When you consider the factors that make a brand, its customer experience takes a leading spot. A major part of an excellent customer experience is resolving customer complaints and issues. How you retain or increase your present customer base largely depends on how you respond to customer dissatisfaction.

High costs of customer acquisition show that customer retention should also be top of priority in your sales and marketing strategy.

When you realize that for every unhappy customer, a dozen or more have turned their backs on the company and that a dissatisfied customer is a potential poor company advertisement, then you understand how important it is to protect your brand reputation and ensure fast and effective damage control. And this includes placating angry customers.

For your business, brand or company to thrive, there should be measures in place to reclaim customer relationships. Here are 3 ways to turn your unhappy customers into loyal customers.


1. Make them feel heard and valued

It is not unusual to find dissatisfied customers – brands flunk on their promise or proposition and systems fail – but an attendant response and damage control process should be chipped into your brand’s DNA.

Your customers expect you to feel their emotions and then respond accordingly by acknowledging their viewpoint and the rationality of their complaints. Going a step further to offer an apology without excuses goes a long way to tell them how you value them.

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2. Reassure your customers

By truly listening to your unhappy customers, responding and showing appreciation, you can generate the most pleasurable and pleasant outcome. In a quest to solidify this outcome, you have to reassure your customers of no such future occurrence.

Get personally involved by observing or even conducting the next transaction they have with your organization to ensure that it goes smoothly.

For every customer’s complaint or dissatisfaction, there is an opportunity to reduce future negative feedbacks and turn an unhappy customer into an “asset”.


3. Compensate them

Turning an unhappy customer into a loyal customer may sometimes require you to compensate him for the inconveniences caused. Demonstrate this by offering something valuable or meaningful enough to put things back in shape, depending on the kind of services you offer. For example, a telecommunications service company may choose to compensate with free data, call credits, etc.

Lastly, customers understand that things could go wrong but how you respond counts eventually.