Fashion Exposed Revived will take place on 20 – 24 February 2015 at Sydney Showground, Sydney Olympic Park. Organiser AGHA shares some business insights ahead of the event, which will also feature a series of industry seminars. Head here for more.
Bad reviews can be quite mortifying for small business owners, but the good news is they can be turned around. In fact, research shows that 95% of unhappy customers will return to a brand if an issue is resolved promptly.
By building a profile through public relations and social media, brands can be prepared to ride out bad feedback and reverse the negative influence it might have had.
Retailers and brands with strong reputations are much more likely to survive negative reviews than those without a strong public profile. Being proactive and working at building your profile from the outset is crucial. Well-planned public relations and social media initiatives can help your business achieve this.
Here’s how you can prepare and react to negative reviews.
Create and maintain a positive reputation
Building the profile and reputation of your business through publicity is a great way to protect against negative reviews. Through developing relationships with key industry media, you are more likely to secure media coverage, gain the favour of influential journalists and in the event of negative publicity, be given the opportunity to respond and salvage your reputation.
The media is always on the lookout for useful, interesting or entertaining content tailored for their readers, so offering interviews, case studies or writing articles providing tips or giveaways are great ways to secure positive publicity. For example, you could offer a lifestyle title an article on how to woo your loved one for Valentine’s Day with the help of the boxes of chocolates you sell.
Establish your online profile
Consumer brands can gain significantly by establishing their profile online, particularly on popular review sites or social media. Fun posts, photos and videos, interesting questions and comments will engage consumers and lead to a strong following for your brand.
Social media gives you the opportunity to engage with your customers and build a community around your brand. As a result, your customers can become brand advocates and are more likely to back you and respond to criticism on your behalf.
By having an online presence, you will also be in a position to recognise and respond to criticism promptly. By responding to online complaints via the particular social media channel or website, not only are you more likely to retain the complaining customer, but you are also able to demonstrate your responsive customer service to a broader online audience.
Have the right policies and processes in place
Another important element of being proactive and better equipped to respond to negative reviews is establishing policies or procedures to help you tackle complaints. This should include a complaints and feedback process, and media and social media policies.
You should treat negative reviews in a similar way you would a formal complaint. Don’t simply ignore feedback. It is important to respond to the customer.
Your policies and processes should clearly outline who is responsible for responding to criticism, what the potential issues may be and how they should be dealt with. These documents should be made available to all staff.
Monitor feedback
Monitoring what is said about your brand in the media and online is important for helping you keep track of both negative and positive commentary. One way to track online activity is by establishing Google Alerts. Keeping a close eye on what’s being said allows you to respond to negative complaints as required and celebrate any positive feedback.
By Catriona Pollard, managing director of CP Communications