This blog post represents the final instalment of a mini trilogy of posts written in a frenzied couple of afternoons of content creation. Like any trilogy worth reading, it often helps if you have read the other books in the series, so if you’ve missed the first two instalments, stick the kettle on, click the links below and lets begin the journey.
Part one: Online review management made easy
Part two: Five reasons you should not ignore reviews
In my second blog post I discussed the necessity of monitoring and acting upon online reviews. Today the finale will explore a set of reactions that I have coined “the 3D approach” to online reputation management. This is the approach that many law firms (and organisations in other industries) take when it comes to online reputation management; it is an approach that often results in serious reputational damage to the firm.
Disregard
On discovery of a bad online review, often the first reaction is to simply ignore it. You may find yourself thinking along the lines of “what do a couple of disgruntled clients mean in the grand scale of things?” and “You can’t win them all.” Both statements are perfectly valid to a point, but consider the following scenario:
All of your reviews (good & bad) are spread across many different review sites. You may have 100 reviews - 90% of which can be considered positive. Does this mean that you can safely assume that your online reputation for positive reviews stands at 90%? Well no actually.
I mentioned in the second instalment of this blog; the fragmented nature of review sites on the web; suppose one of your potential clients chooses to visit one of the many legal review sites out there; your firm only has two reviews on this site. One positive, one negative; in this potential clients eyes your firm has a 50% satisfaction rate. I posit that a potential client in this situation will ignore the small sample size; especially if your local competitor appears on the same review site with a significantly higher review score; it’s their phone which is more likely to ring.
Another pertinent reason you shouldn’t ignore bad reviews was covered in the second instalment; namely the fact that negative reviews can influence others to write negative reviews.
There are cases when you should never disregard or ignore negative reviews. Never ignore a bad review on your Google+ page or on any of your social media or website pages, this is the equivalent of someone writing graffiti on your shop window!
Delete
A common knee-jerk reaction is to immediately attempt to remove the negative review by contacting the review site’s Webmaster or flagging a review as inappropriate in Google Places for Business.
Often this doesn’t get to the bottom of the situation, if a client has had a really negative experience there is very little barrier to them posting the same review or even something more scathing on another review site.
Discredit
Discrediting is not the same as responding to a negative review. Discrediting is where you actively seek to damage the credibility of the reviewer or the reviewer’s comments.
This reaction is the least common of the three, but potentially the most damaging. Often the discredit approach is triggered by a negative review from a particularly difficult or uncooperative client that made it impossible to deliver your best service. Whatever the scenario is, receiving a bad review can evoke an emotional response, but when personal feelings enter the realm of online reputation management, often the result is mudslinging, which is particularly damaging to your firm’s reputation. If you find yourself compelled to respond to a particularly unjust review, a good practice is to write down your response, save it, and refrain from posting for 24 hours. Most of the time, once the heat of the moment has passed you will find a more appropriate response.
If you truly believe that the review you have received is unwarranted or you believe it to be a malicious attack from a competitor then your best option is to contact the review site’s Webmaster and request the removal of the offending review. Try to cite details of why the content is false or inaccurate and back up your request with as much proof as possible.
Concluding thoughts
Now that we have discussed some of the “three sins” of online reputation management you will no doubt be hungry for some solutions and practical tips and advice to manage your online reputation; luckily you won’t have to wait long. Keep an eye out for our tips booklet on online reputation management for law firms which will be released in early 2014. In the mean time I would be interested in hearing your impressions of the review tool in Google Places for Business so please get in touch.