4 Ways to Handle Negative Posts Online

A friend of mine recently called me freaking out about a negative post her company received on Yelp. My advice? "Don't Panic." A negative review is not the end of the world, but it is something that needs to be immediately addressed. Better yet, have a plan for this type of scenario already in place and you won't need to go through the "freak out" stage if it does happen to you - you'll simply spring into action. 

You could have the best customer service in the world as well as a superior product, and there will always be that one person who finds something to complain about… And they will do it (gasp!) online. Having a social media policy creates guidelines for how to respond when a customer posts something negative about your company or product. There are four basic ways to handle a negative post or comment:

1.       Answer the post – it shows your concern for customer issues and your willingness to make improvements where possible.

2.       Ask the person posting to contact you – this hopefully takes the conversation offline, but it still shows that you are responsive as a company. This can also be combined with #1.

3.       Delete the post, if possible – if the post was made on your Facebook page, for example, you could simply delete it; however, this could cause the user to leave additional angry posts, exacerbating the issue.

4.       Ignore the post – this is not recommended unless there are extenuating circumstances.

Responding to issues online and in the public view can help to alleviate the present issue, and can also work to prevent additional negativity on the Internet, which can quickly become a reputation management problem. A pro-active approach to combating negative posts is having great content that shows up in organic search results. This doesn’t happen overnight, though, so in the meantime, make sure you’re addressing customer issues as they come up – either in the real or virtual world. Paying attention to what your customers are saying is a good way to find out where you need to make system improvements and increase overall customer satisfaction.

Does your company have a social media or PR policy in place? How do you handle negative posts about your company online?

5 Tips for Reputation Management

Whether or not you’ll admit it, chances are you’ve Googled yourself in the past year or two. Maybe you did it out of vanity, or maybe you were just curious to see what’s being said on the web about you. No matter the reason, it’s a good idea to know how your personal brand shows up online to others – especially for active job seekers. By the same token, it’s just as important, if not more, to know where your corporate brand ranks online. This is called reputation management.

Sure, there was a similar service offered back in the golden olden days (actually not so long ago) where public relations firms would provide clippings from publications that ran stories, features and advertising about your brand. In the digital age, getting started with reputation management can be done simply by entering your company name or variations into your favorite search engine and seeing what comes up.  

Reputation Management can help you identify issues you may not have known about otherwise, such as complaints on customer review sites like Yelp.com and forum discussions on consumer watchdog sites. While you can’t necessarily remove these types of negative posts, you can address the issues that sparked them, and take proactive steps to push down the negative results and ensure that you control the first two pages of Google.

      Here are five tips for online reputation management:

1. Determine what keywords resonate with consumers and focus on those terms.
2. Decide if you are going to address the negative reviews and how to respond.
3. Create great web content, such as active social media networks, informative websites and popular blogs.
4. Take steps to improve the problems that sparked the negativity in the first place and ask customers to leave a review when they’ve had a positive experience.
5. Measure the results against a baseline and work toward a goal.   

Don’t let this short list fool you – reputation management can be challenging, especially when someone high up in your company also has a reputation management issue, which can happen all too often. The key is to be proactive and monitor the search engines regularly. If you do have a problem with reputation management, you may even want to consider hiring a professional or agency to help you with a strategy and execution. Consorte Marketing recently put together this infographic on reputation management that includes additional tips.  

Consorte Marketing Infographic on Reputation Management

Has your company experienced backlash from negative reviews online? How did you deal with it?

Facing Customer Service Issues in Public

Does your company use social media as an opportunity to handle customer complaints, or does it try to sweep negative comments under the rug? Like it or not, Twitter, Facebook and other social media outlets have become a place for people to publicly air their grievances. Those companies that embrace public customer service are going to be much better off in the long run than those that resist or try to ignore these powerful communication vehicles.

In the past, customers might criticize a product or tell about a negative experience to a handful friends. Now, the whole world can know at once when something has gone wrong. (Think Alec Baldwin tweeting about his own bad behavior on an airplane – and badmouthing the airline).  There are plenty of examples of companies falling prey to one customer airing their dissatisfaction to thousands of Twitter followers or Facebook friends, but there are also great case studies about the right way to handle these oh-so-public customer complaints.

Dell was one of the first companies to use Twitter as a customer service channel, and it really improved their reputation. They have a Twitter profile @DellCares that is dedicated to customer service as evidenced by the bio: Dell's Social Media Outreach Team. 24x7 Global Support. We are here to listen, help and provide proactive info to our Customers.

Facebook recently launched private messages for Pages. Although not a completely public channel, administrators have to be ready to handle these messages, or it could turn into an ugly public conversation. Review sites like Yelp are ripe with both positive and negative customer experiences, so it’s important for companies to be aware of what their customers are saying about them online. Having a strong reputation management strategy can combat some of the negativity that is bound to plague a company at one time or another. However, providing great customer service up front goes a long way towards preventing some of that negativity.

The bottom line: public customer service is not something your company can decide it wants to do – it’s going to be out there no matter what. Embracing social media as a legitimate forum for customer service and putting systems in place to handle customer service in public is your best bet.

How does your company handle complaints that are made via social media? We’d love to hear your stories in the comments section.

Using Press Releases For Reputation Management

Many companies are listening, but are on the defensive, waiting to hear “XYZ Company SUCKS” and other brand bashing done on websites where consumers are able to comment. Well, what if it was just a one off instance, or if the person ' s profile isn’t real as you tried to contact them, what do you do then? How do you attempt to get rid of that negative comment that shows up?

Using a web optimized press release any chance you have is a great way to proactively speak to your customers and be on the offensive. We all know there are so many great opportunities for keywords, link building and others for press releases, but what about preventing your customers from seeing the brand bashing comments that aren’t even real?

Take action before people start commenting, give them information they are looking for, share your great news. By publishing new content often you can potentially push down some negative comments that may show up on the first pages of the search engines. When sending out a press release, use all the services that are available even the free ones as they show up in the search engines.

Reputation Management as an Individual…Have You Ever “Googled” Yourself?

I’m sure at one point in time you might have “Googled” your name and saw results that were either yours or someone else (who may have the same name as you). For myself, my name seems to be common enough that I share it with other people. If you have “Googled” yourself, are you happy with the results? Some people are not aware that people do Google other people’s names, especially if they want more background information about them.

For some people, their own individual online reputation may be important if you own your own business, or you're looking for a new job. Keep in mind that once your name is attached to something that is negative can stay on the internet for a very long time, but there is a way to get those results off the first and second page of Google. It’s called reputation management.

It is definitely a process that requires a very strategic approach, and there are internet marketing consultants who help companies and even individuals manage and improve their reputation online.

Go ahead and Google your name and see if you’d want the results to come up for your name if someone was to find more information about you.