Extreme Customer Service: Serving the Toughest Customers #CX

Asking for the toughest customers is like trying to pet a shark, or date a nun – you instantly know that it won’t end up well.

Here’s how to deal with extreme customer service – and facing off with the customer from hell. Just because a customer is demanding doesn’t mean the interaction won’t go your way – if you know how to have an extreme customer service conversation.

My friend is one of the best salespeople I know – he deals with an ultra-elite clientele in New York City. This guy specializes in the demands of high-net-worth individuals with a skill that is both rare and easygoing.

His customer logic goes like this:

“I want only the most difficult customers because, if they even think of shopping me with competitors, I will win every time. The toughest customers will chew up my competition, and disqualify them right out of the gate, because that’s the kind of service and solutions that my company can provide.”

He’s looking for the clients who are so tough and so demanding that other service providers get scared by their demands, and struggle to prove they can meet them.

Here are some additional thoughts, on extreme customer service:

• If you are faced with a tough customer, thank them for helping you to be better.
• The best antidote for attitude is gratitude. Demands can appear confrontational. On the surface, it may seem like your customer is your adversary. They are your path to profit! Don’t fall into that trap!
• If you are taking a beating over something you did, or your company did, or you are about to do, I have two words of advice: don’t duck.
• Here are six more: Face it, take it, fix it. It's that simple.

Face up to the challenge of the difficult customer. The customer from hell is showing you how you can be better. How you can do more and serve at a higher level. A demanding client, for my friend, means that his competition is out of the mix.

The best way to defeat your competition is extreme customer service.

When you resolve the really scary issues, you learn, you grow, and you create customers for life. What is the customer experience (CX) you want to create?

The only way to know if you have what it takes is to get started. If you’d like one suggestion on what you could do today, make up your mind to astonish the most difficult customer you know (and yes, the people you work with are internal customers).

Can you astonish the customer from hell?

Difficult times show us what we are made of.

Difficult customers force us to be better and help our companies to demonstrate competitive advantage.

Customer service isn’t a challenge. Customer service is a profit center.

What can you do to make a difference, and show that when it comes to customer service, you are ready to go to extremes?

Difficult times show us what we are made of; difficult customers force us to be better and help our companies to demonstrate competitive advantage.

What customer service accomplishments have filled you with the greatest sense of pride? Have you had a tough customer that couldn’t be satisfied, no matter what you tried?