Reputation Management: What to Do with a Bad Review?

In an ideal world, your small business would improve the lives of everyone it touches and all those people would quickly refer three friends and ensure that you stay in business for years to come. But the reality is that sometimes, no matter how hard you work to satisfy every customer, bad reviews crop up.

For example, if you own a business that you market locally, the good news is that people are looking for you. In fact, according to a recent New York Times article, a study by the Yellow Pages Association and comScore found that “local search for businesses, products and services grew 58 percent last year and reached 15.7 billion searches, more than a tenth of overall search traffic.” The bad news is that if you don’t give them what they’re asking for, they may very well use the social media resources at their fingertips to tell the world.

So how do you prevent bad reviews? And what should you do when one appears anyway?

1. Manage your Reputation – If you aren’t searching for yourself on social media, bad reviews could be hurting your business without you even realizing it. Perform a search for your business on all the major search engines, and then use tools like Google Alerts and Twitter Search to track your business name, your name and any other keywords associated with your business. If you offer a product or service locally, check out your reviews on sites like Angie’s List, Yelp.com, and CitySearch.com.
2. Don’t Fly off the Handle – Recently, Twitter user Amanda Bonnen tweeted a complaint about mold in her apartment to her 20 followers. When her apartment management company, saw the Tweet, they sued her for $50,000, alleging the comment was defamatory. The story was picked up in the blogosphere and the mainstream press, and now the alleged mold problem has been reported all over the world. Sure, a bad review of the business you’ve worked so hard on can make you feel angry, hurt, or even litigious, but weigh the options before doing something that you will later regret.
3. Respond Professionally – The New York Times mentioned Jeff Diamond, the co-owner of Farmstead Cheese and Wines in Oakland-Alameda, CA. Diamond responds to every Yelp.com review his store receives, whether positive or negative. He has diffused misunderstandings that way, including an incident where a customer thought a clerk was rude when the employee was actually hard of hearing. After Diamond responded to the problem, the complainer actually joined the store’s wine club and became a loyal customer. If Diamond had let the complaint go, chances are that that scenario would have turned out quite differently.
4. Offer a Do-Over – Is someone complaining long and loudly about your services? Perhaps you did not get the chance to put your best foot forward. Don’t make excuses. Simply offer a discount or freebie and make it right.
5. Learn from Past Mistakes – Perhaps you have found a trove of complaints about one aspect of your company, such as slow email response time or a confusing website. Take complaints as constructive criticism and use them to improve your business. Remember, for every customer who took the time to complain, there are likely 10 more that wanted to but did not.
6. 6.) Provide Excellent Products and Service – The best customer complaints are no complaints at all. Ensure customer satisfaction by providing a top quality product or service every time. Take the time to spell out your policies and procedures for customers so they know what to expect, and incorporate an aspect of feedback into your customer interactions. If a customer feels like you value her business and are listening to her feedback, she is less likely to feel the need to shout a criticism from the rooftops.

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