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§§ Table of Contents − − − − − − − − −
Ultimate Guide to Difficult
Conversations
1. Introduction 2. When you don’t know the answer 3. When you have to transfer a customer to someone else 4. When a customer requests a feature or product 5. When a customer asks you for a favor that you cannot do 6. When there’s something wrong with the delivered product 7. When you close the conversation 8. When a customer is angry 9. When a customer is unwilling to pay 10. When a crisis occurs 11. When you have a frequently complaining customer 12. When customers complain on social media 13. When you have legal issues 14. When you have to deliver bad news 15. When you have an abusive customer 16. When customers cross boundaries 17. When the customer speaks a different language 18. When a customer asks a vague question 19. When customers ask when something is going to be available 20. When you or your fellow agents made a mistake 21. When a customer wants to speak with a manager 22. When you can’t resolve the issue right away 23. When you need to let a customer know that it was their mistake 24. When a customer reaches you by mistake 25. When a customer asks how your product is different from others 26. When a customer is worried about how secure your service is 27. When a customer says that they forgot their password 28. When you want to point a customer to your documentation 29. When a customer violated your terms of service 30. When a customer is not tech-savvy 31. When a customer is right, but your policy is not 32. When a customer sounds like a bigot 33. You’ve got this!

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9.

When a customer is unwilling to pay

Money can be tough. It’s tough to spend, make, and talk about and, given that, you’re likely going to run into customer conversations either in your inbox or chat where they just don’t want to pay. At face-value, especially if you are a subscription-based service, it could surprise you if someone doesn’t want to pay. You might be thinking “but you’ve already used the service?” And while that is true, that doesn’t matter to your customer. According to a study at Wharton, there are three types of customers:

  • Tightwads (24%) — people who spend less than they would ideally like to spend
  • Unconflicted (61%)
  • Spendthrifts (15%) — people who spend more than they would ideally like to spend

The people who are unwilling to pay are the “tightwads” and generally have trouble seeing value in individual prices. If a customer reaches out to you about your pricing or threatens cancellation based on pricing, the best tactic is to try to appeal a rational, numbers-based side of their brain. Here’s a response that we’ve found to be helpful:

Hey there,

Thanks so much for emailing about this — I can definitely see how that might feel a little pricey to you. $1000 upfront can seem like a lot of money, but when you think about the month to month budgeting, it’s actually only $83.33. It looks like you’re using our service pretty frequently, so I just wanted to reframe the financials for you slightly in case it made a difference in your mind.

If that pricing doesn’t work, we do offer our free plan, or a slightly lower plan than the one you’re on at a lower cost. That being said, neither of those two plans offer [x and y features] that I notice you’ve used a lot.

If you do not want to continue to pay, that’s totally cool and I’ll go ahead and cancel your billing and shift you to a free account. Just let me know!

Thanks!

If you aren’t on a subscription-based model and are instead selling physical products or one-off purchases, a great way to do something similar to the above is to focus on the lifetime value of the product. For example, if someone were to be complaining about the price of a coat that you were selling in your store, you could say something like

I know that it seems like a lot of money for a coat — I totally get it. But, [xyz brand] coats have been known to last for around 30 years, and offer a 7-year warranty and free servicing. That’s a pretty high value-add on top of the coat itself.

When you can help tightwad customers see the value of their purchase and move past their anxiety, they’ll be more willing to pay you the money you’re keen on.

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8.
When a customer is angry
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10.
When a crisis occurs
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