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Navigating Through Negative Feedback Online

By on April 2, 2013 in Customer Service, Guest Articles

Navigating Through Negative Feedback Online 199x300 Navigating Through Negative Feedback Online

Guest Article

As an entrepreneur you have been able to blast away boundaries. You’ve beaten the odds of slim-to-none success and crafted your abilities into a genuine, professional promise for your customers.

Considering your continued hard work and extended efforts, accepting negative criticism can be a tough task. However, if you can achieve insight from feedback and implement it into your performance, the lessons learned can serve your business for the better; but how?

How do we navigate through negative criticisms and come out the other end still motivated (and sane)? Here are four help strategies that will help you manage honest feedback about your small business.

It’s all about attitude

Put a positive spin on every criticism by pledging to find a lesson learned. After reading negative feedback ask yourself: How has reading this afforded me the opportunity to improve? Then, command yourself to find an answer.

Reply back…quickly

It’s a fact of social media life; the worst thing you can do in a negative feedback situation is ignore the commentator. You’ve built online platforms to interact with your customers, which means you should entertain all forms of interaction, even the negative ones.

Remember that while the issue may be between one customer and your company, you have an audience. Not responding sends a signal that you’re not proactive about problems and not concerned about your customer’s experiences – impressions we all want to avoid.

So reply, and reply quickly; social media tracks times and dates, so everyone watching will be clued-in to your customer service’s attentiveness, or lack thereof.

But plan first

A simple discrepancy can turn into a viral conversation should things get out of hand, so have a response plan in place before your carefully chosen words ever strike a key.

First, weed out the wronged from the wailers. Some people just want to complain and online forums provide the perfect stage for theatrics. Being able to differentiate truly wronged customers from those who want to rant will save your sanity.

Still, everyone deserves a response, so find one thing to agree on.  Jenny, I’m sorry to hear about your experience, getting conflicting information would completely frustrate me as well.  It’s important to avoid counter criticisms like: We’ve had some staff issues recently and…  No one needs the excuse, they just need the apology.

Keep in mind that the wronged might deserve an extension of your apology in the form of compensation.  Remember to be personable and specific.

Replying with: I’m sorry to hear you had  a bad experience is not as redeeming as: Jenny, I am sorry to hear about the conflicting information you’ve gotten from different staff, and thank you so much for taking the time to comment.  You’ve opened my eyes and I’m currently remedying our efforts to make sure no other customer has a similar experience.  In the meantime, I’d like to email you an exclusive coupon code to use anytime during our Spring Sale.

Notice how the conversation is encouraged to be finished up in a private realm rather than the comments section? Whenever possible opt for moving the discussion off public platforms.

Focus on the positive

You didn’t ignore the situation, you apologized and you may have even extended an offer; now that’s that.  Allowing yourself to get consumed by negative feedback is a one-way ticket to trauma town so do not dwell on it.  Instead relax, take a break, do something enjoyable and move on.  After all, you’ve got a business to grow.

“Businesswoman With Phone” courtesy of Ambro / www.FreeDigitalPhotos.net

What experiences have you had with online criticisms?  Share your story below!

kelly gregorio 159x300 Navigating Through Negative Feedback OnlineAbout the author: Kelly Gregorio writes about topics that affect small businesses and entrepreneurs while working at Advantage Capital Funds, a company that provides businesses working capital. You can read her daily blog at http://www.advantagecapitalfunds.com/blog. 

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4 Proven Ways To Fill Your Restaurant In 2013

By on December 21, 2012 in 31 Ways to Boost Your Small Business, Customer Service, Guest Articles, Social Media

guestpost 300x48 4 Proven Ways To Fill Your Restaurant In 2013As a restaurant owner, your first daily concern is the quality of your food and service. Next, you might be thinking about your associates, your training, your portion sizes (and control), your menu… But the most important thing you have to think about after your food is: YOUR GUESTS and, how to get more of them!

Four ways to fill your restaurant:

1. Get more guests

2. Get your existing guests to visit more often

3. Increase guest spending every time they visit

4. Get referrals from your existing guests

——–

1. Get more guests! Your restaurant is a business – and must be treated as such. As the owner of a restaurant the single highest value activity you can be doing on a daily basis is marketing!

STOP DOING THE MARKETING THAT ISN’T WORKING, RIGHT NOW. That might seem harsh, but really, can you track results from that expensive radio commercial? The newspaper? Your TV ad? A High School sports magnet calendar? You must stop now. You can’t afford to throw money away. The hotel industry talks about putting “heads on beds.” As restaurant owners, our job is to put “butts in seats”.

2. Get your existing guests to come back more often!

Don’t wait for one more second; you’ve got to build a list, a database, a permission based tool to reach your guests via direct mail (postcards, newsletters, offers in the mail); email; phone calls; text messaging. With a database, you are invited by your guests to communicate with them and offer them invitations to return to your restaurant for their special celebrations, birthdays, anniversaries, holidays and more! Where will they go if they are invited? To your restaurant!

The database is the single most effective tool I used to build my restaurant from one location serving 56,000 guests annually to four locations, serving 272,000 guests annually. I created a “birthday club” database and went from zero to 55,000 individuals in our database in just four years. We are really dedicated to this tool, which, in our restaurant, is called the “EggHead Breakfast Club.”

3. Increase guest spending every time they visit!

You know what this is – suggestive selling, upgrades. Do you have a system in place to assure it’s being done by every server or bartender at every opportunity possible with every guest? You must! You know when a body walks through your front door, they are not there to window shop, and they don’t want to try something on. They are there to spend money. Your goal, as a restaurant owner is to help the guest have the best possible experience and maximize revenue to the company at the same time. Suggestive selling or upgrades is not an evil sales technique, it’s a genuine service to your guest to help them get exactly what they want when they’re in your establishment. Make them happy!

4. Get referrals from your existing guests

Don’t confuse this with number 1, get more guests. This is very specific. If each existing guest referred just one more guest like them, you’d double your business!  I want you to build a referral culture in your restaurant and a system to assure you’re getting referrals. This is crucial, it cannot be left to chance or hope. Create a plan to ask for referrals and do it! Track and post results (Anything Measured Improves; Anything Measured AND REPORTED Improves Even More). Each of your employees needs to be trained and quizzed on asking for the referral.

5. Bonus tip!

You’ve got to set up a GPS system today: Get Positioned Socially. I meet restaurant owners all over the country who still don’t partake of the “Four Basic Food Groups of Social” every day: Facebook; Twitter; YouTube and LinkedIn. To get more guests, get your existing guests to visit you more often, to increase spending and get referrals, you’ve got to be top of mind with your guests. Do this by meeting them where they are: on social networks.

According to a recent Nielsen Social Media Report, social networks and blogs reach nearly 80% of active U.S. Internet users and represent the majority of Americans’ time online. You simply have to be there to be seen and heard and remembered. Gone are the days of one-way, broadcast, distributed media consumption. Today’s consumer, including your restaurant guest, is expecting more from you: a conversation.

You can fall in love with your restaurant again and you can increase sales!

4 Proven Ways To Fill Your Restaurant In 2013Misty Young, nicknamed The Restaurant Lady, is Chairman of Squeeze In, a family chain with 4 locations throughout the Reno/Tahoe region. Her blog is www.fromragstorestaurants.com.

day21 4 Proven Ways To Fill Your Restaurant In 2013This article is from the SmallBizLady special blog series: 31 Ways to Boost Your Small Business in 2013. #Boost2013

Week One Posts of 31 Ways to BOOST Your Small Business in 2013 Week Two Posts of 31 Ways to BOOST Your Small Business in 2013

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How to Avoid a Daily Deal Disaster

By on August 13, 2012 in Branding & Marketing, Customer Service

Avoid Daily Deal Disaster 300x196 How to Avoid a Daily Deal DisasterMarketing companies like LivingSocial, Groupon and more, are services with vast databases and are perfectly positioned to help you put together a promotional offer aimed at reaching targeted customer prospects.  By jumping on the coupon clipping trend associated with today’s deal-savvy shoppers, your business can grab lots of new customers.  But, will they keep coming back after the coupon offer is done?  You want to avoid a daily deal disaster in your small business.

But before you sign on, ask yourself whether you’re ready for a crush of people to come in and kick your tires for a discount. If you’re not careful, your coupon-redeeming public could cause your brand to sink, not flourish.

The success of your first foray into daily deal coupons often comes down to your business operations. Have you recently trained and tested your staff in customer service—particularly at a rushed, high-volume scale? Do you have a phone script for answering frequently asked questions?

I recently encountered one unprepared company that I patronized after purchasing a deal through LivingSocial. Let’s call them XYZ Cleaning Services. The company’s coupon offered four hours of cleaning for $87. The timing was perfect, since I’d just decided to replace my existing cleaning service. I bought the coupon at the end of the summer, and it was set to expire in early December. The first week of December I remembered I hadn’t used my coupon, so I called a few times to make an appointment. When I finally reached someone, they said they were swamped during the holidays but would honor my coupon in the New Year.

In mid-January, I tried again. I called seven or eight times before finally reaching someone who informed me, “We’re no longer honoring that deal, but we’ll give you a $55 credit toward a cleaning service.” XYZ’s “credit” was less than the amount I had paid for the coupon! When I protested by recounting my ridiculous number of attempts in scheduling an appointment, she replied, “We tried to reach you, too, but we had to cut this off somewhere, so this is what I am offering you”.

I asked her to confirm that she wanted to handle our transaction in this manner. “Yes!” she said. So I declined the $55 credit: Based on this interaction, I didn’t want anything to do with this company. Then I posted an online review of my experiences with XYZ Cleaning Services. Not surprisingly, another reviewer had made the same complaint. My guess: XYZ’s daily deal didn’t exactly build their customer base the way they’d envisioned.

Don’t make the same mistakes. Here are four ways you can prepare for a daily deal that successfully builds your brand.

1. Anticipate success. Realistically assess how much business your current staff and systems can handle. Hire additional workers or place “reserves” on call to handle additional demand.

2. Engage an answering service or call center. As soon as your deal reaches site subscribers, your phone will start to ring. Interested customers will call asking questions, trying to schedule appointments, and seeking details on location, hours and so on.

3. Conduct customer-service training. In advance, properly train any and all staff who may interact with customers. Make sure they realize the importance of their customer service roles. Your deal may get customers in the door, but following through with a good experience provides your best chance to convert them into loyal long-term patrons.

4. Prepare a fulfillment contingency plan. When it comes to expiration, expect the unexpected: What happens if you can’t accommodate customer demand? If customers are unable to redeem coupons before the expiration because of your lack of availability or out-of-stock merchandise, will you offer a credit or extend the expiration? Outline a plan for dealing with such scenarios.

With so many social media outlets, it’s just as easy to share a negative experience as a positive one.  Small business owners don’t have huge marketing budgets, so why would you risk wasting your hard earned money AND good-standing in your industry by starting a program without the ability to handle the potential flood of new business?

Note: This article was first published under the title, How to Handle Daily Deal Promotions at Open Forum ©FedEx

How would you avoid a daily deal promotion disaster?

Melinda F. Emerson, known to many as SmallBizLady is America’s #1 small business expert. As CEO of Quintessence Multimedia, Melinda educates entrepreneurs and Fortune 500 companies on subjects including small business start-up, business development and social media marketing to fulfill her mission to end small business failure. She writes a weekly column on social media for The New York Times. Forbes Magazine named her #1 woman for entrepreneurs to follow on Twitter. She hosts #SmallBizChat Wednesdays on Twitter 8-9pm ET for emerging entrepreneurs. She also publishes a resource blog http://www.succeedasyourownboss.com Melinda is also the bestselling author of Become Your Own Boss in 12 months; A Month-by-Month Guide to a Business That Works. 

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