Given how interconnected the world is now, it is easier more than ever for customers to share their opinions on a lot of things, including reviews of a company’s products — e.g., a responsive web design — and services on customer review sites.
A customer review site is one of the platforms where you can make or break your relationship with the customers. While it is the perfect place to find new clients to grow your business, it also is one where you can lose many of them.
Whether your business is online or offline, you have to monitor review sites to ensure that they do not negatively impact on your investment.
How exactly can you do this? Here are a few suggestions for you.
Respond to customer reviews promptly
If you have been following several review sites, you know from experience that customers post their feedback almost all the time. You just never know when a new post about your business will go live.
Some of the reasons why they do this might include the following:
- They liked your products and services and would like others to know about it
- They have suggestions to make your products better
- They are unhappy with your services but only want you to improve
- They are totally bitter because they did not like what they got
Regardless of their reasons for posting reviews, one trick that has always worked for entrepreneurs is to respond fast. It is easier to repair the damage early than waiting until it has spread to other websites.
Remember, your competitors are waiting for a chance to overrun you and if they find an opportunity, they will capitalize on the negative reviews to lure your customers away from you.
Join as many customer review sites as possible
As a business owner, it is quite difficult to know the customer review site that your customers prefer. Each one of them has their own online preferences so they will sign up at websites of their choice.
Considering the fact that there are many such sites being set up almost every day, you might want to ensure that you monitor as many sites as possible so that you do not miss anything.
If you are not careful enough, you might just find out in the end that you have been wasting too much time focusing on a particular site when most of your clients are posting about you elsewhere.
One of the best things is that with the advancement in technology, it has become quite easy to know who is posting reviews about you and where they are doing it.
In fact, you do not have to spend too much time or employ several people to monitor specific websites just to know where these reviews about your business are being posted.
For instance, with the right software, you can get notifications every time your brand name is mentioned online. Since these notifications are delivered to your email or even to your cell phone, you can move swiftly to find out what they are saying about you and stop any possible damage in case there is any.
Show professionalism when responding to negative reviews
One of the biggest mistakes that business owners make when handling negative reviews is that they throw professionalism out of the window.
It is quite common to see business owners getting carried away by emotions when responding to a client’s concern. Some of them even go to greater heights to engage the posters in abusive arguments hoping that they will redeem their image.
However, as you will find out, this only leaves you in an awkward position. Remember that as you are arguing and losing your head, there are probably thousands of people who are following the thread.
These are potential clients who will be forced to buy elsewhere when they get the impression that you are not professional enough when handling your customers.
Clearly, managing your reputation on a customer review site requires a lot of caution. It will also be better if you take time to follow up on some customers just to find out how they are doing.
Once they post a review on a site with a responsive web design and you respond to it, you should not leave it at that. Even when they go silent, create another thread of communication asking if their problem was solved. This will also be read by the others and your reputation will be protected.
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Originally published at www.bookmark.com on August 9, 2016.
