Customers aren't always right. And they're not always pleasant. Sometimes they can be rude, combative, or downright obnoxious. As a service provider, you may be faced with the task of helping someone who has a preexisting grudge against your company, or even someone who is intoxicated or mentally unstable! Yet there are also times when it's not the customer who behaves badly. If you inadvertently say or do something that causes a customer to become upset or angry, what can you do to save the interaction?

Dealing with customers isn't always easy. But knowing the right words can make all the difference.

Covering 30 challenging customer behaviors and 20 tough employee-caused situations, Powerful Phrases for Effective Customer Service shows you how to incorporate language that communicates courtesy, warmth, receptiveness, rapport, enthusiasm, assurance, regret, empathy, and appreciation into your daily routine. The book contains over 700 phrases and scripts that have been proven time and again to diffuse even the most difficult exchanges you may face as a customer service professional.

This practical and insightful book focuses on two critical components of service: the value of using proven "powerful" phrases, and backing up your words with appropriate actions. You'll learn the six steps to interacting successfully with your customers, as well as how to identify specific behaviors and situations and pair them with corresponding approaches for guiding the conversation swiftly and smoothly to a happy resolution. You'll also learn how to effectively engage with customers who post comments, complaints, or compliments on social media sites.

Filled with helpful Do This! scenarios that reinforce the correct methods for dealing with difficult situations--as well as Why This Works sections that help you understand the motivation underlying the most effective verbal and behavioral strategies--this invaluable book proves once and for all that phenomenal customer service can be put into words.

RENE EVENSON has worked in the customer service management field for more than 30 years, including nearly two decades as a customer service manager and trainer at BellSouth Telecommunications. She has a degree in organizational psychology and is the author of Customer Service Training 101 and Customer Service Management Training 101. She lives in Saint Simons Island, Georgia.