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Use Negative Reviews as an Opportunity to Improve

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Use negative reviews as an opportunity to improveIs there ever a time when we should look upon negative reviews about our business, its staff and products/services as an opportunity? You bet!

A recent article that caught my eye just proves how trying to suppress freedom of speech when it comes to reviews – even if it was meant as a joke (maybe?) – can really come back and bite you.

Whether or not the hotel in question had indeed meant the policy as a joke is still unclear but it seems the damage is done. But joke or not, why does it seem that some businesses are so terrified of negative reviews?

After all, we don’t get everything 100% right every time and that’s just as true in life as it is in business. Therefore, negative reviews should be seen as an opportunity to improve going forward and maybe even see our negative review updated.

So what should you do if your business receives a negative review or unfavourable feedback?

Comfort your employees

Whilst you may be feeling slightly miffed about reading something bad about your business, spare a thought for your staff. They’ll be experiencing mixed emotions and will be looking to you, as their leader, to pick them up.

People hate to hear criticism and your employees are no different. You need to understand that they’ll be feeling demoralised, despondent and as though they let you down. Comfort them, raise their spirits and get them fighting fit for another day.

Remain calm

The hotel in the article I cited at the start of this post definitely approached negative feedback in the wrong way. The trick is to remain calm in the face of criticism and never overreact.

Often, knee-jerk reactions can have the total opposite effect of what we want and make a bad situation even worse. For example, attempting to respond to a negative review defensively will just draw more attention to the situation and turn your potential opportunity into a public nightmare.

Reach out personally

Get on the phone or send an email to the customer in question expressing your regret that you didn’t meet their expectations and seek further advice – that’s right, ask them how you can improve going forward.

By doing so, you show that you take their opinion very seriously and want to use their experience to better yourself for future customers. If you can resolve any issues that were highlighted, you might just see that negative review be updated to reflect your business much more favourably.

Discover the root causes

Negative feedback and bad reviews are almost always due to only a handful of factors:

1. A bad customer experience – poor service, low-quality product, tardiness. In this instance a negative review should serve as a wake-up call to your business that you’re perhaps missing the mark on occasions.

2. Customer expectations mismatch – they expected one thing but what they got was quite another. This is a bit more difficult to remedy than the previous point but the customer’s feedback should be analysed carefully and your marketing, pricing and staff approach be reviewed accordingly.

3. Your business is inaccessible – people don’t want to deliberately bash your business in public but if you don’t give them any other options, what can you expect? That’s why your customer service channels need to be effective and act upon any feedback you receive.

By tackling negative reviews/feedback head-on you can really turn them into an opportunity for your business to shine. Reacting rashly or overly defensively will not help the situation. Show all your customers that you value their opinions and use feedback, positive or negative, to improve everything that you do.

 

 

Image courtesy of Master isolated images / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

 

5 Crucial Elements that all Business Websites Must Have

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5 Crucial elements that all business websites must have

 

How many times have you heard the phrase, “Check out our website for more information?” I’m going to suggest that the answer is on an almost daily basis. That’s because our business websites have become such a crucial part of our success and we want people to utilise them. After all, they champion our brands, promote our products and give useful information to our visitors.

However, no matter how elaborate or how simple your website, there are certain elements that it absolutely must incorporate. This checklist is obviously open to interpretation and there will undoubtedly be other aspects that you want to include, but I would definitely start with these five as a bare minimum.

A Logical Design

Stunning graphics, a plethora of multimedia wizardry and all manner of bells and whistles are great, but if your website is difficult to navigate your visitors will soon get fed up. They might even go to one of your competitor’s websites to find what they want! That’s why a logical design is an absolute must.

Websites are often designed on paper first and the layout finalised before anything else. Logically-designed websites feature easy-to-navigate menus and intuitive signposts. For example, when was the last time you visited a website that didn’t have a familiar-looking navigation bar running across the top?

Clear Contact Information

This is particularly important if your website is in addition to a bricks and mortar business. A lot of the time people visit your website with the sole purpose of finding your contact information. Therefore, it needs to be clearly displayed – even on the homepage – and not be hidden away out of sight.

You may run the risk of losing potential sales if you neglect to display your business’s contact details and offering them openly helps to build trust and stronger relationships with your customers. It’s also important to provide a range of contact options like email, telephone and physical address (if appropriate).

A Blog

A business blog (like this one) is a great way to reach out to your clients and prospects. Not only does it give you a platform on which to provide useful information, but it also gives your business a voice. And the beauty of a voice is that it helps to build an online reputation and, more importantly, a loyal following.

Moreover, your blog can even help boost your search engine rankings and by providing useful, original and engaging content, your visitors will keep coming back again and again. At the end of the day, the more followers your blog attracts the stronger your brand will become.

Social Media Integration

You will have probably lost count of the amount of times you’ve visited a website and been presented with a range of social media buttons. That’s because businesses want to boost their social media following and if you’ve visited their website then chances are you’ll like their Facebook page, start following them on Twitter or add them to your Google Plus circles.

Social media activity sends strong signals to search engines and so business websites incorporate it wherever possible. After all, by ‘liking’ a company’s Facebook page you are basically signing yourself up to receive further updates from them. It’s kind of like building a mailing list.

Mobile Compatibility

Now more than ever, people are using their smartphones, tablets and other mobile devices to access your business’s website. Therefore, it absolutely has to be mobile compatible. At the very least you need to have a bespoke mobile version of your site or a responsive design that adapts to mobile devices.

Your customers and prospects will be very disappointed if they try to use your website on their mobile devices only to find out that it’s a horrible experience. If your competitors have fully mobile compatible websites then you need to ensure that yours is at least as good, if not better.

 

 

 

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

 

How to create killer content

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How to create killer contentDo you ever feel as though creating online content for your business is stressful? What with blog posts, social media updates and promotional material all forming part of your digital marketing strategy, it can sometimes feel like a struggle to keep creating decent content.

This is especially true if you aren’t much of a writer and crafting engaging material doesn’t come naturally to you. However, by using a content creation checklist – like this one – you can sculpt not just content that people want to read but also be consistent in your writing.

After all, writing is actually a learnable skill and the more you do it, the better you become at it. And by following these simple guidelines you’ll start creating better content right away:

Be alluring

The internet is absolutely littered with content and to make yours stand out you need an alluring title that makes people want to click-through. You could have written the best blog post in the world but if it’s let down by a boring title then chances are people won’t even get to read it.

But what makes a good title?

  • A sense of urgency – For example, a title that begins “Don’t miss out…” automatically makes people curious about the content that follows.
  • Look to inform – The ‘how to’ format is used a lot on the internet because it works. People want to be given knowledge that they can use going forward.
  • Use numbered lists – “Top 10”, “Five Top Tips”, or “20 Ways To…”
  • Incorporate bold/strong language – Notice the word ‘killer’ in the title of this post? Can content really kill? No, but it stands out right.
  • Ask a question – Questions are a fantastic way to engage your reader right off the bat. “Do you dread creating online content for your business?” will probably have most people thinking, yes! Why? Are you going to help me make it easier?

Make people want to continue reading

So you’ve managed to get someone to click-through to your blog post with your alluring title but now you need to keep them hooked. So many pieces of content fail to fully engage the reader at the start and they inevitably navigate away again – don’t let this happen to you.

By using a staggering statistic or a question at the start (like this post does) you further engage the reader and they are more likely to keep reading. Intrigue is very powerful and by triggering it in someone you will get your content read right to the end.

Be personal throughout

One of the best pieces of advice that anyone ever told me was, “Try to write like you talk.” Sounds obvious right? But it really is the best way to approach content creation. Not only does it make the whole process easier but it also gives your posts a sense of personality – people appreciate that.

Show the reader that you care by interacting with them throughout. But how do you do that you say? By asking questions like I just did. It involves the reader and shows that you are writing with them in mind.

The word ‘you’ is extremely powerful throughout an entire post and is more likely to lead to the reader becoming one of your customers in the long run. Plus, a sense of personality will see readers returning to your blog again and again.

Be consistent

Finally, it is important that you are consistent with your content. After all, building a list of regular followers is the key to success. Your audience have become your audience because they like reading what you write. The quality of past blog posts isn’t going to be enough to keep them interested if your new content isn’t up to par.

Always try to:

  • Post new updates frequently – don’t post five updates in a single day and then disappear for a fortnight.
  • Be recognisable – structure your posts carefully and let your audience become used to your layout. People enjoy consistent posts that look familiar every time.
  • Offer real value – By doing this you’ll inevitably increase your search engine ranking as well as pleasing your readers. Just don’t focus on the former, however, too much. You should always write for people first and search engines second – always!

To attract more followers and win more customers, you need to make your content stand out from that of your competition. Stagnant, boring content will just sit there. Lively, fresh, engaging content on the other hand will entice big audiences.

 

 

Image courtesy of Gualberto107 / FreeDigitalPhotos.net