High Maintenance Customer?

[david_ff]

As sellers we occasionally run across a very needy and high maintenance customer. They ask for revision after revision, or want you to hi-jack your time with hundreds of questions (an attempt to get free information out of you). Here’s how I deal with high maintenance customers.

1. If I can quickly do the revisions, I’ll generally try to just do it. Yes, it’s annoying, but you’re going to get a high maintenance customer once in a while. That’s just part of the game.

2. If it’s getting out of hand, you can explain all the work you’ve done, and detail all the revisions. And then say something to the effect of, “I hope you like this latest version. If you do require more revisions, I’d have to kindly ask that you order another gig, as revisions beyond this point are beyond the scope of our original agreement.”

3. If they are being rude to you, I just cancel the order. You have no time for that whatsoever. I’ve lost a few hours of hard work as a result of this, but that’s fine. just expect that will happen once in a while and you won’t be so disappointed and let down when it does.

4. Let them give you a bad review. I see all sorts of sellers on here that are hell-bent on maintaining a perfect 100% positive rating. And when it comes down to it, they are falsely doing that… because they just cancel or refund if the person doesn’t like it. That’s not 100% positive reviews!! That’s fake if you ask me. My reviews are completely accurate of what people think of me. I don’t live my life being constantly extorted and blackmailed by the rating system. You should try it as well. It’s liberating!

And so far Fiverr hasn’t punished me for not having a perfect rating. And I wouldn’t expect them to. There will be some times where you get a customer that impossible to please no matter what you do. You can deliver a solid bar of gold, and they will still give you 3 stars.

5. When customers order my gig I include this note to avoid the problem of multiple revisions from the get go:

“Remember - I can’t read your mind. You must be very clear on what you are looking for. On that note: Please also understand that the finished product from me may require some tweaking from you. I’m not you, so what I feel is final, you may think needs a few more tweaks. It doesn’t mean the final product is bad… it just means it’s different than what you would do.”

6. And as always your last resort is to contact customer service and let them help you through the situation. Personally, I’ve never had to do that. I’ve been able to get by on the four points above.

Hope this helps! Here’s to thinking and succeeding!

Best,
David

[divyagoel]

Everyone has their own strategy to increase sales and its there strategy to get a perfect 100% positive rating to cancel or refund…if the buyer is genuine not fake then he or she will never go for refund or cancelletion but do send the bad reviews on your gig…No seller want to refund or cancel any order as it is their loss of time and money…and i think there is no harm if the seller is still saving his ratings no matter how…i think this is how thing goes and it should be…

[amitsivak1]

What if a buyer pays for unlimited revisions?

[david_ff]

I don’t think my customers could afford a gig from me that included unlimited revisions. 🙂

[mr_diligent]

Thank you !!!

[wildflowerk]

That was quite useful. Thanks, David.
I have struggled with a few clients like that. Sometimes you feel alright and pleased to do a revisions. Other times, clients are taking advantage of you for being a seller on Fiverr as if being their slave… That might sound too harsh but it is true.

[prettytoney]

I offer unlimited revisions but still there are cases when I cancel the order.
First of all, buyers need to understad that revisions are corrections and not completely new artworks.
When somebody is asking for too much I just add the extra cost to the existing order and explain to them why. However at this point they usually starting to like the illustration or they want to cancel in some cases but it is rare.
These kind of people want the whole world for 5 bucks.

[cyaxrex]

Good advice. Also, I completely agree with not giving in and cancelling an order for reviews sake. However, I’ve got some newish gigs which I really do try to avoid getting bad reviews on if I can help it. Once, I’ve pushed them up past the 50-100 review mark, I won’t care anymore. However, new gigs with poor reviews from even experienced sellers can be killed by negative feedback in the early days. Or is that just me being paranoid?

[david_ff]

Great point! I agree that on a new gig you want to make sure the reviews are good. Nothing will kill a gig faster than a few bad reviews right out of the gate.

[david_ff]

It’s not harsh. It’s true. Some buyers think that you should write a 500 page novel for $5. The key is to use a few tricks to filter these out before they order.

Put verbiage in your gig that states “your” expectations for each dollar amount. And when you are messaging with them before they order, notice the red flags of a high maintenance customer, and kindly refer them elsewhere 🙂