How to Deal with Negative Word of Mouth
Friday, December 02, 2005
If you're a small business, word of mouth is, or at least it should be one of the most importand marketing tools you got. Word of mouth is affecting your business, whether you deliberately use it or not. How you react can make a difference -- negatively or positively. Here is a interesting list with 5 tips on how to react to negative word of mouth:
1. Know your detractor
Detractors fall into three categories. First are the Hear Me's that have a gripe and just want to be listened to. Ignore them and they could turn into Reputation Terrorists, who are determined to undermine your company and willing to go out of their way to do it. Finally, there are the Competitive Destroyers, who are trying to get a competitive advantage over you for business reasons.
2. Listen to your complaints.
Whether they're coming via email, customer service reps, or a complaint line, listen to the people who have something to say. 3. Have facts readily available.
You'll want the ability to point to the truth, so when negative word of mouth crops up, you can say, "Yes, there's all this silliness out there, but here are the facts."4. Maintain perspective.
Ask yourself: "Is the negative word of mouth having an impact, or is it a guy sitting at home in his underwear in the basement with his dog looking over his shoulder?"5. Activate your influencers.
If there's truly a problem, make sure you have people willing to step up to the plate for you, and be ready to activate them if the time comes. That doesn't mean simply saying, "I'm right and he's wrong." It means having people willing to talk about their experiences with you.Well these were just some teasers as they were excerpts from the new Word of Mouth Basic Training Blog where you can find a lot of interesting infos on the subject.
Tags: word of mouth, small business, marketing
posted at 10:39 AM
|
