Did you know that 59% of millennials share their highly positive or highly negative reviews with others about your business? 41% of those are also shared on social media which can often spread like wildfire. It’s important to handle their feedback with care to minimize the problems when millennials leave you a negative review. Here are some tips:
Respond in a Timely Manner
When you receive negative feedback, either through a review or just a phone call, you should make sure to respond in a timely manner. This means, don’t make the customer sit on their complaint for weeks, or even several days. This tends to cause more anger in them and you could end up with an even worse review. When an angry customer reaches out to you, they want to be heard and this is your chance to clean up your name. Whether the customer is right or not, your response should be prompt and personal.
Remain Calm
This is a hard one when dealing with angry people. Especially if you feel that they are being unfair or dishonest. Unfortunately, customers tend to have the upper hand as far as reviews go, and they can use that to their advantage. This means, they don’t feel the need to hold back or remain calm. However, you, as the business owner, should always remain calm and respectful. Why? Because you’re responding on behalf of your business.
Have the Data to Back You Up
This is where it’s important to have your customer and transaction data thorough and available. When someone gives you negative feedback, it will be much to your benefit if you have their information and the details about the service or job that was completed for them available to you. You can’t be expected to remember everyone your business has worked with, and what was done for them. Leave it up to your data to remember that for you. You will find yourself much more organized and able to handle these angry-customer-issues.
Avoid Fighting Back
The last thing you want to do when dealing with angry customers is make your business come off as the bad guy. When other customers see you arguing back through online reviews, they will quickly take the side of the angry customer. Avoid the back and forth that will, no doubt, make things worse. Instead, focus on what can be done to resolve the issue quickly.
Get Someone Else To Do It
Seems a little intimidating to handle all of this negative review damage right? It’s not so bad when FreshLime handles it for you – email stippets@freshlime.com or call 800-266-8960 to find out more!
For more insights on marketing strategy that actually works for small business, subscribe to the FreshLime Newsletter here. Connect with Jay Bean, Founder of FreshLime and Small Business Marketing Expert on LinkedIn and Twitter. And last of all, if any of these tips have helped you or if you have anything to add please comment below. We’d love to hear from you!