This is not a rare situation in which I find some prospects; sometimes, only when I conduct a free situation report for them do they know the scale of such an issue. It’s not entirely surprising that so many social media channels and, for that matter, directories are offering a review option. It can be a task to see a company’s reputation profile. I also weigh this up when suggesting to work with a prospect because if a company isn’t bothered about this issue, it makes SEO much more complicated to accomplish. In fact, gaining greater exposure for such an organisation can often amplify the channels for dissatisfied customers to vent their dissatisfaction.
However, in saying this, it is true that usually, the only motivated people who leave reviews are generally those who feel negatively about the service they’ve received or how their initial complaint was dealt with. Most companies don’t realise their reputation isn’t purely something they cannot influence. In fact, you may be surprised just how much you can affect your online reputation through a simple three-step plan to address poor reviews and harnessing a system to gain more positive reviews.
Contact the person who left a bad review directly
This won’t always be an option. For instance, they might not respond to your contact, or you may feel things are beyond salvaging.
However, it’s my experience that if you’re prepared to make an effort to contact them and have a solution in mind to address their issue, they may even feel inclined to remove or change the review. However, you should never have that as your objective since it will be evident that is what you’re trying to do. Getting an ex-client to reconsider their feelings about your company and possibly re-appraise their future usage should be goal enough. You can only hope that the solution you have in mind impresses them sufficiently that they may consider editing or removing the bad review.
Respond to the review through that channel
Not all review sites give you a chance to respond to a review, but some of them do. As a matter of principle, if this is the situation, you should reply to any review anyway. Why? Because it shows that you are a responsive organisation that is keen to take the time to thank people for positive reviews whilst addressing bad reviews and explaining what you did or intend to do from what you have learnt. However, you may not want to do this till you’ve tried approaching them directly. One word of warning is that it is vital to be as matter-of-fact as possible and not to try to belittle the complaint or use emotional language wherever possible.
Ask the review site to take down a fraudulent review
It is rare, but there are occasions when a competitor, for example, may leave a fraudulent review. Generally, with sufficient due diligence, you’ll find that almost all bad reviews are genuine. If you are positive that the review is fake, then approach the review site directly, but don’t make a habit of it since you may end up building a poor reputation with the review sites! Yes, I can see the irony in that, too.
And how do I get good reviews?
Any company that hasn’t gone through this task may find a backlog of historical reviews to either address or are deemed ‘ancient history’. The good news is that, almost without exception, review sites work on posting the most recent reviews first. This gives any organisation an excellent opportunity to impact their future online reputation from today onwards. Of course, in saying that, many sites operate aggregate star systems or histograms so that it may be a slog with some, but getting good reviews is easier than it may seem. Moving forward, as you build up more and more positive reviews, you will gradually dilute the negative reviews, and of course, how long will very much depend on your current online reputation.
Most people harbouring a complaint must go out of their way to find your presence on a website to vent their spleen. The corollary of this argument is when you or your staff receive someone paying you a compliment and then make them aware they can review you. That’s right; it’s as simple as that: make it easy for people who feel positive about the service they’ve received to leave a review. The best way to build on this positive spirit is to act immediately. I’ll often devise an e-mail template for clients outlining all the different channels a customer can leave a review straight after speaking or have it written on a business card that they can physically hand over to them. The secret is to make it as easy as possible. Don’t leave them with just one social channel where they can leave a review. What if they aren’t already on that channel? Generally, the only people who’ll go out of their way to register will be those motivated by a perceived injustice!
Of course, some channels are more valuable than others. For instance, Google+ reviews, I would say, to most businesses, it should be a priority since in any Google search that brings up local listings, your reviews will come up even before the organic listings (even if you’re at the top organically, you’ll still be below). Moreover, the more you can get on this, the more influential your coverage can become, so to get more of these than, say, Facebook reviews, then I would put them in order of desirability to suit that need.
You might say, for even-handedness, why not also give out your review details to someone complaining? My argument is that wouldn’t you expect either that you or your staff would actively handle the complaint there and then and, in most cases, to a satisfactory resolution? You could always give out a card at that point if you were so inclined.
I hope this has proved that almost all businesses can gain positive reviews quickly. As a warning, I would advise caution if you’re considering offering inducements to obtain favourable reviews. You may be penalised if you begin to get reviews of your site where people report that you are trying to gain positive reviews for rewards. You may want to stress that their opinion is valued regardless of the response. However, the best inducement to gaining favourable reviews, I find, is to make the process as easy as possible!
If you need help restoring or gaining an online reputation, don’t hesitate to contact me. Of course, all feedback is welcome!
