Reviews can be very beneficial for any customer-facing business. It allows your biggest fans to gush about how amazing you are, and provides great social proof. But it also allows users who didn’t have such good experiences to vent their frustrations and possibly go off the rails.
Check out our 2023 guides to responding to reviews: Positive Reviews & Negative/Fake Reviews
So, you received a negative review on your Facebook page. What should you do about it?
First off, remember that it’s okay and it happens. As a business, it’s hard to make everyone happy, and bad reviews will likely come and go as you thrive. You can’t simply “delete” the review. Facebook doesn’t allow that. But you can remove the ability for anyone to post reviews. More on that below.
Depending on the review, there are a few steps you can take from here.
If it’s a real and constructive review, then it’s best to respond to it. Maybe you made a mistake, or maybe you were having a bad day. Whatever it is, you should take the time to respond to the review and let the customer know you acknowledge their feedback and you care to make it right.
Not only are you building a relationship with that customer, but also with the customers considering your business. Good reviews reassure potential customers, but bad reviews are the ones that could make or break your next sale.
This also contributes to your brand image and company values. When you respond to a negative review, it lets others know that you care and are willing to do whatever you can to fix it. It also lets potential customers know that this does not reflect a typical experience with your company.
A bad review is a chance to make things right with the customer and win their loyalty. In some cases, customers may even update their review to praise how your company handled the situation, turning your negative review into a positive one.
Now, let’s say the review they left was irrelevant to your business as a whole. For example, this customer’s negative review is regarding their frustration with seeing a Facebook ad that they didn’t find relevant, but has nothing to do with the product, service, or company whatsoever.
Facebook allows you to report reviews that are irrelevant, unfair, spam, and more.
Spam reviews by bots that are clearly not your customers or even real people are fairly common. If you see something like that, make sure to report it.
If the review has nothing to do with your company, service, product, or any of the above reasons, you can report it to Facebook and they will manually review it. If it does not follow the policies, they will remove the review for you.
If you find that reviews are hurting your business more than helping it, you can also remove the ability for users to leave reviews on your Facebook page altogether.
It’s worth noting if this is the case, it’s important to consider why you’re getting bad reviews. If they are real issues, hiding the reviews won’t fix the problems in your business that need to be addressed.
Here are the simple steps to remove the Facebook reviews tab:
As Page Administrator, navigate to Page Settings.
Click on Templates and Tabs, then scroll down until you find the Reviews tab and click Settings.
Hit the toggle switch to off, and you’re done!
Keep in mind that there are pros and cons to removing the reviews from your Facebook page altogether.
For one, while others won’t be able to see your negative reviews, they won’t be able to see your positive ones, either. This means if a customer is about to purchase from a competitor and it comes down to the reviews so they can see who will provide a better experience, you may have lost a customer.
Another thing to keep in mind: Customers can still comment regarding their experiences on your ads or public page posts, where they can be seen by other prospective customers. Unless you’re closely monitoring each comment that comes through on your page, others might see the negative comment before you can respond to it or hide it.
Reputation management on social media can be time consuming, but it’s necessary to maintain a good presence and brand image. If you’re interested in learning more about our social media management packages, send us a message as we’d love to help you out!