Today, seeing brand-bashers online and people leaving negative comments or reviews is no longer a surprise. In a world where bullies can hide their faces behind the computer monitor, negative comments are even more common. Nowadays, almost anyone is capable of fabricating fake social media profiles and accounts. This is the same medium being used by brand-bashers in spreading the hate in the online.
Since we know that brand-bashing is a real problem and is more common in social networking, we have listed a few ways on how to handle negative comments online:
- Act on it!
Don’t leave negative comments on your website unattanted for a log time. You need to connect with your customers, and the ideal way to handle this situation is to respond urgently to the negative comment left on your page, blog, or search engine. Often times, the person who left the comment was an unhappy customer who may have had a bad experience. By answering to their comment, you're letting them know that you truly care about them and you wish to make it better.
- Say the magic word: Sorry.
It's normal to receive complaints from your customers from time to time. When faced with a situation like this, avoid being too defensive and don't think twice about apologizing if you know you or your business are at fault. After all, (most of the time) the customer is always right. It wouldn’t hurt if you would embrace this concept and apologize for any inconvenience that was experienced by your customer with your product or services.
- Thank them for their honest feedback
Instead of looking at complaints as something negative, why don’t you try looking at the bright side and consider it as silver lining instead? It's true that we're able to grow more as a company and as a person every time we experience failure. In receiving complaints, you're able to examine your products and services more and look at various aspects where you can improve in. Listening to your customers is important, and these opportunities for growth and improvement will never be possible if it weren't for the honest feedback that was given to your by your clients. You know that you want to provide the best customer experience, so this is why should thank them and make their feedback as a learning curve to improve your business.
- Know your priorities
There are really online entities whose main goal is to make negative comments on blogs posts on social media websites to be able to gain attention. They are just in it for the controversy and love stealing the spotlight. You must be able to identify these kind of people and decide whether they're worth responding to. Keep in mind that you only have a limited time in doing all the things you need to accomplish and the last thing that you need is wasting your time on anonymous people who are not even worth your time.
