Running a business is tough and there are so many things happening at once. The management has to constantly ensure that the processes in the company are running smoothly and there are no “fires” which need to be put out. In such a tough environment it could be easy to imagine that reputation management is going to be another lengthy, complicated process, which will take a lot of time and effort to set up. However, it doesn’t have to be all gloom and doom! In reality, succeeding with reputation management might be much easier than you think!
There are 4 main activities which you need to ensure that you are performing on a daily basis in order to master reputation management:
1.Monitor review sites
Monitoring reviews needs to be a priority for every company doing customer success management. At any point in time, you need to know what your customers are saying about you and your products. Therefore, collecting and monitoring reviews is the easiest way to succeed in reputation management. Using a customer feedback management tool can really help with aggregating reviews from social media, feedback websites and your own website. Thus, you get a clear overview of all your reviews and can monitor and control them easily at any given time.
2. Watch for negative reviews
Negative reviews are often unavoidable and it is therefore important to handle them properly. This is where a customer feedback management tool has another advantage: often those reviews are monitored before they are published. In this way, you can make sure that they are legitimate, don’t include any swear words, personal information, etc. This way you can protect yourself from fake reviews, which might be directed at you by your competitors with the goal of hurting your business.
3. Respond quickly and try to help the customer
Negative reviews can quickly spiral out of control and something negative posted on social media about your company can quickly go viral. This is why, responding as fast as possible to reviews, especially the lower-star ones, can immensely benefit your brand image. Your customers want to feel valued and heard and by replying to their comments you can do exactly that. Even a short sentence saying that you will do anything you can to fix their issue can make them feel appreciated and possibly even remove the negative review or edit it. Sometimes all they need is an outlet to share their feelings and to feel assured that you are taking care of the problem. Your response to this also signals to other customers that you listen and take their opinions seriously.
4. Actively encourage happy customers to leave reviews
As we previously mentioned in our article “5 Undeniable Reasons to Love Customer Feedback” , 7 out of 10 customers would leave a review if asked! This is why you need to focus on actively encouraging customers to leave reviews. Tell them how much this would mean to you and motivate them by offering them a small token of appreciation, such as a coupon or a small gift for their next purchase.
Another crucial aspect of this is the “moment of truth”, i.e. the moment in the customer journey when you want to measure their customer satisfaction. What this means is that when you ask for feedback you need to pick the right time in order to get the most customer reviews. If you ask your customers for a review a month after they have visited your business, this probably won’t yield a lot of feedback. Customers might not feel that involved anymore or simply don’t remember. On the contrary, asking them for feedback at the right “moments of truth” can bring about a lot of positive reviews from happy customers.
With these simple 4 steps you easily succeed in reputation management! Not as difficult as you might have thought, is it?