You go to work, you serve food, you thank the customers before they leave. You think everything is going great. That is, until you get a customer complaint.
Receiving complaints is part of being in this industry. What’s more, with the rise of social media use, it’s now easier for customers to air their grievances directly to you. It then falls on your hands to handle it properly.
They say the customer is always right. They also say laughter is the best medicine.
Now we’re not one to base our philosophies on trite clichés, but these companies prove that the two can apparently go together.
- This #SEOfail
For any business investing in online marketing, one of the worst things to happen is seeing a search result that misrepresents your brand. And to have a customer point that out to you.
This is exactly what happened to UK-based Greggs, a famous bakery chain known for their steak bakes and sausage rolls.
Customers pointed out that their logo on Google was replaced with a rather offensive slogan. Greggs quickly tweeted Google UK and asked to fix it. Read for yourself how this #SEOfail turned into a #PRWin.
- Domino-uh-oh
How many times have you received a complaint, then it turned out to be a mistake of the customer?
Regardless, Domino’s Pizza knows that a good company responds to any and all complaints, especially when the food you delivered was not up to par. Well, allegedly not up to par.
- There’s something fishy here…
It’s not always through humor that a complaint can be solved, but Sainsbury’s, a UK-based supermarket chain, nailed it.
To read the entire tail of this punny exchange, click here.
- Sandwich SmackDown
Sainsbury’s seems to want to solidify their reputation as one of the sassiest social media ever. And rightfully so, as statistics show that replying to a complaint in social media increases customer advocacy by as much as 25 percent.
- When your food is so good, they don’t care what they get
Taco Bell is one of the world’s famous fast food chains, serving nachos, quesadillas, burritos, and other Mexican food, as well as a side dish of…
- From the mouths of babes
There’s something endearing about a child trying to act like an adult.
Take for instance Lily Robinson, who was then three and a half years old. She wrote to Sainsbury’s asking why their tiger bread is called tiger bread, when, in fact, it should be giraffe bread. (Cue: awwww’s from the audience.)
Sainsbury’s customer service team, of course, gave in to the demands of little Lily (who wouldn’t??). Chris King, their customer manager, wrote back and said that the bread does indeed look more like a giraffe than a tiger. He then attached a gift card.
It didn’t stop there. After the Twitter frenzy over the exchange mellowed, Sainsbury came out with a rebranded tiger bread and called it giraffe bread.
Now that’s listening to your customers.
- Tesco, The Vampire Slayer
It’s one of the basic tenets of vampire lore—do you want to feel safe against the spawn of Dracula? Have some garlic on your person. However, nobody made it clear if the garlic would still work if it was moldy.
Apparently, a Tesco customer was wondering the same thing. User @AlfrescoDB was quick to tweet Tesco when he found some rather unsavory garlic in his purchase.
Tesco responded, sending the man a gift card for some replacement garlic “to help you fight off the undead hordes” and for him to “protect the people that you love.”
They even added an apology towards the end for not having any silver bullets available for werewolves.
- Bacon horror
Tesco’s social media response once again made headlines, when a customer received a funny reply to his tongue-in-cheek Facebook complaint after receiving six slices of bacon on a supposed seven-rasher pack.
TL;DR: Ben Roberts suffered the highest level of betrayal when he found six slices of bacon instead of the expected seven, and proceeded to tell Tesco how much it hurt his feelings.
Tesco didn’t pass up the opportunity to be as equally creative as the complaint they received.
TL;DR: They apologized for the whirlwind of emotions Ben Roberts went through, saying that they share his love for bacon, and the anger is fully understood and justified.
The lesson? Never—and we mean never—mess with anyone’s bacon.
- The wrath of the grammar nazi
Grand West is a casino and entertainment center located in Cape Town, South Africa. It is, as they advertise, “a wonderland of around-the-clock entertainment”, good food, and apparently a misplaced apostrophe.
Jason Elk tweeted the casino to inform them of the lapse in grammar.
Grand West quickly remedied the problem.
- A little brand-on-brand war
Business is business, but that doesn’t mean they can’t have a little fun.
Old Spice, one of the well-known companies creating products for men, once threw some shade towards Taco Bell’s fire sauce.
Taco Bell, of course, did not let that go unanswered.
Oh, snap!
Have you ever received any funny customer complaints? How did you respond? Share your story with us on the comments section below!
