Managing your business reputation

The longer you stay in business, the more likely you are to experience a dissatisfied customer or client. How you respond to negative feedback or complaints impacts your business reputation negatively or positively. It is particularly true for businesses that rely heavily on referrals. Poorly handled issues can lead to more formal customer complaints and in some cases lawsuits. Avoid the potential costly exercise of defending against formal complaints by taking a few proactive steps.

Don’t dismiss complaints. Paying customers and clients hate when an owner is dismisses their concern. Pay attention to what is bothering your customers and clients.

Ask questions. Don’t be afraid to ask follow-up questions to gain clarity or get to the root cause of their frustration.

Take Action. Once you have gathered information and determined the root cause of the problem, take definitive action.

Follow-up. Once you take action, let the customer know what steps you’ve taken to resolve the issue. In fact, before you take action, make sure you’ve clearly communicated to the customer or client what steps you plan to take to address their issue.

Being known for caring about your customers and taking their concerns seriously is a reputation that you want your business to have if you plan to keep doing business for many years to come.