The door into the hotel was locked and no amount of pounding on the lobby windows would garner any response. It was well after midnight. I was exhausted. I had driven several hours to get to my destination and there was no way to get inside without a hotel room key, which I didn’t have since I hadn’t checked in yet.
Finally, after 20 minutes outside, a hotel guest happened to come down to the lobby and graciously opened the door for me. But my ordeal was far from over. I spent the next 15 minutes scouring the first floor, searching for someone, anyone, to check me in. The reception area did not look abandoned but there was no note indicating someone planned to return.
When the front desk agent finally appeared, I asked her where she had been. She defensively answered that she had been in the employee bathroom and attempted to downplay the length of my wait. She did not offer an apology nor even acknowledge the inconvenience I suffered as a result of the situation she had created. The interaction did not leave me with a warm feeling about her, or by extension, the hotel.
Too often, we can make a bad situation worse by thinking of ourselves instead of the person we are supposedly serving. In my case, the front desk clerk thought of defending herself instead of considering the inconvenience she had caused the customer, me. Had she taken a moment to think about how tired and frustrated I must have been and shown empathy for my experience, I likely would have shown empathy for her situation, alone in the hotel with no other staff to cover her breaks. As it is, I’m not anxious to return to that hotel, even though it’s in a city I visit often.
Excellent customer service begins by empathizing with the customer. If we can’t have empathy for a customer’s situation, how can we expect them to want to continue to buy from us?
Lanny Zechar, speaker and consultant to some of the most happily successful people on the planet. Cold calling, sales and customer happiness consulting.
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