If you are wondering whether you read the title correctly, rest assured, you did. Yes, customer complaints can be a good thing. Traditionally, complaints are a sign that something is wrong and they can trigger a sense of panic. What if those customers leave? What if they tell others? Will this impact on our relationship?
Complaints are an inevitable part of the customer service lifecycle. Some customers will rave about you to their friends and become fans for life, while others may not be satisfied no matter how hard your customer service agents try. Embrace this reality, and your brand is already on the right path.
Here’s where things get interesting. Did you know that 96% of unhappy customers don’t complain at all? Don’t think of this as a reassuring statistic. Far from it: 91% of those unhappy customers leave and never come back. Rather than reaching out to your brand for support or explanations, those customers simply leave and pursue one of your competitors. Before moving on, however, they will often vent their frustration. An unhappy customer typically tells 9-15 people about their experience, and 13% of this unsatisfied group will tell more than 20 people.
As for recommendations, 91% of U.K. customers who give organisations a 9 or 10 out of 10 for customer satisfaction will give the same scores for the likelihood to recommend the brand. However, among those who provide a customer satisfaction score of 8-8.9, only 46% will give a 9 or 10 score for likelihood of recommendation. Given that 92% of customers trust peer recommendations over advertisements, your customer loyalty could see a rapid decline if your brand doesn’t take proactive measures to resolve complaints quickly and efficiently.
So how can any of this be good news? Essentially, this knowledge empowers your brand to optimise omnichannel practices and solve problems before they arise. Investing in optimum contact centre software that supports omnichannel communications is a great start. Your brand may then take measures to handle complaints before they spiral out of control. For example, if customers complain on your social media pages, they may be routed to customer service agents based on the mention of your brand’s Twitter handle or Facebook account name and invited to discuss further privately. Likewise, you can initiate webchat sessions with customers who may be navigating your website after a negative service experience.
Such practices combined with periodic customer feedback surveys are excellent for prompting customers to share their feelings with your brand before venting elsewhere. In this sense, your brand has much to gain from customer complaints. Listening closely can help you work continuously on reducing customer effort and increasing satisfaction for long-term customer loyalty.
Sources: 1st Financial Training Services; The White House Office of Consumer Affairs; Nielsen Global Trust in Advertising Report; UK Customer Satisfaction Index-January 2017.