We’ve all gotten that one bad review on social media from an overly angry customer for seemingly no reason at all. You can give the best customer service possible, answering all of their questions and helping them to find what they need, but if they are unhappy, then nothing stops them from giving you a bad review online. It’s easy to say to just suck it up and move on, it’s only one bad review, what harm can it do? But sometimes you just can’t stop that nagging in the back of your mind… Should you really be worried?
The answer is yes, but not really, according to an article by Antoine Dupont, CEO at Katapult Marketing. If most of the customers who walk into your shop are satisfied, then there’s no need to overreact. No matter how hard you try to please everyone, there will always be that one who can’t be pleased.
According to a business.com article, 80% of consumers changed their minds before purchasing a product due to a bad review. Like Antoine put it, if it’s only one bad review amongst 10 good ones, chances are the customer will breeze right by it. That being said, you should still take care of the situation as best as possible. Here are some ways on how to handle a bad online review:
Make sure to respond to the complaint.
Antoine advises to take responsibility for the problem and apologize, even if it’s a complaint about something minor, like the color of your store walls. Always make sure to respond positively and nicely. Once a customer sees your professional response, it’ll look better on you and might secure a potential sale.
Offer the person complaining a coupon, such as a percentage off of their next purchase.
Nine times out of ten a customer will cool off once they’re offered something, and not only will you look better to everyone reading the comments, but you’ll make the person complaining happy and may get another potential sale.
Thank the person responding and offer a better future experience.
Even though the feedback may be negative, it’s important to thank the customer for leaving a review. It not only gives you the opportunity to fix the situation, but also gives you the ability to prevent the situation from happening again. If it was a problem involving one of your employees, sit down and have a talk with them to make sure it doesn’t happen again.
Jessica Jeffers, the Director of Marketing at United Flea Markets, says that social media provides an avenue for vendors to not only engage with customers, but also to influence them with the right content that helps them to make a decision. With that being said, there are also negative aspects to social media, and negative customer reviews are at the top.
“Social media is a big platform for customers to complain. Not everyone will contact you directly with issues, but may turn to the internet, and the more complaints you get the more your brand will suffer. Take reviews, good and bad, as an opportunity to interact with the customer and solve their problem.”
Jeffers also has some good tips on how to deal with a bad review: regularly access and monitor your company’s social media profiles for the latest comments and reviews, respond to customer complaints instantly and find way to offer them a solution and solve the issue. If the issue is not with your booth but with the market, be sure to share the information with the market owners and managers. Publicly reaching out to a customer shows that you care about them.
The main thing to take away from getting a bad review online is not to panic. The reality is that it’s not the end of the world. Nobody can prevent bad reviews from finding their way onto your Facebook page or other online outlets, so just take a deep breath, relax, and use the above points to handle the situation properly and know that you tried your hardest to amend the problem. To provide some extra added comfort for yourself, make sure to tell happy customers to leave a review online and push that negative comment further down the line.