Mike Michalowicz walks through handling negative reviews: expect them, respond professionally even when unfair, and offer concrete fixes like refunds or discounts. A mix of 1-star and 5-star reviews actually builds trust because all-positive looks fake.
Welcome to Honor Roll, and now here's your host, Mike Michalowicz.
Welcome to Honor Roll. I'm Mike Michalowicz. You're not. That's okay. Today we're going to talk about how to handle negative reviews about your business. But first, my boy Barry Moltz, who is awesome, and he's a must-read author, wrote another book. Called Small Town Rules, and this is a book you gotta pick up. I would almost say, almost say, over The Pumpkin Plan, but I'm not gonna say that. Pick The Pumpkin Plan first, but then also get this book. Barry Moltz, awesome guy, awesome author. Alright, so how do you handle negative reviews? Here's the first trick: recognize you want negative reviews. If it's always 5 stars, people coming considering your business think that is manufactured. It may not be, but it feels that way if it's all lopsided one way. So, first way to handle it is to recognize you actually want them. Second is if they're unfair and scathing, then you have to respond, but respond professionally. So if someone's being all slanderous about your business, don't get up all in their face and call them a jerkwad or something. Instead, write back professionally, and this is how you do it, the third thing. Write back with an offer to resolve the problem. If someone buys a book of mine and they say, "It sucks. I hate it," I can offer a refund. Someone goes to your restaurant and they hate it, offer another complimentary dinner. Someone uses your service, offer a discount or even turn them on to an alternative vendor that may serve them better. Offer a resolution. The final thing to know about 1-star reviews, every one of your customers is going there and checking it out. They're not checking out the 5 stars. They want to see what sucks about you and if nothing sucks about you, then they may hire you. One stars are that important, and how you handle them is just as important. Alright, so I wanna show you a one star review and how you should appropriately handle it on my own site. Here's a one star review that I got, and what I do instead of responding immediately to them, because you can get in the moment, I go into a word processor and write down exactly what I want this person to hear. Always address the person by name too. People respond to their own names being said. This came in from Harold Micrombus, so I start off, "Dear Harry Micro Penis." That's how you roll.
