A good customer review can carry your business through tough times, but a bad one can send your business into a death spiral. Businesses, rightfully, should be concerned about what people say. Customers will rightfully do research before they spend their money, and a single well-written review can make them skip your offering.

You can’t prevented negative reviews from happening. All you can do is minimize them by making they have a clear understanding of what you offer and managing any disappointments. Here are a few guidelines that will help you do that.

 

 Accept Imperfection

Despite your best efforts, you’re going to disappoint customers. Some instances will be your fault, others will be because of random events like acts of god or squirrels getting into the production line. That sounds silly, but if you do something long enough you’re going to see weird things, things that will affective productivity and product quality.

Embrace the idea that you’ll make mistakes. Survey customers whenever a campaign finishes or after a product’s hit the market to find out what they have to say. You’ll not only find out where you need improvement, but where the business excels.

 

 Offer Information at Every Opportunity

When disappointed, most customers will simply slink into the darkness and look for someone else to fulfill their needs. It takes a lot to inspire people to actually post a negative review, like feeling like they aren’t heard. How you treat customers can not only influence whether or not they drop a bad review, but whether or not they even choose your company. Make them feel heard by staying in constant contact with them. Give them all the information they need and more.

 

 Don’t Rest On Your Laurels

It doesn’t matter how many positive reviews the product gets, there’s always more to do. All your goodwill and praise can be undermined by a single flaw and a cutting review. Generally speaking, it will take around 10 positive reviews do make up for a bad one.

Don’t ignore product flaws because no one’s pointed them out. That’s like ignoring a man with a gun because he’s not pointing it at you. You don’t need to be perfect, you just need to be the best at your niche.

 

Show Customers Your Work

Trust is difficult to develop, but it is vital in developing customer relationships and sustaining them. If customers have faith in your company, they won’t assume that the product’s shortcomings or any mistakes that happen are intentional. They’ll have faith that you’ll do something to fix it.

So show off your work. Have pages on your site dedicated to your staff, showing customers that your staff is skilled. Create videos or online galleries detailing the product development and creating processes. It’s not their responsibility to dig deep into your records and find your qualifications. Be proud of yourself, your team, and the company.

 

Be Easy to Contact

Customers who speak out tend to do so because they’re not being heard. Not everyone runs straight to the review site of their choice to try to tear you down. Some of them will actually try to talk to you should a problem come up with your product. Problems arise when you’re not easy to contact. Your customer service team is pointless if people don’t know how to contact them, or don’t even know they exist.

Make contact information readily available and easy to see on every page of your site. Put it on the product’s box and on your calling cards. Respond to any and all messages sent to your company. Let nothing sip through the cracks.

 

Managing customer reviews isn’t about bullying or bribing them – it’s about good customer service. Make it easy for them to talk to you and develop strong relationships with them, and you’ll keep negative review numbers down. You’ll never get rid of them entirely, as some customers will be impossible to mollify, but it should minimize their appearance.

 

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