Responding to Customers with Positivity

A colleague shared an experience from their days in retail customer service: A computer-repair company had a customer whose hard drive crashed and caused them to lose everything. The customer was understandably upset and took out his anger on the store’s team. The manager got involved, listened to the customer’s complaints, apologized for the situation he was in, and offered to help. The customer calmed down after a few minutes, and they were able to set him up with a new computer.

To this day, our colleague thinks about the advice the manager gave afterward: “Sometimes, people just need to be heard.”

In both community and customer support, front-line agents such as Mods are the people engaging the customer and listening to their needs. It’s their duty to hear them out. Emotion is often a symptom of the problem, and it’s their job to listen through the emotion to hear the cause, and thus address the situation to find a fix.

For social media and community managers handling complaints in a public space, this exchange needs to be handled with tact and great care.

Dealing with customer interactions that start off positively or neutral in a visible spot like an app store is easy. Where the rubber meets the road is how a company handles negative interactions from the beginning. Responding to negative comments can help in three ways:

• The issue is acknowledged (even in the smallest degree)
• It shows that help is available
• It’s a demonstration that the company is invested in the customer community (and that the social channel isn’t just an unmanned promo tool)

Sure, no one likes to be at the receiving end of spicy ire or unbridled frustration, but it’s important to remember that your support and community teams are the stewards of the customer’s or user’s experience. Changing a negative experience into a positive experience is doable, and it’s super valuable to the ongoing worth of your brand. 

Start with analyzing the customer’s communication and the customer’s situation. What is the root cause of their issue? Could it be a miscommunication, or is there an easy fix? Once you know the root of the issue, is it something you or the company can fix, or is it out of the company’s control? Maybe all you can do is listen so that you can understand the issue completely before finding a solution.

How do we respond to these in the context of customer reviews? Consider your two options:

• Provide through support in comments, so the public can also see the helpful resolutions; this is a rarely used option, but effective when used cleverly.
• Provide brief help and move the conversation to DMs (direct messages) or your customer support system; this is the standard option.

Hashing out details publicly is challenging for a few reasons (privacy, sensitivity, ongoing details, etc). In the very rare event that the problem appears to be a larger symptom customers are experiencing, the resolution does not involve personally identifiable details, and you think it could help a greater pool of people, then triage with the customer in the comments of the review.

However, if those particular stars have not aligned, aim to move the conversation offline via private message or DM. You might even consider, in certain instances, giving truly problematic reviews a direct path to elevated support. (But keep in mind not to offer this access to everyone, as the process isn’t scalable.)

Listen to every part of their conversation and make sure to address each concern. Use their name and phrases from their comments to help acknowledge them and showcase that you are indeed a human, and not a bot or static customer response. And here’s the tricky part: Do not take responsibility for the issue on behalf of the company unless it’s a known issue and cleared to be disclosed.

Other tips to keep in mind:

• Avoid accusative or defensive language. Reread your responses to make sure there’s no unintended tone.
• Take everything said seriously, and make sure to reiterate their issues for clarity.
• Whether it’s in DM or public reply, provide a solution or recommendation, even if that solution is a direct contact for active troubleshooting.
• Ask them to follow up. (For example, “Please let us know if that recommendation works. If it doesn’t, we can try something else.”)

Hopefully by now their issue is resolved. What’s next? Some would suggest that you ask the customer to remove their negative review. However, this can cheapen the solution you provided. Instead, ask them to update their response to show anyone who reads the original review that your company took it seriously and assisted this person, then helped them to a more positive experience.

At the end of the day, the best thing you can do for a negative review is to make sure the customer receives acknowledgement. Even though a solution can’t always be found, you should strive to turn a bad experience into a positive one. Most importantly, be there when a customer needs to be heard.

Want further insights on how to provide exceptional customer service? Contact us today.