Wednesday, February 20, 2013

Good public relations

                                              Adventure branding,,Wise to advertise
              From the other side of the river the bank that nearly sank the nation


How do you conduct your business?
Do you give that extra bit of value to help your customers on their way?

A friend of mine went out for a special meal, the bill came and they paid it and went home.
Then they thought that it was too reasonable at €94.
So after counting it up they went back in the next day and spoke to the manager.

The bill should have been €194  Which they paid.

Now as a business person what would you do next?

If they had not pointed out the error you had lost €100, It was a cash sale.

So how would you turn the situation into a winning one for both sides ?

I don't know if I mentioned that the Sushi restaurant in the Dundrum shopping center is very good.
I have been there twice. But never again.
I bought 2 x €4 bowls the last time I was there and the bill came to €9 , I thought it might be service charge.
No it was for a glass of water from the tap at the counter !
That is sharp practice, which is bad business.
There is a really good Sushi in Ranelagh.(I wonder what the waters like)

The last one big gripe I have is a really big company "Specsavers"
This is really hard to believe !
I went in got measured up and got the glasses, with a spare pair around €400 for the lot.
Take care of your eyes as they say.

The glasses were wrong, so I went back.
"No you have to give them time  to get used to them"
A week later I went back again where he checked the lenses against the prescription.
"NO they are not wrong"
I had lost my old pair so I went into another opticians and got a new prescription.
I brought that into the  first guy but  his answer was so bad.
"Look if you have bought a new pair the problem is solved"
No refund ! And no Specsavers promise either.

A few months later I made a complaint through Specsavers in the GPO arcade, no joy.
I was in Blackpool and went into Specsavers there
They said that some one from head office would contact me. It didn't happen.
I found the address of head office...Still no joy.

So a customer in the taxi told me to write it all down and send it all in with a check to the small claims court.
Then I made 2 mistakes, I sent a copy of the letter to Specsavers in Guernsey saying I was were going to the small claims court.
The guy who had caused me all the grief rang me and said." Whats going on? This has  all been looked after"
The second mistake was to go back in for 1 (Free) pair of glasses, remember I had paid for 2.
During the eye test the optician declared that "the angle of astigmatism had chanced from left to right to the opposite and the glasses were right at the time of fitting but my eyes had changed"

I should have left the shop then and proceeded with my claim

You know Specsavers spend many Millions on advertising and yet they never followed up any of my letters and they did not at that time provide an e mail or a complaints contact on their website.

By the way if this is not all true they can sue me!

A business man told me that a complaint when dealt with properly is an opportunity to get a loyal customer for life.
Once as a junior car salesman he took back a car with a persistent fault back and replaced it with a new car. Before he left that garage he had sold the extended family 12 new cars over the years. Each time he made a sale he reminded his boss that these people were coming back because I had replaced their problem car, the boss eventually told him he had done the right thing.

So how would you turn the repayment of €100 to your best advantage?

4 comments:

  1. Don't get me started on Spec savers, I could write a whole book about my complaints with them, however to answer your question, if I was the manager of the restaurant where the person had returned to pay the €100, I would have given him a 20% discount for his next meal.

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  2. I would have brought the fellow into my office, and presented him with two gift certificates for a hundred Euro each. The first gift certificate would be for his honesty, and the second gift certificate would be to use to bring a friend in for a meal.
    A gift certificate costs a mid range restaurant about 40 per cent. So the restaurant is money ahead, and now has a LOT of good will.
    One last thing I would do for remarkable customers like that...assuming I lived in Dublin....I would visit the Jaimeson Distillery and have them make a special label with their name on it, have them stick it on a bottle of 12 year old, and keep it behind the bar just for him and his friends. They will do that.

    We always get the behavior which we reward.
    Thats what I would do.

    (I am a business man, and I rewarded a customer who got a shop lifted item back for me in just that way. When handing out gift certificates, go for double value reward and a bit extra. Word gets around!)

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    Replies
    1. Well done Stag.
      The owner gave them a free meal for two.
      Which when you think about it his action created a great lot of good will,much more than the same amount spent on advertising.
      Its all about building up good relations

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  3. That would be the "Jameson" distillery of course.....
    I knew that!!!


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