How to effectively manage difficult and demanding customers?

Managing difficult and demanding customers is definitely something that business owners and professionals have to be dealing with more than once during their careers. Why is that? Well, such thing as a world with no demanding and difficult customers simply doesn’t exist. Now the real question to ask ourselves is how to deal with them successfully so they never become a threat to the business? The answer is right below.

The last thing you want is to have these demanding clients taking?all your time at the expense of other clients. Not in any case should other clients be paying for the difficult and unrealistic ones. It therefore all starts with managing your time successfully around these customers. Do never underestimate your ”kind” customers by taking their kindness for granted and thinking it is okay to spend less time on them, as they may definitely become your most unhappy customers. It is not because some of your clients are kind that they are fully happy with everything you are providing. And you do not want to make them unhappy by not spending enough time on them.

You must always remember that giving too much time to demanding customers will not make things better. It will in fact make things worse. As these customers will now be taking this time for granted and only become more difficult. As in a way, you have allowed them to do so by telling them that not only it is okay to be difficult, but it will also get them more care and attention. And they will be the first to complain the minute you haven’t given them the same quantity of time that it is now seen as “granted” by them.

Allocating the time you spend with customers equally is definitely not the only thing you should do. Another crucial thing to do is to have what I like to call “courageous conversations” with them so you can set your limits successfully. It is however crucial to make sure that you are doing it in a respectful and diplomatic way as the last thing you want is to turn this courageous conversation into a conflict. But it needs to be done.

If a client is calling 10 times a day, it needs to be addressed. If a client is expecting you to be available out of working hours, it needs to be addressed. If a client is constantly blaming you on unrealistic things you have already been informing the client about, it needs to be discussed. Sometimes, we do not want to have these conversations as we “do not want to make the situation worse” nor “be confrontational”. But addressing things can only make the situation better and you can definitely do it while being respectful and diplomatic.

For instance, you can take time with the client to re-explain how things work; you can make it about them by explaining them that it is better to contact you during working hours so you can help them more effectively; or you can tell them that you will be quicker in handling their requests if you have all information into one email rather than several ones.

What you absolutely need to do in addition to that, is see what you could do to improve and make sure this situation doesn’t happen again with other customers. It is all about trying to see where our part of responsibility is in ending up dealing with such difficult customers. As the reason why clients are difficult may actually be coming from our own making. If that’s the case, the customer is not to be blamed (it is not about blaming in any case) as you haven’t done them a favour by not having this courageous conversation when you had to or stipulate into an email how things work so they don’t end up being unrealistic.

Always remember that the main consequence of situations like this is on the customers themselves, who end up not having a good experience.

Focusing on our own responsibilities as business owners or professionals can even go up to whether or not it was a good idea to take the customer in the first place. Sometimes, we may have done everything perfectly such as managing expectations and onboarding the client successfully but we still end up with him/her being challenging. And what if the only thing we could have done better was actually to not take the client onboard? As this client may simply not be the right client for us. And yes, a new client represents additional income but does this additional income worth bringing potential threats to the business while still ending up providing a bad experience to the client?

Another tips that could be really helpful to handle difficult customers is to understand the specific needs a customer has behind being difficult or demanding. It is indeed important to understand that most part of the time there is a hidden need behind a client’s behaviour. And it is our responsibility as business owners or professionals to find it.

As the more you focus on the needs of a demanding clients, the more you will be able to adapt your service, communication, attitude and decisions towards this need. In fact, a demanding client is also a great opportunity for you to really show what you got and how good you are in making your clients happy.

So how to understand your clientele’s needs? Well you must first of all try your best to understand the reason behind a specific request or behaviour. There are 3 main types of customers’ needs that you should definitely be aware of:

• Customers’ direct needs: the reason why they go for your services/product (i.e. better productivity and solve internal issues)
• Customers’ indirect needs: what they indirectly need from you (i.e. care, recognition and availability)
• Customers’ specific needs: a specific need related to a specific request (i.e. get help to resolve a specific issue and have it sorted ASAP)

Your ability to read between the lines while understanding you customer’s perspective is key to handle these customers successfully and see more in them than just “annoying clients”. For instance, a way to read between the lines could be to relate what your clients are saying with their expectations and have a courageous conversations if needed (i.e. clients requesting something they are not paying for, or unrealistic deadlines based on the time you need).

You also need to ask those lock-on questions which are especially made to push your customers to speak so you can get more information. You can also ask paraphrasing questions which are quite good to check on your customers’ specific needs. In terms of lock-on questions, here is what you could ask related to each need:

Lock-on questions to understand the customer’s direct needs:

• So, what is the main goal you are looking to achieve with this product?
• Do you have any specific issues/reasons justifying the need of purchasing this specific product?

Lock-on questions to understand the customer’s indirect needs:

• Are you happy with everything provided so far?
• Is there anything you would like to change in the way we help you?

Paraphrasing questions to understand the customer’s specific needs:

• Just to make sure I understand correctly, you are having an issue with _____, correct?
• So just to summarize, is your request related to ____ so you can ____?

It is also important to report these information while making sure they are accessible for everyone within the team. Sometimes we don’t often realize is that the reason a client can be annoyed and therefore difficult is because we don’t have enough knowledge on important information concerning their issues or queries. Or we simply don’t adapt ourselves to the customer’s indirect needs and therefore end up frustrating them.

Once you know their needs, you can then adapt yourself to your client. For instance, a client that keeps calling you out may simply need a certain level of attention and feel important. If you are able to understand this, you will have the ability to take actions accordingly by anticipating on your client’s needs and requests even before he/she is asking for it.

By doing so, you will have all the chances on your side to really “wowed” the client by showing her/him how much you are on top of everything while obviously address anything that needs to be addresses as previously mentioned.. This is what real customer service is about, adapting yourself to the client from both ways: their needs and the limits you set for you and your business.

Need more advice? Feel free to reach out! You can also check the video I did about setting your limits with customers!