay, so the way that this works is we're going into this. Our mindset is we don't want to be right. We don't want to win. So you get this can be in person, or it can be on the phone. Customer says, hey, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. The sky is falling, whatever. And you say.
Oh, my gosh, I can't believe that. Please tell me all about it. You just. What you want them to do is puke all over the table. You don't want to interrupt. There's been times I've sat there and you're. You're looking at the clock, and, you know, you're 30 minutes in to listen. It is what it is. You just.
Whatever it takes.
Yeah. And.
Yeah.
And by the way, but in what. Admit. And my Lexus never did this, but, you know, and just. They're gonna say all kinds of stuff most of the time. Just let them do it. Now. Whatever they say or whatever they end up with, once again, we don't want to be right. We don't want to correct them in the moment. This. All we're trying to do is absorb all of the energy from them. That's it. We're trying to absorb all the energy. And so whatever they end with, wherever it kind of starts to slow down. You. You want to say something to the effect or you want to impose this feeling on them is, oh, my God, I can't believe that happened to you. I am so sorry. We are going to use this as a learning opportunity.
So. Right. Oh, my God. I can't believe that happened to you. I'm so sorry. We're gonna use this as a learning opportunity. Now, in that moment, most of the time, they are expecting you to do what?
To fight them.
Fix it.
Yep.
Have a bunch of excuses. Whatever it is, tell them the policy, whatever. No, we're not doing that. Worse. No matter what it is, like, they're. Like, they think the location of our building is wrong. Things that are way outside of our control. It doesn't matter. Oh, my God. I can't believe that happened to you. I'm so sorry. We're gonna use this as an opportunity to learn and get better. So that's kind of step two. Step three is.
Putting them on ice.
All right, explain that a little bit.
So I'm gonna say, give me some time to look into this. And most of the time, I already know what the answer is because I've already researched before I called them. But this. This has nothing to do with us. This is purely for them. To now relax because they've just. They've given all this energy. They've got it all off their chest. You've absorbed all their energy. And you apologized and you said, we're gonna use this as a learning opportunity. Now, when that's followed by let me look into this. They're like, oh, heads are gonna roll.
Yeah.
Like this really made a difference. Right? Like, heads are gonna roll. Somebody's gonna get in trouble. Whatever it is. Let me look into this. I'm gonna call you back and then tell them when you're gonna call them. And you have to call them when you tell them you're gonna call them. Don't say, I'm gonna call you in two hours. And then not call them sometimes, too.
It's funny that you just said that because do you'd get them to backpedal right away when they recognize the heads are gonna grow. They're like, wait, I don't want anyone to get fired out of this. You ever heard that happen?
It happens all the time.
They go backwards even before we get them on ice. Yeah. It's so funny.
Now, also, just like that, when you call them back in two hours, what is the tone?
They're calm.
Yeah.
They're like so nice.
You're on my side. We're like, you know, I. That two hours in between. I know it's. The world isn't perfect. I know mistakes happen.
You know, it's like they took cbd. CBD or something like that in the meantime. Maybe not cbd.
No maybe. Or maybe.
I don't know. I don't know what else. What other drug to say there. I was trying to think of one, but I don't know.
Quaaludes.
What's the. What's the date? What's the one Michael Jackson took that, like, was an elephant tranquilizer?
I don't know.
That one maybe.
That sounds. That sounds terribly strong.
Okay, so now you're going to have a completely different experience on the after ice. Right? We put them on ice. Now we're coming back. The tone is going to be different. And then at that point, I then state the facts. So I would say, you know, Christian, I looked into is true that, you know, rattles aren't covered after a year. And I'm, you know, I'm really sorry about that. And I'm going to. I'm. I'm going to run that up the flagpole. And, you know, I'm on the dealer council, and so I'm going to bring that up because you know, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
But it isn't. So anything we do, I would. I would be absorbing or paying for.
So what. What. But what. What can I do to. To fix this and make you feel good about it? And once again, kind of like you were saying, most of the time they're like, oh, well, I don't want you to pay for it or whatever it is. But I'm just. After the. After I put them on ice, I'm stating the facts as. As they are. And then they will. They will impose where they're at on those.
Most of the time. I mean, if. If we've made a really huge mistake, you probably are gonna have to eat something. But most of the time, whatever the solution is is more than fair, and.
It'S usually less like. So I think that was probably one of my favorite parts about this particular lesson is that I remember before I started doing the put them on ice, I would call and offer them something.
And in a lot of cases, when I do it the other way around and ask them what they want.
It'S less than what I would have offered. And in the cases where it's more, then I have a decision to make. But, like, when you offer first, there's not too much that can happen. Right. Other than, like, you're gonna give more than you needed to, or it still wasn't enough for someone to be happy, and they're gonna feel like you shortchanged them. So letting them have that control of the. What is it that makes you feel right? That's super important part of this thing. Do not go in there with an offer of, here's what I'm gonna do to fix it. It's like, what do you need to feel whole is. And you'd be amazed at how often it's a nice car wash. Yeah.
And also, I'm framing it that they kind of.
Know that I'm eating it. It's not. This isn't a.
And at this point, your friends. And they don't want to hurt their friend.
Yeah.
So it's really.
That's the. That's the put them on ice technique. Very effective. Works in any situation, really. Not just with customers, because at the end of the day, most of the time, people want to be heard. Once they talk through it, it's almost like guided discovery. They realize that it's a mistake. They realize the world isn't perfect. They sometimes realize that they are overreacting. But what happens most of the time is we meet them with resistance. We try to justify we try to tell them how they're wrong. And all that does is build up pressure. That's more pressure, more pressure. And then there's just a point. They'll die on the hill.
That's right.
We don't want them to die on the hill. We want to get, hey, let's get off the hill and let's go down here and have some lunch and be friends. Let's not die on the hill together. And so that's really what this technique is, is it's pulling the pressure away and absorbing their pressure, which nobody does most of the time. Everybody wants to get off the phone, justify. I will say that it takes time. Sometimes they will go for a while. Thanks so much for watching this clip of Service Driving Revolution. We're uploading new stuff every day, so make sure you subscribe and click the bell icon so you don't miss out. If you have a question you'd like us to answer on the show, call 8333 Ask SDR and we'll answer your question on the show. That's 8333 Ask SDR. For special deals on our books and training, head over to Offers Chris collinsinc. Com. Now that's Offers chriscollinsinc. Com. I'm Chris Collins, and I'll see you in the next video.
