How to Deal with Difficult Customers: Turning Unpleasantness into Opportunity

You can’t be in business - as an owner or employee - without dealing with at least one difficult or unhappy customer. It doesn’t matter how well you aim your marketing to target your ideal customer, sometimes, a difficult customer gets through or something goes wrong that makes an easy-going customer angry.

When it comes to home sales, difficult customers are perhaps more likely. Not only are passions high, since they’re looking to make a huge financial and emotional investment, but a home-builder’s net is much wider than other businesses that can be more selective. That means you need to have the skills to deal with difficult customers when they arise.

Of course, no one likes to deal with unpleasantness, but with the right mindset and my tips below at hand, you can come out feeling on top - and hopefully make the customer feel that way, too.

How to Deal with Difficult Customers: Mindset

1. Take a moment to prepare before all calls: It can be easy to just pick up the phone and jump into a conversation, but make sure you’re taking a moment to get into the right mindset. Remember that you’re talking to real people - they’re not a metric or data. They are someone’s sister, father, aunt, or grandfather. Think about them as real people so you come into the conversation from a place of service.
2. Remember, you are a guide: As an OSC, you’re there to guide the customer and support them - through the good and the bad. You need to remember the “C” in OSC - I like to think of myself as a hotel concierge. When a client is happy and positive, I’m going to talk them through where everything is, map things out, and call them in their room to check they’ve got everything they need.When a customer is upset, it’s a hand-holding experience, more like the role of a caretaker. I’ll guide them up to their room, make sure they have no problems getting in, and make sure they’ve got everything they need to feel comforted. I’m essentially doing the same things, it’s just at a higher intensity when a customer is upset.
3. People who are mad have a BIG problem: And it’s not an attitude problem. They’re mad because something isn’t living up to the promises they feel the company made to them, and they want you to help them put it right. If they are blowing something all out of proportion, there will be something else going on in their life that they feel completely out of control of, and so their emotions are being redirected. It’s not always easy, but try to lead with compassion.
4. Look at their journey thus far: You should have a wealth of information at your fingertips through the CRM, so go back and look at what’s happened on their journey so far. If you don’t yet know the extent of the problem, can you glean any information that could clue you into their dissatisfaction? Has a ball been dropped?

How to Deal with Difficult Customers: Listen

1. Be actively listening for at least 80% of the conversation: When people are angry, they want to get all their feelings out. They want to not only tell you what’s wrong, but why they feel wronged. If you interrupt that flow, the river of their anger will crash over you. It’s better to stand at the side and direct it with empathetic and probing questions to find out exactly what’s wrong and what needs to be done.
2. When you can, slow them down and start taking notes: The CRM has all the notes, so ask them to pause so you can write down all their concerns so they don’t have to keep explaining themselves to you and other team members. This will help smooth the way to getting their problem solved.
3. Don’t stop their flow, even if you can’t fix their problem: Even if you find out half a minute into their story that you aren’t the person who can do anything to solve their problem (and the OSC often can’t), let them get it all out. When they’ve explained everything, and you’ve made sympathetic noises, pass them on to the person who can.
4. Take ownership of the problem: Use language like, “I understand that you feel that way, and here’s how I can help you find a solution. I’m here with you and we’ll find a solution together.” You may not be able to take the necessary steps to implement the solution, but you’ll find most customers will calm right down knowing that you care and are going to do all you can to fix the problem.

How to Deal with Difficult Customers: Be a Guide

1. Don’t take responsibility for the fault: We’ve touched on all the ways you should be empathetic and willing to put yourself in their shoes, but don’t admit fault that’s not yours. Come into the conversation with the mindset of wanting to find a solution, and the intention of mapping out a better journey for them.
2. Don’t reflect the blame: Remember, even if you truly believe someone else on the team has dropped the ball, don’t tell the customer that it has nothing to do with you and it was another person’s fault. You’re a team, and you need to present a united front. Playing the blame game is childish and will ultimately make the company look unprofessional.
3. Be a steward of the conversation: Let them rant for as long as they need to (without checking out), and guide the conversation until they’re calm enough to have a constructive conversation.
4. Guide them to the solution: Have a few steps outlined that you can take so you can make some promises on what will happen next - and keep them. Once I’ve established what a customer needs, I don’t make promises I personally can’t keep - for example, I won’t promise them the toilets can be fixed, even if I’m sure they can. I don’t have control over it, so I only make promises I personally know I can fulfill.
5. Set a date and time for when you’ll follow up: One of the simplest (and most effective) promises you can make is to give them a date and time when you will call them back (or email) with an update on what’s going to happen to resolve the issue. If you are going to pass them on to another team member, you should still set a date and time to check in with them and ensure the problem has been satisfactorily resolved.I’ll do this even if I know that another team member did follow up and has solved the problem. I’ll ask them if they’re all set and if everything is under control. In cases where they’re still unhappy, then it’s just a case of going back to my role as the guide to figure out what the next step should be. I’m aware that not all OSCs have the bandwidth to do this, but it’s something we need to fight for, since missing this step is often where the crazy bad reviews come from. People feel abandoned when their problem isn’t resolved.

Builders Have a Responsibility Too:

The OSC can handle difficult customers - they can often work magic, calming a customer down and getting them back on track. But the OSC needs to have the right access and knowledge so they have real agency, and aren’t just lending an ear to a customer, only to be able to do little to fix a problem.

Builders need to make sure they’re not gatekeeping information from the OSC. Here’s why:

Imagine you walk into your living room one day and see a giant crack in the roof. You rush to the phone and you call your main contact - the OSC - and tell them about the crack.

“I’m sorry,” they say. “You’re going to have to reach out to the warranty team, I can’t help you.”

So you do, but the warranty team is already swamped, and so you don’t get to talk to someone seriously for a few days. After four days of trying to get someone to take action, the crack is no longer just a line in the ceiling, but a hole. You panic - and you’re furious because no one listened to you because the warranty team is so busy and the OSC could do nothing to help you.

It doesn’t have to be this way…

One of our builders at Shared Drive had a warranty team that was just completely exhausted - they were fielding questions and calls constantly, and not all needed to be dealt with by them. They were essentially drowning in a sea of constant questions that could be easily handled by an OSC if the builder gave them the tools.

So they did - the OSC was given a spreadsheet with common problems the warranty team often dealt with, and so it was just a case of copy-and-pasting the right response that the warranty team gave all the time.

With the OSC handling minor issues, they were able to handle a ton of problems for the warranty team. It was just a case of creating the right system and giving the OSC the right knowledge and tools to handle these inquiries. As a result, the warranty team was able to deal with the big issues the OSC identified and knew needed to be addressed as soon as possible.

And it was so easy - all it took was giving the right knowledge to the OSC. They didn’t need to hire another warranty team member, and it nipped the problem in the bud before someone got seriously pissed.

Of course, from the buyer’s perspective, it also offered them a far better experience. Instead of waiting for days for a response, they got a fast response and the right expectations were set. Those with serious issues got seen to within days, and felt like they were being truly looked after.

Builders need to see how OSCs can handle difficult customers from all angles.

If you are an OSC and you don’t have the flexibility to help the customers when they experience a problem like this, you need to advocate for yourself and get your builder to give it to you.

• Dealing with difficult customers is all about de-escalation, separating your emotions from the call, and seeing yourself as the concierge guiding customers to a solution. When a problem has concluded, ask yourself:
• How can I use this experience to make it better for future customers?
• How can I become an expert in this issue so I can better assist customers in the future? (You may need to speak to your builder to get them to give you the right information here.)
• How can I outline the right steps and systematize solving this issue, so it’s just a case of following the process next time?
• Is this a common issue that my builder should address at the source?

When you take ownership of the problem, and of finding a solution, you’ll create a quality customer experience that avoids bad reviews and satisfies home buyers.

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