How to Deal With Negative Customers on Social Media

As a small business, you are marketing yourself on various social media platforms. This is a good thing. But, anytime you post and give your readers a platform where they can comment about your products or services, you do have some risk.

When you allow your readers to comment on your posts you could get a bad review or a damaging comment. And these negatives are out there on the Internet for everyone to see.

While you can’t completely avoid negative comments on social media, you can plan on how to respond to it in a professional manner. This will reflect well on your brand.

Set up Google Alerts

You want to know what people are saying about your company. If you can’t see their comments, how will you know?

It’s easy to set up Google Alerts to notify you when your brand has been mentioned online. This will give you a chance to respond, if necessary.

Step back

Don’t take everything posted in your comments so seriously. Sometimes negative comments are just a by-product of the world we now live in. People feel safe making negative comments online because it’s sort of anonymous and they just don’t think about the effects of what they are saying online.  Some people intentionally malign individuals and companies online just to get a rise out of them. Don’t play into their wacko plans.

You have to avoid letting people’s comments get to you. Sometimes, you just have to ignore things and let them go.

Don’t be defensive

It’s difficult to not feel defensive when facing a negative comment about your company – especially one that you don’t feel is accurate. Remember that everything you post online is visible to everyone so you can’t afford to get defensive and go after the person who made the comment. This will make you look like a bully, which isn’t healthy for your company’s image.

Acknowledge when you’ve made a mistake

It is possible that a negative comment about your business is justified. If that is the case, you need to quickly give an apology to the affected person and make a promise to do better in the future.

While using social media is a great way to promote your small business, you have to keep an ear to the digital ground and identify and respond to comments about your company so that your time promoting your small business on social media isn’t wasted.