A: The old adage “the customer is always right” rings true to a point. Most people do not know, nor do they care, about your costs of delivery of the product or service. Your customers have a right to expect good service and a quality product at a fair price.
Having said this, there are some clients or customers whose expectations are so unreasonable that you may ask are they more trouble than they’re worth? If the answer is yes, you have several choices to make:
• Rank your customers in terms of their value to the business. The ones who are the easiest to deal with and who do not constantly beat you down on price are “valued customers.”
• For the rest, is there a way to change their attitudes and still retain their goodwill? Remind your customer of the services you currently offer them. Explain that you cannot continue to offer the value added benefits they enjoy and offer substantial discounts too. Establish new ground rules for doing business going forward.
Your difficult customers then have a choice to make… agree to your terms or go somewhere else. Contrary to popular belief, you do not need to retain every client. Studies have shown that twenty percent of customers account for sixty percent of revenues. Concentrate your efforts on retaining the valued customers and do the best you can to retain the rest.
Do not spend valuable time and energy on problem accounts that generate little profit for the business. Allow them to go somewhere else and become your competitor’s headache.
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Gray Poehler is a volunteer with the Richmond Chapter of SCORE, Counselors to America's Small Business. To ask a question or request free and confidential business counseling, go to www.richmond.score.org/mentors. A counselor will respond. Select questions and answers will be featured in Metro Business. To learn more about management issues facing small business and SCORE’s workshops, go to their web site or call (804) 771-2400, ext. 131