This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
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When something goes wrong and you have a negative experience with a big company, like a travel company, for example, or it could be some other big company or retailer, some big company that you have paid money to and had a negative experience, things didn't go the way you expected. What do you do? Do you remain silent or do you speak up? You know, there's two groups of people here and of course there's different approaches if you do speak up, but some people choose to not say anything about it. Maybe they won't use that company in the future, but they're not gonna complain.
Whereas others are happy to complain and they're like, I actually want to get what I've paid for. You know, I want to express my disappointment. Well, you know, one key of successful complaining or let's say getting a positive response, you know, getting the remedy that you want is to focus on the issue without getting overly emotional and to identify that specific remedy that you are looking for. Okay, that's something that I have learned over the years, especially with travel situations, but today's caller might be a better complainer than me. This listener is really good at speaking up and getting what he deserves whenever something goes wrong.
He's got an example to do with an airline, I believe, but he also has some experience just kind of navigating this process in general, which is essentially, you know, the art of negotiation, negotiating from one person, one individual to a large corporation. And of course there are individuals, you know, operating behind that corporation. So this is side hustle school. Like why are we talking about this year? Hopefully you can become a better complainer, but also we're trying to find the opportunity.
So I think there's something everybody can do to make extra money to create a little business, even if they don't want to quit their job. That's totally fine. That's what it's all about here, in fact. And I'm trying to show people that there's all kinds of ways to do that. Okay, that's what we have been doing for more than 1600 days.
Let's see what we can do with today's caller. His name is Tom. He wants to become a professional complaint coach. Well, at least a semi-professional one, because, you know, day job and all. Let's see if there's a way to turn this skill into a service.
That's today's topic. It's coming up after this quick message. [Music]
Hi, Chris, this is Tom. I recently found your show and I'm enjoying the stories and content. I have an idea.
United Airlines canceled the flight I was on, then tried to rebook me on an itinerary that would have required a 4 a.m. trip to the airport and an extra connection. I escalated the complaint, and after talking to a manager, I got it down to one connection at a reasonable time and a voucher for $200. If I hadn't spoken up, I would have been out of luck. It wasn't that hard, but lots of people don't know what to say or how to be what I call politely assertive.
I'd like to brand myself as the complaint coach and help people get what they deserve from large companies, especially when something goes wrong. Do you have any tips or advice? Thanks. [Music]
Politely assertive. I love that.
I think that in a nutshell is a great takeaway lesson for somebody who's like, how do I properly complain when something goes wrong on my next flight or something? You are politely assertive, right? So bonus lesson there, thank you for that, Tom. Now, as for the business potential, I totally agree, as mentioned, that people do not know how to properly complain, especially to big companies. They tend to get very emotional and point out lots and lots of different issues without really focusing on like, what is the core issue?
Like, where did this company let me down? And also what seems like a fair remedy for that experience. So these big retail companies, B2C companies, they have entire departments focused on recovery or customer experience or the art of making good when something goes wrong. So how can Tom turn this into a service? I think it needs to be really simple.
It can't be a 24 module, six month long class. People need to get results quickly. There's also as a business model, people who work as negotiators trying to lower the cost of large bills, like in the medical world. But that's a bit different because helping people get $200 vouchers on flights, I mean, that's awesome, that's valuable. But if you were earning a commission on that, which is how that works in the world of medical bill negotiation.
You know, it's kind of a lot of work for, you know, a relatively small amount of money. Like you're saving somebody $200, but you're gonna get, you know, five to 10% of that. Probably not a great business model. So I like the idea of one of these two approaches. Tom, as the complaint coach, sells a quick and dirty informational product that probably sells for like $39.
$39 to $79 somewhere in that range. And it's just like, here is what you need to know to get what you want. The second option would be a half hour consultation in which Tom guarantees his service will have positive results. So when somebody's having a difficult situation, he's like, I'm gonna talk you through it. I'll tell you exactly what to say.
I'll tell you who to ask for, how to respond when they say certain things and so on. And because this is a consultation, it has to cost more. So this is something like $100 to $220 somewhere in that range for, you know, as I said, half an hour. And there he's trying to help solve a specific situation. And the goal is for the client to go away with the knowledge to make much more than that cost in value to them, you know, as they complain to whatever large company has let them down.
And hopefully also they're gonna learn a skill that they will be able to use again. But I think there still needs to be that quick result. It's not just about building the skill. It's like, how can I help solve that specific situation to make clients feel like they have spent their money well. So that's my thought on that.
Our two thoughts actually, two different approaches, a quick and dirty, really simple info product that sells for, you know, a medium price point, $39 to, I think I said 75 somewhere in that range or a half hour short consultation in which Tom guarantees his service is gonna have a positive value. And that costs, I don't know, something like $100 to $250 somewhere in that range. So Tom, good luck listeners. I hope that's helpful maybe to somebody else out there. There's probably room for more than one person to do something like this.
So perhaps it gives somebody an idea. And listeners, if you are trying to find your idea, or if you're struggling in getting your idea out to the world or getting some traction, let us know what's going on. Come to sidehustleschool.com/questions. We'll continue to feature as many of these as possible throughout the year, along with updates from listeners as they launch their projects. Thank you so much for being out there.
Please do subscribe and follow. Please come back tomorrow 'cause I'll be here. And that's it for today. My name is Chris Guillebeau. This is Side Hustle School.
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- From the Onward Project.
