It can be frustrating to see a negative customer review posted online for the world to see. However, negative reviews can actually be a good thing for your company. This is because it provides insight into what your business can do better to serve the people who buy its products or services. Let’s take a closer look at why customers may leave negative reviews, how to respond to them and why it’s generally a good idea to keep them on your site.
Why Do Customers Leave Negative Reviews?
There are many reasons why someone might provide negative feedback about his or her experience with your business. For example, an individual may have had a difficult time communicating with your sales, marketing, or customer service teams.
Customers may also provide negative feedback if they can’t find the items that they need in a reasonable amount of time. Those who order products from your online store may also be upset if they weren’t able to check out in a timely manner, didn’t receive their order by its estimated arrival date, or were sent the wrong items.
If your firm offers a service, clients expect that a job will be done right the first time. Therefore, they won’t hesitate to let you know if they had to call someone else to do the job that you were hired to take care of.
How Should You Respond to Negative Customer Reviews?
It’s generally in your best interest to respond quickly to customer complaints. Ideally, you’ll thank them for their feedback, apologize for the inconvenience that the issue caused and offer a proper response with a solution. When responding to customer feedback, it’s important to do so in a sincere manner. Otherwise, your customers may feel as if you only care about their money.
In many cases, responding to customer concerns in a timely, genuine and constructive way provides you with a chance to make a wrong a right. It’s important to understand that customers are willing to give your brand a second chance if they believe that your company has learned from its mistakes.
Receiving negative feedback can be an opportunity to learn about problems that you were previously unaware of. For example, if customers are complaining that your site keeps crashing, it should prompt you to discuss this with your IT team. Doing so may help you create a permanent fix that will make it possible to provide site users with the experience that they deserve.
Why It’s a Good Idea to Keep Negative Reviews on Your Site
Allowing negative reviews to stay on your site allows prospective customers to get a real look into the business and how it operates. Generally speaking, consumers tend to be wary of any company that doesn’t have any negative feedback on its website. This is because they know that no company is perfect and that reputable businesses strive to be as transparent as possible.
Furthermore, keeping negative feedback on your site allows you to showcase the fact that you always respond to it professionally. Ultimately, a potential client will feel good about the fact that he or she will be treated properly if a problem arises. This can provide more trust in the brand, which can make it easier to attract more business.
You Can Make an Exception for Trolls
While you want to allow people to feel comfortable providing feedback, it is important to have ground rules. For instance, if a comment is posted more than once, the duplicate posts should be deleted. This prevents a single person from drowning out the voices of others who may have questions, comments, or concerns that deserve your attention.
It may also be in your company’s best interest to remove comments that have nothing to do with your products or services. This is because spam links might contain viruses, malware, or other harmful programs that are designed to annoy, harass or defraud those who click on them.
It rarely feels good to know that you weren’t able to meet a customer’s expectations. However, as a business owner, it’s important to understand that it’s impossible to make everyone happy at all times. Instead, you simply have to learn how to deal with any problems that arise professionally and pragmatically.
