Suppose you deliver your work and your client writes this:
""Sorry, but I do not like any of these X at all. How is it possible that you have been rated so good? Please do not try it again. Thanks for trying. "
How do you respond to it? Do you apologize? I’m curious because customer service has always been my weakness.
Your respond, ‘’ Ohh i am very sad to know that my work did not fulfill your expectation. But still i can improve the work i did for you. Can you kindly tell me, what you did not like and what change you would like to see. This time, i will try my best to fulfill your expectation. Please, write me back so i can bring back both us smile. Thank you!’’
#BTW, dont look at my profile as i am not experience seller yet on fiverr. But my reply suggestion base on my marketing background which you can trust.
It appears that the buyer has made up their mind by the fact they tell you not to try again. They have also been insulting with their comment. Clearly something has gone wrong here and their “sorry” and “Thanks” are pretty lame to have at either end of an insult and cut-off. There is a part of me that sees this as an attempt to get a refund by giving you negative feedback before a review in the hope that you will cancel it and they get their money back and potentially use your X. I am against giving refunds after work has been done as it encourages this type of behavior.
However, if you think this isn’t the case then firstly, I would say something like “I am sorry you are not happy with X…” - this is not an apology but an acknowledgment that they are unhappy and that you would prefer if they were happy!
From there, there are three approaches I might take with this buyer:
I may ask them for more information, if there was something more specific they had in mind, a point they wanted the X to make etc. Depending on their response, I might offer a revision but if they come back with the generic “it had no spark” or “I wanted something catchy” then I would probably not offer a revision.
Alternatively, I would offer to come up with something completely different.
The thing with subjective gigs is that buyers often find it difficult to see the value or time spent. This perception is very important as if a buyer thinks you did it very quickly/without thought, then they will do the same and possibly reject it just because “it didn’t pop”.
I don’t offer things like taglines but one regular buyer asked me to do so, to come up with 5 taglines. Because I was familiar with them, I came up with one within 1 minute and I felt it was the best I could do. As they had paid for 5, I struggled for a further hour to come up with 4 others. They chose the first one of course and were absolutely delighted with it, even though it had only taken a minute to come up with.
With the delivery, I explained in detail why I picked each tagline and what it meant. This showed them that I had spent at least an hour on the order and they could see the value. Even if they hadn’t liked what I had said, they would have seen the value of my time. If I had delivered 5 sentences then they would have thought I spent 5 minutes on it. Their attitude to the delivery would have been very different and they may not have liked the tagline, even though it was absolutely perfect for the company. Had they not seen the time I spent, they may have just skipped over it.
I did a post about communicating value recently, this is it: Communicating the Value of Your Gig to Buyers - UPYOUR
It is quite long and to follow the advice will take a little time initially and then a couple of minutes for each order but after 10-20 orders, you will have enough templates to make it a 30 second addition to each order which adds huge value for your buyers and should hopefully help you avoid getting that kind of message from buyers in future.
Exactly. I wouldn’t suggest trying again or opening a dialog for an amendment but rather simply replying like eoin said[quote=“eoinfinnegan, post:3, topic:154137”]
“I am sorry you are not happy with X…”
[/quote]
Offer them a small background as to why you delivered what you delivered and move on.
Oh, and mobile posting is really difficult at times!
“Thank you. Have a great day.”
Make it short and sweet. Don’t pry, don’t try to find out why, it’ll lead you into long conversation and time is money. Some people can’t be satisfied and like Eoin said, most of your gigs are subjective.
Tell them that you are sorry to hear that and don’t offer them a refund since they don’t give you the chance to meet their expectations.
I wouldn’t respond at all to them. They were needlessly rude.
Thanks for your answer. The gig in question about about taglines, in fact, I didn’t want to say what it was about because I think this is something that can happen to anyone regardless of what we do.
I like your suggestions. Maybe I can say. “I’m sorry you didn’t like my work, as I wrote in my gig description, this is a subjective gig where what is good or bad is really a matter of opinion. If you order again, I can give you more options. If not, I can refer you to other people who do what I do.”
What do you think?
Exactly…
It’s funny to be so polite when they’ve just been so rude. 
It is, but it sure is smart business. 
If the buyer decides to complain to CS later and they check the messages, they’ll see who the pro is and who the ant is.
That’s true. CS once warned me that they expect a TRS seller to be a role model and conduct himself professionally, otherwise one can suffer a demotion.
For example, sarcasm can get you an account warning, same goes with being disrespectful. It’s always better not to sink to their level. Let CS see that you were not the one pouring gasoline on the fire.
“Long wait. It better be worth it.”
How would you react to this @fastcopywriter , @eoinfinnegan and @misscrystal ? This despite the fact that I told the buyer that I would do his order 14 days ahead of my admittedly long delivery time.
I asked for a mutual cancellation saying I can’t work under pressure. Avoided a negative review, I think. (This was before I started with the work.) But with buyers able to give internal feedback for even mutual cancellation, expect the worst. Hate such attitude.
@writer99025 I would have cancelled too. That is simply not the way to talk to a seller.
Sometimes you have to when the buyer gives you no choice. Occasionally you do get someone who is unpleasant. That was a threat.
Well, cancellations may hurt your ranking, but then again, you get so many orders that one little cancellation won’t hurt you much, although it will hurt your order completion rate. I care about that one because an order that isn’t completed (refunds) means money that was lost. My own rate went up from 88% to 94%. I’m proud of that.
If I was in your shoes, and had started working on his order, I would finish the job.
Personally, I think your buyer was in the wrong. If you’re in a hurry, why order from someone that takes 29 days? And why not be happy when you’re offered 14 days? You’re clearly someone that’s not writing articles in 15 minutes or less, it’s obvious you take your time so most clients should appreciate that.
So I’m going to agree with what you did. If you don’t need the money or the aggravation, why suffer fools?
No, I didn’t start working on his order, I planned to do so from Monday. My order completion rate was 98% before this, so I don’t think that will be affected too much. It is the internal feedback that worries me. But to be fair I have quit worrying about these things. If I get orders, will do them to the best of my ability, if I don’t get orders, will do something else. Most of my buyers are good people, it is very rare for anyone to show such attitude. When that happens, I don’t let them walk all over me.
Agreed don’t waste your time just work away from trouble
Don’t know how the internal feedback can affect you, even if someone complains to CS, they can only hurt you if you’ve done something wrong.
Now if you’re talking about your self-esteem, don’t worry about it, never let a few bad clients bring you down, focus on the ones that love your work. You have like 1,500 reviews, people obviously love your work.
I’m glad you did what you did. I hope that guy learns quick that being a jerk with the people you hire doesn’t help you at all. There are too many people with the attitude of “the customer is king.” Selfridge never said that, he said “the customer is always right” which means that if a customer says “I prefer that red jacket,” you give it to him even if you think it looks horrible on him. It’s the same reason I don’t lecture my clients when they pick options I don’t agree with, the most I will do is write something like “my favorite one is #5.”
Haha…2455 reviews, to be exact But thanks for that!