“Hey, princess.”
“I see why you got your job.”
“You’re so handsome.”
If you’re in a customer-facing role, it’s important to know how to deal with difficult customers. Sadly, unwanted advances, flirting, inappropriate comments and sexual harassment from customers isn’t uncommon.
And while video messaging makes it easier to deliver an exceptional customer support experience, it can lead to uncomfortable situations. Some people will take the opportunity to focus on physical appearance, make gendered comments or infuse the conversation with innuendo.
You need to empower your customer support team to handle these situations effectively.
Customer support reps who feel powerless, scared or burned out in their roles don’t stay long. One SQM Report found that 88% of call center employees completely agree that burnout is a problem in the industry.
That’s why having strategies for dealing with difficult customers is important. It protects your team and gives people the freedom to serve customers with joy and dignity.
Strategies for Customer Support Team Managers
Let’s start first with strategies for people who manage teams of customer support reps.
Make sure your employees know you support them
Your employees need to know they can come to you with anything. Make sure they know:
- You won’t dismiss their concerns
- They are more important than a retained customer or metric
- You won’t tolerate harassment
Believe your team members
Customer support reps often feel uncomfortable bringing concerns to managers about difficult employees. It’s part of the job, right? Not exactly.
Their job is to address issues that stand between customers and their goals, not serve as a punching bag.
If an employee brings a difficult customer situation to your attention, chances are they had to work up some courage. Gather the facts, listen and trust what they say.
Give employees permission to deal with difficult situations themselves
Give your team members the tools and permission to deal with situations on their own. Share advice on how you’d respond or handle a conversation. And then give them opportunities to build this skill.
Provide helpful language
Give your customer support reps language and scripts they can use in common situations. This is especially helpful for newer reps.
With practice, your team will gain confidence and eventually lean less on these scripts and more on their experience.
Offer to join meetings or reassign problematic customers
In some cases, it can make sense for you to join meetings with yours reps and difficult customers. You can help mend a relationship or take some of the pressure off a team member.
Having a first-hand conversation can also help you determine when you should “fire” a customer.
Be proactive
Don’t wait for difficult customer situations to arise before teaching your team how to deal with them. Provide dedicated training during the onboarding process and then keep building those skills across the team over time.
You can also partner with HR to document how team members should handle common situations. These systems help ensure consistent responses and save you time.
Understand the psychological toll difficult customers have on employees
Customer support can take an emotional and psychological toll on people. Work with your team members and HR to make sure that people have the mental health support they need. In some cases, customer support reps might not even be aware of how their interactions with customers affect them.
Know when to “fire” a customer
Not all customers are right for your business. If someone has repeatedly offended your customer support reps and caused you trouble, the best path for all sides may be discontinuing the partnership.
Strategies for Customer Support Reps
If you are a customer support rep looking for help in dealing with difficult customers, check out the strategies below.
Keep context in mind
Every situation is context-dependent. You’ll have different relationships and interactions with people who you’ve worked with for years than you will with new customers.
By keeping context in mind, it’s easier to discern whether something was inappropriate and worth escalating.
Give yourself permission to have boundaries
Keeping firm boundaries is easier for some than others. Customer support reps who are more people-pleasing in nature may have a harder time speaking up for themselves.
If this is you, it’s important to reflect on your boundaries and speak up for yourself when something crosses the line. If you’re still building this skill, bring in your manager to help.
And keep in mind that not everyone has the same boundaries. What’s uncomfortable for you may not be for someone else. That’s why it’s crucial to decide for yourself what you put up with and what you don’t.
Here’s some more commentary on this idea…
Get clearance from your manager to deal with difficult situations
As mentioned in the section above, a great manager should give you the permission and tools needed to handle uncomfortable customer situations. However, you may not be ready yet (which is okay!). That’s why having an open dialogue with your manager is important.
Practice, practice, practice
Customer support doesn’t come naturally to everyone. It’s okay if you need to practice and rehearse. It takes time to build the skill of responding to negativity in real time.
Embrace the discomfort of role play. Lean on scripts. Do whatever you need to do to become more competent and confident in yourself as a customer support rep.
Set the tone of a relationship at the beginning
Often when someone makes an inappropriate comment, they’re testing the water. They’re seeing what you’ll put up with and pushing buttons purposefully.
If you’re comfortable, call out the behavior the first time. This helps prevent that person from assuming you’re okay with they’re behavior, leading them to becoming a repeat offender.
Be direct and adjust your tone accordingly
You don’t have to be “sweet” when responding to things that make you feel uncomfortable. Use a more serious tone to condemn a comment or let your customer know you didn’t appreciate what they said.
Their response will tell you a lot about whether they’re the kind of customer you or your company wants to work with long term.
Ask for input from colleagues
Sometimes you need someone else’s input. Talk to a colleague you trust about an experience and how it affected you. See what they think and how they would respond.
This is a great way to gut-check your reaction to a situation and continue to grow as a rep.
Record difficult interactions, and inform your manager
Always document your difficult interactions. Make note of times, dates, situations and how you responded. This is key for identifying patterns and customers that continue to mistreat you.
Invite someone else on your team to a meeting or ask for customers to get reassigned
If you continue to have difficult conversations with a particular customer, as a colleague or manager to join your next meeting. You can also ask for that customer to be reassigned to a new rep.
There is no shame in wanting to free yourself from a toxic relationship.
Know your value
Don’t let bad experiences with customers affect your self-worth. Even though you may feel bad or lesser than because of what someone said, you are still worthy of love and respect, always.
Helpful Phrases and Techniques
Here’s a list of phrases or techniques you can use (ordered from less direct to more direct):
- “Let’s get back to the topic.” If you don’t want to directly call out behavior, use a simple phrase like this and move on.
- “I’m not sure how that relates, but I’m here to help you with X.” If you want to call out behavior but quickly redirect the conversation, this phrase is for you. You could also say, “I don’t know about that, but what I do know about is X.” This reasserts the expertise and value you bring to the interaction.
- “I’d prefer you use my name; my name is X.” If customers use pet names, such as “Beautiful,” “Sweetheart” or “Handsome,” ask that they use your name. You can be direct (“That’s not my name.”) or more indirect (“I’d prefer if you’d use my name.”).
- “I’m also really good at my job.” Use a phrase like this if attention has been diverted to your appearance and you want to call out the way this distracts from your competence.
- Silence. If someone makes an off-color or inappropriate comment, you don’t have to figure out a brilliant or witty response. Silence can be a way of putting the discomfort back on the other person, rather than feeling you have to dispel the discomfort or fill the space with nervous or fake laughter.
- “That’s inappropriate.” A simple phrase like this, with a bit of space left after it, gives the person a chance to apologize before you move on.
- “That’s inappropriate and I’m going to need to end this meeting/email chain/phone call.” If the context warrants it, you may need to end an interaction, no matter the context or channel.
A much more fun topic is learning about how to build great relationships with customers. Check out our article here on the topic.
And if you’re interested in reading about the customer experience platforms we recommend, check out this post.
Finally, if you want to incorporate video messaging into your customer support function, you can start a free trial here or book a demo for your team.
