Bad Chemistry Can Quickly Dissolve Customer Relationships

Writen by Dr. Gary S. Goodman

I'm doing everything in my power to avoid doing any more business than strictly necessary with the car dealership where I leased my car.

Literally, they've been pushing away my business, since I got into my new ride.

Where I used to get free loan cars as a matter of course, they stopped subsidizing them, unless authorized under warranty repairs.

Their service department inconveniently requires appointments a full week in advance, and they're in the habit of losing parts that I've handed them that fall off the car, errant pieces of the luxury interior, for instance.

But the most problematic issue is how they've been changing their personnel, bringing in hardball communicators who speak in "mands." These include commands, "You MUST do X;" and demands, "You'll HAVE TO HAVE Y."

Indelicate at best, but usually defensive and destructive of relationships, mand-dispensers usually fly under the radar of anyone who can correct them. They disturb customers greatly, but seem to do nothing that is so obvious, that it can be detected easily.

What you do see is mysterious fallout from their word-bombs.

Customers drop-off all around the demanders and commanders, yet the offended don't feel they have a smoking gun to point to that sums up why they feel the service advisors upset them.

So, the behavior continues, until a consultant comes in and actually hears their language.

By that time, the damage has been done, customer relationships have dissolved, and irreversible losses have occurred.

And how do the defensive folks who caused these problems respond?

They blame their customers for being flakes, and worse.

It's their style.

Dr. Gary S. Goodman, President of Customersatisfaction.com, is a popular keynote speaker, management consultant, and seminar leader and the best-selling author of 12 books, including Reach Out & Sell Someone® and Monitoring, Measuring & Managing Customer Service, and the audio program, "The Law of Large Numbers: How To Make Success Inevitable," published by Nightingale-Conant. He is a frequent guest on radio and television, worldwide. A Ph.D. from USC's Annenberg School, a Loyola lawyer, and an MBA from the Peter F. Drucker School at Claremont Graduate University, Gary offers programs through UCLA Extension and numerous universities, trade associations, and other organizations in the United States and abroad. He holds the rank of Shodan, 1st Degree Black Belt in Kenpo Karate. He is headquartered in Glendale, California, and he can be reached at (818) 243-7338 or at: gary@customersatisfaction.com.