A Little Customer Service Goes a Long Way

I have learned HUGE lessons this week. Let me give you a little background, and then we’ll talk about how it can affect you, and your business, no matter what stage you’re in.

Monday KISS Club Launch:

On Monday I launched the KISS Club as many of you know.  We tested the process, it all worked. The membership plugin I was using came up with a last minute upgrade due to the new wp version. We upgraded ~ and there were some big glitches, even before we opened the KISS Club doors.

If you happened to have seen this entire site covered in the words “Wishlist Member” you saw the first of many problems.  The membership plugin randomly created 1500 new pages called wishlist member when it was reactivated.

I sent an email to the plugin support people and received an answer 5 or so hours later. However, the solution they offered did not apply to me, and luckily my tech whiz had already deleted the pages from the database. We reinstalled and everything went fine.

Everything looked fine.

My Mistake

After such a crazy mishap I should have run through the entire process again, checked it all. But I didn’t, the buttons were already in place. The holiday weekend was upon us. My tech person was going out of town. I trusted that it would work as it had before.

Like I said, my mistake.

Launch Day

Monday I put up my posts, and people came. I was so excited to see people signing up. I got off my morning accountability call and went to log in to the forum to greet new members and suddenly my login is not working. My site no longer recognizes me. And further, each time a new person joins Kiss Club they are made the admin not only of the forum ~ but of my blog as well. I couldn’t log in. I couldn’t get in. Nothing. There was no way for me to even get in and take down the post so people would stop joining until we got the problem fixed.

I was freaking out.

My tech person was still out of town. I reached out to some people I know from Twitter to see if they could help, but unless you can get in the back office, there’s not a lot you can do!

I sent an urgent email to support team at the plugin. I received an email from them asking for my login information, and my ftp information and didn’t hear back from them again. Until yesterday afternoon.

My tech person came home and somehow wrangled herself into the database and wrestled admin access back from the plugin and I could get back in my site.:) But NOT into the membership area, nor could any of the members.

It was kind of exciting to see people signing up for the program ~ but it totally sucked to get that email a few minutes later:

“Jackie I just joined your site and I can’t log in. What do I do now?”

I immediately answered each one, letting them know there were some tech issues going on. I had people working on it and when I expected it to be fixed. I also let them know how much I appreciated their patience.

Yesterday I had to make some decisions. Should I count on the original membership people to get back to me and help me get this working ~ even though I hadn’t heard JACK from them since I sent my login information, or should I figure out something else?

I’m not much for waiting it out and trusting people who haven’t shown me much reason to be trusted so I brainstormed with my tech person another way to manage this situation.

It wasn’t an easy solution, but for this situation it was the best thing we could do. We decided to scrap the whole thing, get a different membership plugin and start over.

I went and purchased the Digital Access Pass plugin (which I should have done originally but I was being cheap and got the cheaper solution  ~ even though I’d used it before without success and had requested a refund ~ I thought they had improved since that time ~not so much.)

We set up the new forum on a subdomain and started over. I can say as of this moment that all the people who have paid have been set up with new passwords on the new site and should have access (if you don’t, please let me know!)

So what does this long, drawn out, crazy story have to do with YOUR business?

A lot.

• I will never, ever use Wishlist Member again. (duh), I will not recommend it. I will discourage people from using it, even if it is 70 dollars cheaper than the other alternative.

I can tell you this probably wouldn’t have happened if they had just communicated with me. I’m not unreasonable. If they had sent out an email ~ dang, this is messed up, we’re working on a new version to fix it… I would have probably hung in there. I would have had information to give my members. But I got nothing.

This one simple act of customer service would have kept my business ~ and any and all business I would have sent their way down the road.

• I did not lose one member through this whole fiasco.

I replied to every email I got regarding the problem. I then sent out a whole email explaining the situation, what we had decided to do about it, what to expect and when we hoped to be running.

• Most of the members who joined already knew me.

My relationship with most of the members of KISS Club didn’t start when they joined. I’ve known them for a while. I’ve provided plenty of great content. I’ve answered questions. I’ve participated in conversations, answered emails. I’ve been there providing fantastic customer service all along.

This relationship allowed them to give me a little leeway. They knew I wasn’t out to screw them out of their money. They understood stuff happens, and because I was open and let them know what was going on, they appeared to be willing to hang in there with me until things get fixed. (which they are for the most part now! YAY!!)

What you can do to provide great customer service in your business
(no matter what stage of business you are in)

1. Answer emails from  your readers/customers

2. Reply to comments

3. Provide consistent content (it shows that you are reliable)

4. Give away plenty of great stuff (it shows you are generous)

5. Let people get to know you ~ through your writing,  your conversations, BE YOU. (people will trust that you are who you say you are, thus you will do what you say you will do)

6. Do what you say you’re going to do. It doesn’t matter what it is, but make your word mean something. If you say you’re going to do something ~ do it.

By creating this kind of foundation with your readers and customers you give yourself a little leeway when crazy stuff happens. People will hang in there with you because they know, like and trust you. (Have you heard that from me before?!?) Yeah, well, it has been 900 times more cemented in my brain this week just how important that is.

Start providing great customer service now ~ even if you have nothing to sell. Creating a foundation of great trust with your readers/customers will take you farther than anything else you can do.