How to Apologize to Your Customers

When I worked at the Word of Mouth Marketing Association, we talked a lot about apologies. After all, people aren't perfect, and neither are their companies. Both make mistakes. The question is, when your business mucks something up, how does it say, "I'm sorry"?

The answer, I discovered at WOMMA, is a matter not only of customer service, but also of branding. That's because customers are an understanding breed of beast. They appreciate honesty. They appreciate transparency. They appreciate candor. A company's response to its own missteps therefore offers a unique glimpse into its character. Customers don't want to do business with finger pointers; they want to do business with sincere, stand-up corporate citizens.

So, if you've messed up, what do you do? You could cue up Brenda Lee's famous "I'm sorry" country song and broadcast it via loudspeaker. You could ignore the problem. You could send customers a note that's overflowing with excuses and explanations. Or, you could simply say, "We screwed up, and we're sorry. We'll do better next time."

That's exactly what my Web hosting company, DreamHost, did recently when it overcharged my account. Here's how they said, "Sorry":

Hi Matthew!

Ack. Through a COMPLETE bumbling on our part, we've accidentally attempted to charge you for the ENTIRE year of 2008 (and probably 2009!) ALREADY (it was all due to a fat finger)!

We're really really realllly embarassed about this, but you have nothing to worry about. Please ignore any confusing billing messages you may have received recently; we've already removed all those bum future charges on your account and fixed everything up.

Thank you very very much for your patience with this .. we PROMISE this won't happen again. There's no need to reply to this message unless of course you have any other questions at all!

Sincerely,

The Foolish DreamHost Billing Team!

DreamHost solved and notified me of the problem before I was even aware of it. They were sincere and they were proactive. I was impressed.

Sure, it sucks that they screwed up, but because of their apology, I was appreciative instead of annoyed. That's how you say, "I'm sorry."