How to Remove Negative Reviews from Social Media

Bad comments about your business can harm your business, especially if they take on a life of their own on social media.

The first thing you should learn about dealing with such reviews is to take a deep breath, calm down and think of how you can rationally respond to them. You should also make it a point to respond to them in a timely fashion. If you don’t, you are just going to let the bad feelings fester and encourage others to jump on the bandwagon.

Handle negative reviews properly to maintain your online reputation

The worst thing you can do with these types of reviews is remove them. Remember that if you remove them, the person making the complaint can resort to other platforms to shame your business. If such reviews are taken to a closed group you have no access to, your business reputation could even be ruined.

The first thing you should make sure to do is engage with the person making the complaint. It will reinforce your reputation if you respond to them publicly, so everyone can see that you are reaching out in a calm and reasonable manner. The main thing to avoid is going on the defensive by putting the issue back onto the client. Don’t go on a crusade to prove yourself right. Even if the fault is not yours, offer a public apology and ask them for more details of what went wrong. Remember that bad reviews are often left in a fit of frustration or anger and may not reflect exactly what happened. Tell the customer that your business will do all in its power to address the grievance and put things right in a reasonable and timely manner.

You should also reach out to the person lodging the bad review and ask them if you can contact them directly over the phone or email. You would be surprised how much a tone can improve when humans speak to humans, rather than posting an angry rant on a comments wall. When you do get to speak to them directly, ask what they feel should be done to rectify the issue. Once they have told you, and if it is reasonable, do as they ask and throw in a free gift, voucher or some store credit. You will find that many times, if you rectify the situation, the person who posted the bad review will actually remove it, rectify it or return to the board to outline how professional you were in dealing with their issue. If they do not volunteer to do it themselves, follow up with them once you believe the issue is sorted and gently ask if they would mind updating their comment with the final outcome.

If you stick to the above steps, you will turn an angry (even if they are unjustified) customer into a brand ambassador.

And now the most important bit. Dealing with a client issue is only the first part of the job. Analyse your processes and work out where the system let your business down. Was it software, carelessness, genuine human error, third party actions? Work it out and improve your system to avoid getting bad reviews in the first place when possible.

Managing your reputation is crucial, a bad review can reduce your sales by 60%. Make sure to have the right plan (and the right tool for your plan) to monitor your reviews on all the general platforms like Google, Facebook, Yelp, Yellow Pages including the platforms related to your industry.

If you want to work on your online reputation but have concerns about getting it right (because let’s face it, you only have one chance to get this right) we’d like to offer you a Free Reputation Audit.

Book Your Free Reputation Audit here - we audit and review your online reputation on all the online platforms then you get a free 30-minute call where we help you put a strategy in place.