For visible brand accounts, negative feedback and comments are a given. However, it’s what comes after the negative feedback that people will see and remember most. Is it a defensive argument? Is it an ignored complaint? Or, is it a helpful response that shows the customer is being taken seriously and is valued?

When it comes to social media marketing and negative feedback, the goal is to have an even head and good judgment, as opposed to panic. One must be able to identify legitimate complaints, how to respond while providing privacy, how to resolve complaints, and how to learn from ongoing troubling complaints and feedback.

A Practical Guide for Using Negative Feedback for Social Media Marketing

Comments sections are usually just the virtual version of call centers. The goal is to offer a unique solution to the commenter while keeping the rest of your customer base happy and onboard.

Establish your process for handling feedback on the following path

1. Make sure your team is monitoring your social channels and is the first to notice comments that could attract negative engagement.

2. What type of message is this? Feedback? Is it a question? Did we post false information? Is the feedback/suggestion/profanity even that feeback?

3. Respond with empathy and provide guidance on the next steps.

4. Take the conversation out of the social channel and provide guidance privately if order details, account, payment, or private information is being shared.

5. Solve the issue and follow up on what was done.

6. Document and analyze the feedback trends.

Hootsuite, Sprout Social, and Brandwatch are examples of tools that can help teams that track brand mentions. However, no tool is going to be effective if no one owns the social channel and is able to escalate issues.

The speed of a response to feedback is important, but the nature of the response is equally important.

Discern the Type of Negative Feedback Received

Not all negative feedback requires the same response. If a restaurant responds to all feedback by saying that it's the same response to a trolling comment, then that restaurant may lose a lot of potential business. Treating scam feedback and links as a customer service issue is even more dangerous because of the potential financial risk cybercriminal feedback may offer your customers.

Begin with the following list to help you formulate a response to the feedback you received:

1. Genuine Complaints. This includes negative feedback on a product, poor customer service, issues with delivery, or even billing.

2. This includes feedback that may sound negative and even be phrased as a negative statement, but is really just the customer lacking the necessary information to formulate a more positive or productive feedback or question.

3. This includes feedback that is factually incorrect, and requires calm correction.

4. Spam and scam cases typically drive traffic to fabricated products, fake giveaways, and/or links that are dubious in nature.

5. This includes negative comments that are simply harassing and threatening and are filled with hate speech.

6. This category may include negative comments that require the responder to respond within a certain time.

As a first step, take a screenshot, and save the link if it is available. This will help your company and you in the future.

Make Timely Responses Part of Your Routine

You need to assist clients in keeping your standards in mind. Publish service hours and respond to service tickets and emails within the same hour. Set a same-day maximum for complaints that are made through public forums. HubSpot uses a target of a first response time under 30 minutes as a strong benchmark. Plan your service hours according to this benchmark.

Getting a response out lets clients know that you are not ignoring them. Use something along the lines of "Hi, Maya, thank you for reaching out. We are on it and will update you here shortly."

Be a person that wants to help. Keep it short. Focus on the future and do not create an out of the box response for every complaint that you have to apologize for. Don’t respond with blame.

Give them something you will do along with your response. "The courier was late, I'm sorry, that is not our fault, don't you know your feedback is important to us, so we will get to it, I guess." is not going to cut it.

Sometimes an issue is complicated and it will take longer than you want to respond to, so let them know that, it will keep the goodwill you have earned with the rest of your responses.

Write a Trustworthy Public Response

Build your response to include four components. Recognition, name the issue, empathy, outline the next step.

Here’s an example.

“Hi Jordan! Thanks for reaching out. There’s no need for concern as our billing team is reviewing it while you send us a direct message with the email associated with your account.”

Recognition can come in the form of a name, so be sure to use the first name when visible and appropriate. After some recognition, address the issue. Avoid the generic “Sorry to hear that.” although a lot of people appreciate an apology, they especially want to see you take responsibility. Avoid “We understand why this would be frustrating.” and instead let people know you’re checking the issue.

If a claim is incorrect respond with facts, respectfully. Do not disclose order info, direct messages, or account info to validate your response. Approved response templates are a good idea and work especially well for delays and outages. However the best practice is still to personalize the response. Social media provides a copy and paste reaction outlet for your audience and they can especially tell when a negative response is simply a templated response.

Sensitive Complaints & Private Customer Support

Complaints must be public before you move private. Just moving a complaint to private means you just want it out of the public eye.

When the issue includes the following you can move private:

1. Order numbers, payment information, account information, addresses, or any personal information.

2. Multiple messages for replacement, refund, or troubleshooting that is more complex.

3. Complaints that involve public discussions that could reveal private information or could escalate the complaint.

Clearly state how the interaction will be moved private. Let the customer know where to interact and what information to provide. Include the email, chat, or phone number for your support teams private customer contact. Make it easy, especially where customer message requests will be deleted.

Provide a response to the public interaction when the customer issue is resolved. Follow up with a "Thanks for reaching out, Jordan. We've resolved this issue with you," note, to show you have resolved it and to document the interaction.

Track the response time and resolution of interactions, and customer satisfaction for social services. This will show if moving an interaction private leads to a resolution or just moves a problem out of the public view.

How to Improve Marketing and Customer Service Based on Constructive Feedback

Closed cases provide valuable insights. Look for similar issues across closed cases such as product description issues, misleading advertisements, lack of notice for delivery time, difficult return process, link issues, and lack of customer support.

Count negative feedback in ways other than just the overall feedback number. Helpful measures include:

1. The average time to the first response and the overall resolution time.

2. The resolution rate and the customer satisfaction score after the case is closed.

3. The overall sentiment by support channel, marketing campaign, product, and the recurring issue.

4. The overall number of cases that need to be escalated to a private support channel.

Take a look at the issues marketing can resolve before customers use the feedback channel. If a special offer campaign results in customers repeatedly asking whether the offer applies to subscriptions, then the special offer campaign copy needs to be revised. If customers do not understand the product size, then the product page, related social media posts, and the FAQ need to be revised. If customers report the same issue with the service provided, customer operations and support need to review the evidence.

After larger incidents, do an internal review in less than two weeks. Discuss what went wrong and what replies were used. Focus on what stalled the process and what needs to be improved. Feedback on social media marketing becomes useful when the feedback gets to the appropriate staff to address the issues.

Conclusion

Timely, polite, and exact answers that provide real solutions are your best response. You should publicly acknowledge legitimate concerns, keep your customers’ private information private, and only delete feedback if it violates your rules.

Each case you resolve can help you strengthen your messaging and your customer service and experience. Following through on complaints can help you convert a public complaint into a trust-building opportunity.

How to Handle Negative Feedback in Social Media Marketing