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TOPIC: If You Get A Bad Review

Apple Roof Cleaning Tampa FL (813) 655-8777

RCIA Founder

Status: Offline

Posts: 7908

Date: Dec 17, 2013

If You Get A Bad Review

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Hey, it happens to all of us, sooner or later.

A gutter leaked, a tarp blows off, or a ground man does not do his job when cleaning a roof, and the next thing you know, your business receives a bad review!

Angie's List, Yelp, Google, Facebook. Online review sites and social media can be a double-edged sword for businesses. Consumers may praise, hate, rant or rave about a business and reach thousands, even millions, of other consumers.

It's great when customers are saying good things about your business, but not so great when they are trashing it. Studies show that 7 out of 10 consumers believe online reviews as much as they do family and friends. Fifty-seven percent of people avoid businesses with bad online reviews.

So how do you deal with bad online reviews about your business?

1.	Don't ignore them. They will not go away on their own and your lack of acknowledgement may give the appearance that you don't care about your customers.
2.	Respond quickly. Be polite and apologize for what went wrong. Resist the urge to be argumentative.
3.	Learn from them. Think of a bad review as free market research. Try to use it to improve your business. The customer may have found a legitimate problem with your service or product which you can now address.
4.	Know what you can and can't do in your response. You will have to learn the policy of each review site. Some let you challenge a review that you feel is unfounded; others leave all posts up, but allow you to respond.
5.	Have a system for dealing with reviews. Make sure someone is in charge of review sites and responding to any complaints so they don't slip through the cracks.

You can sign up for Google Alerts which will monitor what is being posted about your business.Brandify scans social media for your business.

There are reputation management services available, but beware of what is promised. According to BIA/Kelsey, a Chantilly, VA media research firm, businesses are expected to spend $700 million on technology tools and services to monitor business reputations.

Many sites promise to remove negative reviews, but they cannot always do that, even though they charge for it. Reputation.com, one of the oldest reputation management firms, doesn't try to remove all bad reviews. They try, instead, to move positive reviews to the forefront.

Don't be put off by bad reviews. Reach out to disgruntled posters and try to resolve issues. You may well turn these naysayers into loyal customers and it will demonstrate your commitment to customer satisfaction if they update their online opinion of your business. Also remember to actively solicit good reviews from your satisfied customers. Since happy customers are not as motivated as unhappy customers in posting comments, make it easy for them to leave comments on your site. Several good reviews by happy customers may go a long way to offset any negative comments.

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