Tough Customers

Originally published: New York: Simon & Schuster, 2010.

A guide to holding your ground with hardball negotiators, from a “talented advisor with a rare ability for connecting people with ideas” (Patrick Lencioni, bestselling author of The Five Dysfunctions of a Team). Negotiation is the middle ground between capitulation and stonewalling—a back-and-forth between two parties trying to reach agreement. If a price or other term is non-negotiable, there is no give and take, just “take it or leave it.” You may think you are negotiating, but if the other side isn’t playing, you aren’t either. Regardless of the industry, situation, or product, the two most common mistakes negotiators make are: 1) they give ground too easily, and 2) they get nothing in return. When dealing with tough customers, it is even more important to be able to defend your position and bargain for reciprocal concessions. Negotiating with Tough Customers provides proven methods for holding your ground against (seemingly) more powerful negotiators. But it goes further, making sure that when you do give ground, you get equal or better value in return. Using a cooperative, collaborative approach in a hardball negotiation just doesn’t work. Tough negotiators will play win-win, but only if they have nothing to lose. Negotiating With Tough Customers will make you a better salesperson by making you a better negotiator . . . and vice versa.

Praise for How to Deal with Difficult Customers "The application of the ten key strategies in this book will help every sales professional learn how to deal with the truly difficult and how to avoid creating unnecessary difficulties. It's written with the same wit, humor, and inspiration that have made Anderson's prior books so effective." --Margaret Callihan, President, Chairman, and CEO, SunTrust Bank, Florida "Anderson knocks another one out of the park with How to Deal with Difficult Customers! The problem is real; Anderson's solutions make sense and, as always, he makes you laugh in the process." --Mike Roscoe, Editor in Chief, Dealer Magazine "I could not put this book down. It's a salesperson's bible, offering clear and concise how-to advice. If you're in the selling profession and want to sell more, you should read this book . . . twice." --Warren Lada, Senior Vice President, Saga Communications "An individual executing the ideas within this book will change their own life and their organization. No one has the gift like Anderson to articulate the importance character plays in maximizing potential." --Mike Tomberlin, CEO, The Tomberlin Group "Throw out all your other sales manuals. Anderson's new book will change the way you look at customers, the way your salespeople look at themselves, and, quite frankly, the way you look at the sales process." --Dan Janal, President, PRleads.com "What are you waiting for? We all have difficult customers. If you're tired of leaving money on the table because you can't handle them, read this book. If your good customers are turning into difficult customers, read this book. If you want to deliver results year-in and year-out, read, re-read, and apply the lessons of this book." --Randy Pennington, author, Results Rule!

MANAGING CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIPS A Strategic Framework Praise for the first edition: "Peppers and Rogers do a beautiful job of integrating actionable frameworks, the thinking of other leaders in the field, and best practices from leading-edge companies. "—Dr. Hugh J. Watson, C. Herman and Mary Virginia Terry Chair of Business Administration, Terry College of Business, University of Georgia "Peppers and Rogers have been the vanguard for the developing field of customer relationship management, and in this book, they bring their wealth of experience and knowledge into academic focus. This text successfully centers the development of the field and its theories and methodologies squarely within the broader context of enterprise competitive theory. It is a must-have for educators of customer relationship management and anyone who considers customer-centric marketing the cornerstone of sound corporate strategy." —Dr. Charlotte Mason, Department Head, Director, and Professor, Department of Marketing and Distribution, Terry College of Business, University of Georgia "Don and Martha have done it again! The useful concepts and rich case studies revealed in Managing Customer Relationships remove any excuse for those of us responsible for actually delivering one-to-one customer results. This is the ultimate inside scoop!" —Roy Barnes, Formerly with Marriott, now President, Blue Space Consulting "This is going to become the how-to book on developing a customer-driven enterprise. The marketplace is so much in need of this road map!" —Mike Henry, Leader for Consumer Insights at Acxiom Praise for the second edition: "Every company has customers, and that's why every company needs a reference guide like this. Peppers and Rogers are uniquely qualified to provide us with the top textbook on the subject, and the essential tool for the field they helped to create." —David Reibstein, William Stewart Woodside Professor of Marketing, The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania

`The text is clear and easy to follow with vivid sessional excerpts that illustrate the theoretical dialogue' - International Review of Psychiatry `The publication proves to contain much instructive and practice-oriented material' - Nursing Standard Stress Counselling is a comprehensive study of the theory and practice of the Rational Emotive Behaviour approach applied to stress counselling and psychotherapy. Albert Ellis pioneered Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy (REBT), which has since been adopted internationally. This approach enables the clients to embark on a course of effective counselling which has a clear beginning and end. This book discusses techniques and solutions to common problems and also provides guidance on conducting group work. Its comprehensive coverage includes additional material on techniques such as skills training, relaxation methods, hypnosis and biofeedback.

Every business on the planet is trying to maximize the value created by its customers Learn how to do it, step by step, in this newly revised Fourth Edition of Managing Customer Experience and Relationships: A Strategic Framework. Written by Don Peppers and Martha Rogers, Ph.D., recognized for decades as two of the world’s leading experts on customer experience issues, the book combines theory, case studies, and strategic analyses to guide a company on its own quest to position its customers at the very center of its business model, and to “treat different customers differently.” This latest edition adds new material including: How to manage the mass-customization principles that drive digital interactions How to understand and manage data-driven marketing analytics issues, without having to do the math How to implement and monitor customer success management, the new discipline that has arisen alongside software-as-a-service businesses How to deal with the increasing threat to privacy, autonomy, and competition posed by the big tech companies like Facebook, Amazon, and Google Teaching slide decks to accompany the book, author-written test banks for all chapters, a complete glossary for the field, and full indexing Ideal not just for students, but for managers, executives, and other business leaders, Managing Customer Experience and Relationships should prove an indispensable resource for marketing, sales, or customer service professionals in both the B2C and B2B world.

Bacal provides a practical guide to dealing with nasty, hostile, angry, and even abusive customers. He gives you the skills and confidence to deal with the most troublesome of customers.

Ignore a valid complaint and you could be the next viral sensation for all the wrong reasons. But give in to every demand and you may be consumed with the often petty complaints of your worst customers and wind up pandering to them with freebies, discounts, and special attention. That will cost you time and money, and perhaps worse, do little or nothing to solve the root problem. Dealing with Difficult Customers will show you: How to stop using gimmicks and trick promotions to encourage repeat business and the alternatives that will keep your customers salivating for more. How “Hungry Hippos” and “Problem Children” are sapping your employees time and energy and what to do about them. The behaviors that turn great customers into dissatisfied critics and how to change them.