5 Tips on How to Handle Negative Online Reviews

how to handle negative online reviews

Your business is awesome. There’s no doubt about that. But from time to time you’re going to end up with a customer who isn’t 100% happy, and that’s okay. As a matter of fact, it would look a little strange to have all perfect reviews. Potential customers may start to think something fishy is going on and you don’t want that.

The trick is to respond to the negative reviews publicly and make the situation right with the customer. You’ll make the customer happy and future customers will see your activity and know you own up to your mistakes. It’s kind of a reverse double-whammy. Everyone wins!

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Here are 5 tips on how to handle negative online reviews:

Act fast
Hopefully you keep a close eye on what people are saying about your brand online. That way when a negative review shows up you’ll know about it right away. If possible, get in touch with the reviewer within 24 hours. The last thing you want to do is ignore a negative online review. They aren’t going to disappear. And the longer you wait to respond, the harder it will be to fix the situation.

Keep it classy
It’s important to keep it classy when you respond to a negative review, even if the review is totally bogus. No one wants to see a business owner lose his or her cool online. It’s going to give the whole world a bad 1st impression of your business, and we both know you’re business is pretty darn cool.

Don’t take it personally
Chances are the reviewer isn’t talking about you (the business owner). More likely, they’re talking about a particular worker, product, or service. Not you. You’re the one in charge of resolving the issue, but it isn’t something you should take personally. Look at the situation from the point of view of the customer and respond to it accordingly.

Take note and make changes
If someone takes the time to write a review of your business, you had better take note and learn from it. Suppose a reviewer leaves you feedback that contains suggestions about how to improve the customer experience. Take that information and make changes so the same situation won’t happen for a future customer.

Take the conversation offline
The internet is pretty cool. That’s pretty much a fact, right? Even still, we recommend you try to navigate the conversation offline when handling a negative review. Try to schedule a phone call or get in touch with email. These mediums will give you a better opportunity to articulate your response and move toward a resolution.

What happens if you receive a negative online review and you’re certain it’s phoney baloney? On some review sites, not so much. On WikiReviews we’re building a site where this can never happen.

It can never happen because we have a very reliable appeals process that will use the community to rectify any false, fake, or otherwise bogus reviews. Learn more about how our appeals process works in this post.

Have you experienced a negative online review? What did you do to handle the situation?

Looking for other tips on handling negative online reviews? Click your way on over to these helpful articles:

LocalVox – How to Respond to Negative Online Reviews

Search Engine Land – 5 Tips for Responding to Negative Customer Reviews Online

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