Last month I wrote a post called How to Lose a Customer for Life for Ten Bucks. I received a lot of feedback, mostly private and positive, but some people didn’t understand my point. I have no interest in punishing a business that lets me down. I simply choose to redirect my business to someone who wants it more. I applaud entrepreneurs at every level, but first and foremost, my mantra of “People, Products, Profits—in that order” is not directed exclusively toward the People who run the business. It extends to the customers who are served by the business, the suppliers and partners who support the business, and even the investors who champion the business. The People part of business is unending, complex, fascinating, and a noble bedrock on which to establish competitive advantage.

Nowhere is this more true than in the discipline and practice of customer service. My key point in the tale of enforcing restaurant corkage as specified by company policy despite customer confusion was not that the restaurant owner had upset and lost me as a customer by not showing concern for my concern. It was that he had willingly tossed into the incinerator an opportunity to bond me as a customer forever, future cost of acquisition priced at zero.

This is the takeaway that matters: Any botched moment in a transaction is a moment of truth, a distinct fork in the road that will lead you to one of two places, separated or hitched. Mess-ups are good. Mess-ups are big-ticket fountains of light. A momentary instance of failure is the single best opportunity a business will ever have to connect with a customer’s conviction. Understanding that a boo-boo is not a lethal wound is as simple as knowing that almost anything gone wrong unintentionally and without malice opens the door to a celebrated winback.

When something goes wrong, you have a unique opportunity presented to you on a platter. This is opportunity you can’t create intentionally in good faith; it happens when things go astray in a way you hadn’t planned. When something goes boom, you can lose your customer or you can save your customer. They are likely both forever choices. You get to decide. You just have to make that decision on the spot, quickly and correctly.

The error can be your friend if the winback is always what you keep top of mind. Do it right, reach beyond the customer’s expectations, they’ll be back again and again. It works every time.

You just bought your child an ice cream cone from a local vendor in the park. Your child takes a bite and drops the cone on the ground, eyes already beginning to tear. The vendor can offer up a free replacement before you ask, or else charge you for another one. Of course the free one hurts his pocketbook. Which choice makes him the hero you always come back to find?

You arrive at your hotel room late at night and discover the bed is not made. You’re tired, perturbed, and frankly a bit shocked. You call down to the front desk, not exactly joyful. The attendant at the front desk sees no other rooms available on par with yours, leaving the options of sending up a housekeeper or upgrading you to a suite. It’s a busy time of year and the attendant is pretty sure he can sell the suite in the next hour at triple the discount price you paid. What’s the attendant’s best move?

You pick up a half-dozen shirts from the dry cleaner. Your favorite one has been returned with frayed cuffs. The owner has seen this shirt come through more than a few times, and everyone knows that laundering can be harsh on pressed cotton. You complain that this was your favorite shirt and you really hadn’t sent it to the cleaner that many times, although maybe you had. The owner can delete the cost of cleaning that shirt, offer not to charge you for that order, or offer you the replacement cost of the shirt. What will serve you and the owner best?

What is at stake here is nothing less than the lifetime value of your customer. In any one of these cases, the customer might refuse the act of good will and make due, but your kind offer is unlikely to be forgotten or undervalued. If the customer does take you up on your generosity, you might have invested in ten times or a hundred times the business. All three of these examples are real for me, not the exact circumstances, but close enough. As a result, I make a point of where I buy ice cream, which hotel chain I favor, and which dry cleaner gets my laundry bag every single week. Honestly, I can’t remember whether I took their offer or not, but I remember the point of failure, I remember the response attitude, and I now am as loyal a customer as I could ever be, way more so than if the failure had never occurred. The winback is that powerful. It makes bad into good, good into great, temporal into forever. No advertising can do that, no coupon can do that, no promotion can do that. Only a person can do that by making a smart choice that is authentic and heartfelt.

Are there awful customers who will take advantage of merchants and service providers? Of course there are. As I said in my prior article, the customer is not always right. Sometimes a truly miserable customer will force the point of failure to see what goodies will come, even lie about the unmade bed to sneak a free upgrade. Yes, there are good customers and there are bad customers. Decide which one you’re dealing with and act accordingly. My experience is that if you worry less about whether there is a charade before you and more about the immeasurable value of the winback opportunity, the bucket of winback business will fully offset the times you get beat for your graciousness.

Good business starts at the front lines, where those who interact with customers are meeting their true boss. All the small things we can do to make businesses better at any touchpoint can add longevity and prosperity to the enterprise. It’s that kind of creativity I most encourage when a winback is at hand.

Go on, get out there, and start winning ’em back! Reach way out. It’s worth the stretch.

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Image: Dilbert.com ©Scott Adams