If you sell stuff on a consistent basis, some of its going to come back. It almost never matters what youre actually selling. You could be selling food and people will come knocking on your restaurant, swearing and cursing that it had a whole nest of lice in there, asking for a refund or a whole different meal.
Sometimes its your fault. Other times, its because someone just wanted to weasel into a free meal. Whatever the reason, refunds come up and it can be hell to deal with it. I should know.
This also happens a lot when you try to sell things online, both the refunds and the scams. Instead of getting worked up over refunds, understand that there are some things you need to consider when dealing with refunds.
Tip 1: Maybe They’re Stupid
Usually, I look at conflicts with a simple motto: “do not attribute to malice what you can first blame on stupidity”.
For example, there are some people that dont understand the idea of a digital download (which is what makes me the bulk of my money). You would think that being on the internet and buying items on the internet would mean that they know what a digital download is.
Every now and then youre going to find the occasional customer who has no idea what theyre doing, or at the very least knows half of whats going on and thinks the digital part of a digital transaction only involves the internet instead of merely the transfer of information. Then when you just give them a file or something similar, they freak out and start calling you nasty names, names that shouldnt come out of any mouth ever and tend to make various religious figures cry in their sleep.
Don’t stress over these people. Give them their money back and let another info product marketer try and explain things to them.
Tip 2: Relax, Dont Do It [Get Pissed Off]
Dealing with something like that is tiring, to say the least, especially if your business is young or in trouble or if you just wanted that new gadget that you were going to buy with your sales money.
Anyone would be drained, even enraged by it but hell, it just isnt worth it. And the truth is that in most cases youre not the only one disappointed. Maybe your sales letter was so good that you sent your customer into a buying frenzy and in their stupor they missed all your “digital product” warnings.
Things are going to go wrong better learn to roll with it before it shortens your life with a heart attack.
Tip 3: Fight the Scam Artist on a Small Scale
Of course, there are some people out there who arent innocent. They arent old ladies who are in over their debt, but scammers or jerks out to waste your time or worse.
The temptation to start a war with them can be overwhelming, but its one that needs to be stymied. For one thing, theyre like bugs and roaches theyre everywhere. If you suspect that theres a scammer running amuck, you can warn others of their wicked ways or at least block them from your site.
Sure they can get around it, but you gotta do what you can to keep yourself out of trouble. You cant let yourself get angry either, at least not insanely angry. The internet gave us the ability to work and sell and make money from home, in the same breath offering scammers an easy way to attack. You have to put up with a little rain.
Tip 4: Learn From It
No matter how good the product is, there is always room for improvement. If the customer really wasn’t satisfied with your product and told you what they didn’t like about it, you just got some great advice that could one day increase your bottom line.
What if there was a huge flaw in one of your products and you fixed it thanks to customer feedback in exchange for returning their money? You just saved yourself from a lot more future refunds and potential embarassment.
Dealing with refunds is no fun, but in the IM industry it’s part of life. Learn to deal with it calmly or you’ll drive yourself crazy.