How to Respond to Negative Reviews ?

The Right Way to Respond to Negative Feedback

For a business, reviews are critical because they reflect how customers receive services or products from your company and the significant concerns that must be resolved. There are various platforms like Google, Facebook, Yelp, and Tripadvisor where people leave their reviews, which other customers read to make their purchase decisions. Positive reviews are good, but when the negative reviews flood, it affects the business, losing customers from the competing market. Here are some tips on how to deal with such negative reviews.

You should apologize: Apologies should be taken from the customer first. You must understand that the customer knows nothing about your company and could be in a bad mood. A competitor could write it, or the claims made in a negative review are false. But you must apologize because you must be professional with them, and for your public image's sake. You can ask for more detailed information about their experience and listen to them. 

You should take the customer's name in your response: "Dear Sir or Ma'am." This is one of the easiest ways to respond to any customer's review, but it is not professional. Here, you should take their name while referring to their review or feedback; it shows that you are talking with the customer and that your writing is not an auto-generated response. It will also help them to cooperate with you after seeing that you are starting the conversation more cooperatively. 

You should accept negative Reviews or Feedback. It is okay to find that some people don't like your service or product, and it could be anything, whether the price segment, style, or anything else. You can't do anything about that and must accept their opinion. You should respond gracefully and apologize. 

Show sympathy to the customer: Another essential thing is to understand that your customer is writing negative feedback out of frustration, and this frustration comes up when they don't get the expected service. It is essential to maintain a sympathetic relationship with each of your customers. You must smartly use your words while responding to the customers and show your sympathy; if the issue is more serious, then you can carry forward the conversation offline and offer them to contact you by making a phone call or meeting at the office. Doing this lets them feel you are concerned about them and work to resolve the issue as soon as possible. 

Tell the customer that you are working on the solution. Trust your customer's feelings, although their preferences or feelings could drive them. Instead of changing them, you can work on identifying the cause of the issue. Most businesses fail when they cannot determine the reason behind the negative reviews. Understand that your customer writes feedback instead of talking to your customer service team. 

Pro tip: Let your customers know you are working on resolutions and keep them updated. This will help you regain their trust and turn them into potential loyal customers. 

Try to fix the issues ASAP: Not all reviews or feedback are written by your competitors, so a response that offers a solution will work for you because your response will professionally clarify others. Fixing the issue will improve your business and show that you don't want other customers to face similar problems again. 

Offer your customers a discount or a compliment: Customers sometimes point out a legitimate issue in your business or product, and you should praise them. By offering them a second chance, you can make a positive impression on your business, among other things. If their problem is with a product, you can ask them to return it and offer them a replacement, or you can offer them an exclusive discount coupon to purchase and a compliment. 

How Do You Remove Negative Reviews?

Once you have fixed the issue about what the customer complained about, you can ask them again about the change or solution and whether they liked it. Most of the time, people genuinely care about a second chance, and when they get it, they become happy. If you get a positive response from them, you can smoothly ask them to remove that. But sometimes customers don't like to do that; it's completely fine. Here, in such a case, you can take this as an opportunity to respond publicly about how you care for the customer's concerns and fix them as soon as possible.  

Can You Avoid Getting Negative Feedback?

Yes, it is possible. Negative feedback or a response is inevitable for any business, but it is also possible to avoid or reduce it by practicing the right things and tricks. Here are some of the keys you can use for your business to prevent negative feedback easily.

• Customer Satisfaction (CSAT) Surveys: You must have seen a prompt or page asking, "How Satisfied are you with our Product or Service?" after you purchase or use any product or service. These help identify issues or customer experiences with your website, products, or internal processes. These CSAT surveys also prevent customers from writing anything negative about you on review platforms because you have already asked them. 
• Net Promoter Score (NPS) survey: It is a rating that customers give you after interacting with your business, and you can easily identify their experiences. When any customer gives you a 9/10 rating, you can redirect them to any trusted review platform, such as Google Reviews or Trustpilot, to write a review. 
• Setting up a feedback button: To prevent customers from writing anything negative about your business, you can provide them with a feedback button. It allows them to express their disappointment and feelings. But you must first try to understand them and resolve their problems on a primary basis.