No matter how hard you try, you will never win over everyone. Receiving negative reviews or feedback is unavoidable in any industry, but in the service industry it is extremely important that complaints are addressed.
If handled properly, you will almost always be able to turn a bad experience into a good experience and you may even learn a thing or two. Here are some tips on things you should and should not do when responding to a negative review on Yelp, City Search, Yellow Pages, Google+, Facebook or any review site:
DON’T retaliate.
No matter how rude, obnoxious, or insulting a comment is, there is absolutely no situation where it is appropriate to escalate the situation by further antagonizing a patron. This person may have simply had a bad day and getting confrontational with them on a public forum will only make the situation worse. Remember, you are representing your company when you are online and any hasty comments will be indexed on the internet indefinitely, shedding your entire company in a poor light. It should also be noted, that if a review is false (and you can prove it) you should contact your account representative and inform them. While there are no guarantees, the account rep should be able to conduct an investigation and determine a fair outcome.
DO reach out to the unhappy customer.
If you can find contact information for whoever posted a negative review or can reply to their post with a comment, do whatever you can to rectify their dissatisfaction. Simply offering an apology along with a complimentary gift card to your facilities will often be enough to completely change that person’s perception about your company.
DON’T pressure them to take down the review.
If you are able to speak with the individual and accommodate them, do not press them to remove their negative review. Even though the situation has been fixed, the customer did still encounter something that made them unhappy. Take this as a learning experience and think about what you could have done better in the future. If anything, ask them if they can update their review with what you did to correct the issue.
DO look at the review objectively.
Don’t immediately take offense at the review and become defensive. Perhaps, your customer is simply trying to give you constructive criticism. Get to the root of the problem and make improvements so that this sort of thing doesn’t continue to occur.
At the end of the day remember that a bad review is just a chance for you to improve your services and make your clients happier in the future. One negative review will not shut down your business or cause future customers to go running. Most people take a couple of negative review with a grain of salt so don’t let it get you down, and in the future try your best to make sure that your customers will have no option but to leave a glowing review.
For restaurant consulting services contact TRG Restaurant Consulting.
info@trgrestaurantconsulting.com www.trgrestaurantconsulting.com
