Your online reputation is extremely important, and negative reviews can hurt that reputation, but you can turn them into sales opportunities.
The negative review you receive from a customer should be looked at as an opportunity to make things right, grow, and correct behavior that might be ongoing. Sometimes, we don’t know something is wrong until a customer points it out to us, which makes negative reviews invaluable in creating opportunities for growth. Nobody wants to receive negative feedback, but when you do, here are some ways to handle the review and turn it into an opportunity for growth.
A quick, professional response is a must
Before responding, ensure you have your emotions in check, and you’re acting professionally. The customer is already dissatisfied with your dealership, and you don’t need to make things worse or act like you’ve been attacked. Delayed responses can make things worse because the customer might think you’re avoiding them.
When you respond to the negative feedback, you should:
- Acknowledge the issue – thank the customer for their feedback and let them know you take their issue seriously
- Apologize – This needs to be sincere and without excuses. Don’t deflect fault; you represent your dealership and need to take responsibility for the problem
- Offer an offline conversation – Invite the customer to call or email you directly, which can take the issue offline. This shows your willingness to resolve the issue without further escalation.
Find a solution
Taking ownership of the issues brought up in negative reviews is a must. You have to own the problem and provide an acceptable solution to your customer. It doesn’t help to be defensive or dismissive, so avoid that, no matter how belligerent the customer might become. Even if you believe the review to be unjustified, there was something that upset the customer, and you need to get to the root of that problem. When you handle the situation with a customer-first attitude, you could gain a customer for life.
Some steps to finding a solution are:
- Avoid excuses – Nobody likes excuses or deflection. Simply acknowledge the issue and express your commitment to making things right
- Show what’s being done – How is your team working to improve and avoid similar situations in the future?
- Offer a resolution – This could be a future service discount, a free oil change, or a follow-up meeting to discuss the issue. If it’s possible, offer a concrete resolution to the problem at hand.
Create learning opportunities
Negative reviews don’t have to remain negative. Review what caused the customer to become dissatisfied with your dealership and what you can do to improve and avoid other customers having similar situations. These reviews are training gold and need to be thought of as learning opportunities for you and your team.
Some things you can do to create learning from negative reviews are:
- Identify common themes – if several reviews mention the same issue, you’ve got to address that issue
- Improve processes – Are there operational issues mentioned? Can you streamline the process for future customers?
- Train your team – using negative reviews to train your team can give them real-world, hands-on experiences that should be improved. Involving your team in the solution process can help bring more ideas to the forefront to offer better solutions going forward.
Respond online to negative reviews
When a customer leaves a review that doesn’t show your dealership team in the best light, that review is likely going to be read by many future customers. People want to know what went wrong and how the dealership addressed the issue. This means you should have a well-crated response showing your commitment to customer satisfaction and how you’ve addressed the issue with the customer who left the negative feedback.
Ask the customer to help
Once you’ve addressed and corrected the issues brought up in negative reviews, its important to ask the customer to update their review and score. If your customer feels heard and valued, they might be likely to change their review score or add comments about how your team fixed the problem. This can be a huge part of showing your dealership’s customer-first focus and transparency.
Ask customers to leave positive reviews
Positive reviews are necessary to offset negative reviews. Its valuable to learn from negative feedback, but you need positive reviews to build up your online reputation and show future customers they should trust your dealership team. This means asking customers to leave positive reviews when you know they have had a good experience with your team.
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