August 12, 2009, My Office, Athens, OH - It’s kind of funny that dealing with negative feedback was on the agenda for today’s blog post. We got a big hunk of it on Facebook this afternoon, which happens from time to time. Some of our beloved fans didn’t like the quality of a video we posted. Ouch.
“Ouch” being the key word here! Negative feedback gets beneath our skin like the nurses warning just before the needle goes in, “you’re going to feel a little prick here.” It’s not a “little prick” it hurts and no on likes things that hurt. Well, most of us don’t! Negative feedback hurts whether or not it has merit. So why open yourself up for it? Why give mean people a chance to hurt you?
I’ll give you 5 reasons.
Medicine
In the case of our Facebook fans, they were spot on. While the content of the video was quite good, there were too many cooks in the kitchen that day and that wasn’t our best production work. Lesson learned: content still needs a pretty package every time. We are now better producers. Be gracious, because if you don’t crumble, you will get better.
Credibility
No one, and no business, is perfect. The grace with which you handle negativity speaks volumes about your character and the character of your organization. Let’s face it, a reputation is impossible to control, but character is the one thing in this world you can control. Well, your own anyway!
Influence
Stepping for just one moment into reality, conversations both positive and negative are happening about your brand. If you give that conversation a place to live where it can influence you to become better – and where you can influence it so it doesn’t fester into something horrible (like lost sales, for instance) then you begin to reap the rewards that social media marketing can bring.
Illusion
By avoiding social networking, by hiding from the conversation and pretending it’s not happening, by sticking to the tried and true models, you are controlling your message. False. Control is an illusion. Social media is democratizing communication and trust is shifting from the all-power institutions of society to the “wisdom of crowds”. Influence is possible, control is not. In reality, it never was.
Humanity
Social media allows people to get to know each other (hence the name, social) and a lot of people are uncomfortable about that. But I think it is a good thing. Yes, we get to hear first hand how people feel about our products and services, but they also get to hear from us, the people behind the ideas, and most of the time it surprises the heck out of them. When you reply back with a genuine “thank you” – a gracious response of some kind, you will often find the tone quickly changing. Sometimes people even delete negative comments or otherwise retract or soften their responses. You create a connection. Connections are good, ‘mkay?
Hope that helps. Do you have more ideas? Let me know in the comments.
While you’re at it, monitor the buzz – here are some tools: Monitoring Your Company: The Caffeinated Blog
Some books and articles and ideas that influenced my thinking about this topic:
The New Community Rules: Marketing on the Social Web by Tamar Weinberg (twitter @tamar)
Brand Influence
Social Media Damage Control
How to deal with negative feedback
The Work, Bryon Katie
