Angry Client? Apologize

Seth Godin shows us why many apologies only make matters worse -- since many apologies are no apology at all, but a way to appear like you give a darn. The winner apology:

"We're sorry that we caused this problem." or "We're sorry that we have let this happen." (9): This is a full apology, and is what the customer needs to hear. Frankly, it doesn't matter that it was really the post office's fault, and not yours; the customer doesn't care. Most people hearing this cannot help but respond with some sort of graciousness, such as "Well, all right then, these things happen. What are you going to do to fix it?" This is the target level that you want to hit for your customer service. But for the record, there is still one level to go.

Read the rest on his blog. Here is an earlier Seth post on Apology. [BTW, I'll be with Seth all day next Tuesday for his Marketing seminar!].