Building and maintaining a brand is harder than ever. The competition is stronger than ever, media is fragmenting more than ever, and social media channels are becoming more influential than ever (and they seem to be the place everyone slags you off). The temptation as a result of this can be to work harder to ‘manage’ the narrative. To delete comments, to only show the favourable reviews.
But that is the last thing you should do. I’m sure it goes against everything that feels right, especially when your detractors can say what they want and will twist their story to get pity when you know the truth is nothing like that. Suck it up princess! The current generation of customers is more educated and savvy than any generation in history. They know when they only see 5 star reviews that you are hiding bad reviews. They see where posts are deleted. They likely don’t believe much that you say in response.
Sure, some people love to troll on social media. But it is a powerful force for good too. If you leave a negative post and have an advocate on your page see it, chances are they will stick up for your good experience. And this is way more powerful than anything you could say.
What if they don’t? If you don’t have someone stand up, and more people discuss the same issue, it is a great opportunity for improvement and shows there is a problem with customers expectations of your brand and their actual experience. It is an opportunity for you to learn and improve. The worst thing you can do here is not be genuine. Trust is hard to earn and easy to destroy. Understand that short term gimmicks will be seen by the customer and that the only sustainable way to operate is openly and transparently, and that means warts and all.
If there are issues, you can manage them for a little while by taking measures to control the narrative, but sooner or later the truth will come out. So don’t worry about managing it all, simply work openly and honestly and watch as customers appreciate that and vote with their wallets…