How to Turn Customer Pet Peeves into Your Advantage

As a business person you are aware that your business exist to create customers and, that involves doing a whole lot of things to keep the customer happy.

Unfortunately, there’s no way you’re going to please all of your customers all the time. In fact, if you try doing so, you’ll definitely go crazy!

While its easy to say that the customer is always right you'll however agree that this can be taken too far by some. For example, like when a customer is always complaining all of the time.

It’s annoying right?

Indeed. it’s not a problem for customers to have issues with your business because there is none that doesn’t have complaining customers. But then there are some complaints that are an annoyance. What we have come to refer to as customer pet peeves! But what does that really means?

What Is A Customer Pet Peeve?

According to Vocabulary.com,

“A pet peeve is an annoyance that’s nurtured like a pet — it's something someone can never resist complaining about.”

This means a customer pet peeve is something that the customer has nurtured like a pet and has turned into a frequent subject of complaint. No matter what you do as a business this customer has a way of finding faults and complaining about it!

Now, while this could be annoying you can actually turn such complaints into your business' good. For example, you can use such complaints to provide you with insight that will help you improve your business, products and/or overall customer experience.

So, when your customers do complain, don’t take it that your company is bad or that it has some serious issues. Rather take it that your company is like any other – it has its own faults. And, instead of focusing on how you can eliminate these faults you should rather focus on how you can move forward and adjust.

To do this, you need to understand the issues customers might have with your business and find ways to avoid them. In this post I want to share with you some of the common customer pet peeves that you need to watch out for in your business.

4 Common Customer Pet Peeves to Watch Out For

1. Excuse Me, I’m Talking To You

If your Twitter feed is filled with customers complaining that they have no way to talk to your business or engage with you, you have a big problem. This suggests that there is no relationship between business and consumer.

If that’s the case, there’s a good chance that customers are going to feel undervalued and unimportant. They hate this, and they will have no issue spending their time spreading their thoughts and feelings to other people who may have otherwise taken a chance on your business.

Correcting this is easy. Make sure that you always have an open dialogue with your customers. If there are any issues even on social media feeds, respond to them promptly, and you will dazzle customers with your speedy responses to their issues.

2. Hey, What’s Taking So Long?

That probably means that you have a problem with your turnaround time and more broadly your supply chain. Perhaps you never took your supply chain management masters, and as such you don’t know how to keep things rapid and efficient.

If that’s the case, then you could correct this by taking an online course, but the main thing to focus on here is making sure you deliver the goods promptly and keep a high level of quality in your service.

Handling supply issues, companies often jump towards the possibility of an outsourcing business. It’s not the worst idea in the world, but you do need to make sure that you can trust the company you choose to handle things the right way. Otherwise, you’re just creating something else for customers to get irritated at.

3. I Am Shocked And Appalled!

This isn’t so much as a pet peeve as it is something that will cause customers to scream ‘boycott’ at the top of their lungs.

Scandals in businesses are more uncommon than you think, but they do happen. If they hit the public spotlight or your consumer base gets word of them, it can have a crippling impact on sales.

To handle this issue, there’s a simple solution. Just make sure that you are doing what you can legally to stay on the right side of the line. Do this, and you shouldn’t have any issues with scandals taking town your company.

4. What A Rip Off

And finally, there’s the issue with prices. It’s not so much about how much you’re selling your products for but rather how much other people are selling theirs at. If your price isn’t competitive, you will struggle to keep customers on board and buying from your business.

So, do your research and make sure that a key competitor isn’t undercutting you.

Conclusion

Eliminating customer frustrations is a sure way to making your business more successful in the marketplace. If you note the above customer pet peeves and find ways of taking care of them then you can be sure of having more and more happy customers and of course, more success.