083- Customer Reviews
Summary:
On today’s episode we talk all about reviews! If you’re in business long enough, you’re bound to get a bad one. How do you handle that kind of feedback and how do you even define what a bad review is? We discuss all of that and more. Plus, on this week’s “Ask a Pet Biz Coach” segment with Natasha O’Banion, she answers the question, “How do you hire people, while still making money for yourself and how do you hire the right people.”
Topics on this episode:
Our recent 1-Star Review
Why have reviews available to the public?
Where do you put them?
How do you ask for them?
The three kinds of people that leave reviews
What if you get a bad one?
Types of “bad reviews”
The three things you can do about it
The three things you shouldn’t do
How to respond to positive feedback and praise
Ask a Pet Business Coach with Natasha O’Banion
Main take away? Remember to breathe and never react or respond out of anger or frustration. Bad reviews are part of this business and we all have to learn to roll with them as they come.
Links:
Check out Start. Scale. Sail. and use PSC20 for 15% off.
Give us a call! (636) 364-8260
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Follow us on: Instagram, Facebook, Twitter
Subscribe on iTunes, Spotify, Google, Stitcher, & TuneIn
Email us at: feedback@petsitterconfessional.com
A VERY ROUGH TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE
Provided by otter.ai
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
review, business, star review, people, clients, stars, service, person, hire, feedback, bad, respond, write, rating, pet, Natasha, podcast, personally, speak, online
SPEAKERS
Meghan, Collin, Natasha
Collin 00:17
I'm Collin
Meghan 00:18
and I'm Meghan. And this is pet sitter confessional, an open and honest discussion about life as a pet sitter. Hey guys, welcome to Episode 83. We hope that you are having a great week so far. And if you aren't subscribed, please do so on your favorite podcast player. We are on Apple, iTunes, Spotify, Google basically anywhere that you can subscribe to podcast we are there you can also listen on our website at pet sitter confessional calm. I
Collin 00:49
would also say that if you find any of our shows our episodes helpful in any way please share it with somebody who you know would benefit from listening to us.
Meghan 00:58
So today's episode is all about reading. reviews and we had started thinking about this topic a few weeks ago. And then last week on our Monday episode, I said that if we have earned it to go to Apple podcasts and give us a rating and review, I did not specify how many stars you should give us. So if someone did go to Apple podcasts, and they gave us a one star review,
Collin 01:21
and they said that they were not a fan, and it seems very, and
Meghan 01:25
so we appreciate that feedback.
Collin 01:27
We totally do. We asked for reviews and that's all part of of growing as Megan said, we thought about having discussing the topic of reviews in a business. And then we got this review on our podcast and so he said, You know what, we need to have this discussion and not just how to ask for them but everything about reviews and why they are important and
Meghan 01:48
how to deal with them right personally and professionally.
Collin 01:51
One of the first questions I think it should be blatantly obvious is should you should you have them should you seek out getting reviews?
Meghan 01:57
Obviously the answer here is yes, it It increases your credibility within your market and makes you more marketable for potential clients.
Collin 02:07
It allows people to see that you are legitimate and responsible enough to care for their pets.
Meghan 02:12
It also helps them to know whether you are a good fit for them.
Collin 02:15
Think of it as marketing when you are not there to pitch yourself. Having reviews out there that speak to your character and how you run your business allows other people to see that and know whether you'll be a good fit or not.
Meghan 02:29
And then once you get a lot of reviews over a long period of time, it shows consistency within your business.
Collin 02:35
That's really important to show that if you market yourself as being responsible and timely and good communicator. If you have five, six years of reviews that say all of that, it really does show that as Megan said, You are being consistent.
Meghan 02:49
They speak for your services so that you don't have to,
Collin 02:52
which is what we're all after. We're all after ways to market and get ourselves out there without us having to do all of the labor. work
Meghan 03:00
right so your business can still be growing and moving even when you're sleeping. Like Natasha said a few weeks ago. The next part is where do you put them? If you were asking for reviews for yourself and you're doing it in house, you need to post them to your website. You can also encourage people to leave reviews on your Facebook business page, your Google My Business Page, Yelp, and other local pages like next door, Facebook, local groups,
Collin 03:29
it can be really overwhelming to keep track of all of those places where someone could possibly leave a review or look for reviews. But the more places you are, the more places you have excellent reviews, the better
Meghan 03:43
doing some market research in your area to see where most people have reviews is a good idea so that you know where most eyeballs are and you can funnel your clients to leave a review there.
Collin 03:56
So if in your area you see that most of the businesses Have all of their reviews on Google My Business, then you need to make sure you have that too. Because obviously, that's where people are going. That's where people are looking. But don't discount people leaving reviews on your Facebook page, or I still really think having at least a subset of reviews displayed on your website is again, a really great way to bring in some of that, that marketing aspect.
Meghan 04:24
A big part of reviews and something that a lot of people have trouble with and stress over is asking for them. If you're just starting out in this business, you can ask friends, maybe even some family, close family, those who have seen you work with animals is really important
Collin 04:42
to write to write that review. Again, maybe not speaking to a business side or anything like that, but speaking to your level of care, and your professionalism and character and some of those aspects first to get your foot in the door.
Meghan 04:57
And that'll help you gain traction and hope business. So as you grow and get clients, your reviews should be basically only from your clients.
Collin 05:07
Again, increasing your legitimacy. So again, that that's still why they have their and I think we are stressing this a lot, because having reviews is just really important to your business, whether it's a rating or someone or a written comment, it really does help. So how do you end up asking for these?
Meghan 05:26
Well, you should be asking for them after every visit. It can be done either verbally, or through a text or an automated electronic email,
Collin 05:35
it just make it part of your procedure at the end of the day. And that could be maybe a survey that somebody gets emailed, or you ask them how their experience was. And you can allow them to provide written feedback, as well as ratings on like zero to 10 scale for certain key elements that you want to know more about.
Meghan 05:54
Some of those elements could be timeliness, professionalism, communication, and your Knowledge of care about the pets that you are caring for.
Collin 06:03
And it's not you're not asking for a mountain here, you're just asking for a few moments of their time. And again, it's automated. So you're not having to remember to do it or forget how to phrase it.
Meghan 06:15
But if you have software, this may already be done for you. But you could also create it in something like Google forums or just have a very standard email survey.
Collin 06:24
But if you're on a platform like rover or wag, the client is automatically emailed this and you don't even know that it's being sent out in there that asks them for a rating and review for for the care.
Meghan 06:36
So how do you ask in what manner do you ask?
Collin 06:40
It can be something really simple. The simpler the better you don't need to go into why a review is good for your business, what it means to you what they should include anything like that. So something as we really enjoyed watching Fido, he was such a great pub, we would appreciate a review on how we did thank you and then include a link to where they can go fill that out or just have that write in text with wherever you have sent that
Meghan 07:05
we also wanted to talk about some ethics around asking for a review. Some people don't really enjoy asking, and some people are perfectly fine with it, but we feel that you shouldn't pay for them, or tell people what to say. That gets a little tricky, because some people will run giveaways based on who has left a review or not. Personally, though, we feel that we are not comfortable with that, because it feels like you're kind of buying the review. And you want your reviews to be genuine, whether they're good or bad. You just want them to be from real clients who have used you before. And they're giving their honest feedback, right?
Collin 07:43
And you'll you'll see this sometimes, as far as please leave us a five star review. Well, what if you didn't earn a five star review? And what if the person doesn't feel like giving you a five star review? What if they have good criticism and good feedback to give? Well, you're shutting the door on them. Not allowing them to actually verbalize what they would like to see change.
Meghan 08:03
Honestly, though, of course, we all want five stars like nobody wants a three star review on their business.
Collin 08:09
No. So it makes it at first blush, it makes sense to say, I know I did a good, good job. So give me a five star review. But they may have again, feedback and good constructive things to tell you. So don't try and prime the pump with anything. Just ask let us know how we did. And so you're asking nicely and kindly and again, make sure that the client knows that a review is not contingent upon any future services or rendering of services while you're caring for their pop or their pet. Nothing is contingent upon the review, whether they give one or not that does not change how you're going to interact with that client.
Meghan 08:50
When it comes to clients. There are typically three kinds of people that leave reviews. There are some people who love writing and reviewing everything They experience and will do so every single time. Others just by nature will never leave a review at all, no matter what kind of experience they've had.
Collin 09:10
And then the third kind is those that will only leave a review when they've had a bad experience.
Meghan 09:15
The most frustrating group of people is the middle group, the people who will never leave a review at all, because they may love your service and appreciate what you do. But they just may never feel the need to write a review.
Collin 09:26
No matter how much you ask, you could send all the prompts all the face to face conversations, and they're just not going to do it.
Meghan 09:33
And this is why most reviews tend to be either five stars or one star. It's not because of a lack of consistency of service or quality, but typically rather the character of the person leaving the review.
Collin 09:47
And that's really important to remember, when you are receiving reviews, people typically will either just immediately click five stars, or again that last group that will only review when they have had a bad experience or they have perceived To have had a bad experience. So I am the kind of person that I don't give very many five stars. I like reviewing, I enjoy reviewing, but I'm not an immediate five star review there. When it comes to five stars, it has to have blown me away to leave that kind of five stars whether exceeded my expectations have gone above and beyond or exceeded quality in some aspect. I just, I'm not a five star it takes a lot. I really reserve five stars for something way above and beyond. That's not a standard thing that I have.
Meghan 10:36
I typically either give one or five stars. I will definitely let them know if it's been a great experience. If it's been a bad experience, I will definitely let them know. So I think that's why when you go onto somebody's page, they'll either be awesome reviews or a few negative reviews.
Collin 10:54
Right? I don't think very many people are in my boat where three stars is you did ever Right. And that's what that's what was expected was a three star. And then you have to work your way up or lose stars going back down. So we've done all of these steps and you go to your Google My Business Page, and you've gotten a one star review on your business. Now, what do you do?
Meghan 11:17
Well, as we just talked about, some people will just never leave five stars. They may have had an excellent service, you may have been on time professional, everything, but they'll leave you four stars. It's very frustrating. But keep in mind that four stars is better than two stars. It's better than one star. Yeah. There there are just some people out there who will not give five stars, they would rather give four stars.
Collin 11:41
And and so a lot of us talk about we got a bad review, or that's a bad review. I think there are a few categories that define what a bad review can be. I would say the first one is a bad review can mean that they misrepresent something that happened. So that's a better it speaks badly About a service that you gave, it could also be that they don't articulate the service very well, or it's just poorly written. So it just looks bad. It reads poorly. It could be where they hated your service and everything about your business and just write the scathing long screed against you personally. Or it could just be something that's not very helpful. It doesn't tell you why they have that review, good or bad and doesn't help anybody choose your service over somebody else.
Meghan 12:33
Right. And that's kind of what happened with our podcast review. Yeah, they just said they're not a fan. And it seems very fake that that's not helpful. That doesn't tell other people why they should listen to our podcast or not listen to our
Collin 12:45
it doesn't tell us how we can improve how we can change things. So when dealing with those kind of reviews, I would say that the poorly written ones are something that you're just going to have to brush aside. We can't expect everybody to be a novelist in the world. well written, individual, and that those just gonna have to set aside for for a moment.
Meghan 13:06
First thing you have to do when you get a bad review is breathe. It's okay. It happens to a lot of people happens to most people actually. And a lot of people say that when they go onto a page and they see one one star review, it kind of legitimizes the business, because you're not going to please everybody. So also, don't jump to conclusions. Don't jump to assumptions or anger right away. And maybe even give yourself 10 minutes to just collect yourself before doing anything at all,
Collin 13:40
which is really hard. Because you immediately want to react, you immediately want to do something, reach out, make something change about that review, but you really should just sit and breathe for a few minutes before you act at all because we don't want to be acting out of haste or frustration. Anger when we respond or when we go on to the next step,
Meghan 14:03
you could also talk with someone before you do anything. And like you just said, make sure that you are not acting out of emotion with whatever you do. Remember, you can't please everyone all the time, and you shouldn't, some people will just leave bad reviews.
Collin 14:17
So I would say that the most important part of getting a bad review is not that you've got one, but how we respond. So let's say we've done the breathing, we've talked it out. Now it's time to take action. What are some things that we can actually do for our business when we get a bad review?
Meghan 14:35
The first one is you could just ignore it. This likely won't look very good for your business, but it is an option.
Collin 14:42
Depending on what kind of bad review it was, it may be a legitimate option. You may not want to deal with it and go down a rabbit hole. It may be a really touchy subject. There are many reasons why you would ignore it and that's that's a valid thing to do in some cases.
Meghan 14:59
Sometimes That's the only option to like on our instance for Apple podcast, you can't respond to reviews, right? We have no option to it's just there, you could also try and get it removed. And we would only recommend removing a review if it was either left by someone who you didn't provide service to, or if it was factually inaccurate, if it was just a nasty review, and this can happen if someone had a grudge against you, doesn't even know you, or if like I just said, they're just being mean,
Collin 15:27
right? And we you've seen these reviews, I know I have to have somebody, you're looking up a place to go eat or go to a place to get new carpet and there's three one star reviews and they go on this long screen about how it was terrible. It was awful is no good, very bad day, whatever the business responds and say, Hey, we looked up your information and we don't have you on files having ever been a customer here. So we appreciate this feedback. But if you've never been a customer here,
Meghan 15:55
right and that leads to the third option that you have is respond to it. So If somebody didn't use your services, if you've never cared for their pet before, you can respond with that and say, I have never had you as a client.
Collin 16:09
That can be all you need to say, right? You just say, I looked you up in our system, we don't have any record of having rendered service to you period in a story right? That's, that's all you need would need to say.
Meghan 16:20
If someone is genuinely dissatisfied with the service you have provided, you can respond to that person. If something about the way the stay went or the walk was your fault. Don't try to cover it up, apologize and have a solution for how you have fixed it or going to fix it
Collin 16:37
right? covering up blame shifting just makes it worse. It ends up people pointing fingers at each other about it about the situation.
Meghan 16:44
When you respond to the person you should express concern over their experience. You should want to talk to them in person. If you feel that's necessary. Getting into an online war with someone going back and forth is not helpful to your business. It's not To your emotions, and you're likely not going to sway the person on the other end.
Collin 17:06
Right and thinking back to our conversation about having hard conversations, this can include one of them of discussing a bad review with somebody and trying to reach a solution. You can talk to them maybe not in person if you feel if you feel unsafe, but definitely over the phone in a different situation. Anything basically other than short text snippets online,
Meghan 17:26
like we said in our customer service episode, the customer is not always right. But you do have to make sure you don't tell them that they are wrong. So don't use a public written reply to justify or explain what happened, what went wrong. Just keep it short and simple. You can't read tone over text. So try to be as kind as possible with your words. And not be mean
Collin 17:50
that old saying if you have to choose between being right and being kind, be kind, always be kind just because you don't quote unquote love Somebody as a person doesn't mean that they don't have value to give you as a business. It's like saying, I'm not going to value your criticism because I wouldn't go to you for advice. Just because somebody isn't an expert on something, or somebody isn't, particularly being kind of nice back to you doesn't mean that there isn't truth or there isn't something to learn and bring more value to you as a person or to your business.
Meghan 18:27
But if someone truly took the time out of their day to write you an unwarranted or nasty comment that says more about them than it does you, so you need to have empathy for them. Ultimately, though, learn from the experience of having a bad review. Because at one point in your pet care career, it's likely to happen, even if you have always had excellent stays. And the clients have all been awesome. If you're in pet care long enough, you're likely to make somebody unhappy. That's just humans. That's how We are. So being prepared on how you will and won't handle it is very key, you could say something as simple as thank you very much for your feedback. We value all feedback and take it into consideration to make our pet business a better business.
Collin 19:15
Even difficult feedback or news that we don't want to hear helps us provide better service moving forward
Meghan 19:22
and then offer a solution. So is there some way that we can make this better for you? How can we remedy this situation?
Collin 19:29
You're being straightforward. You are validating them in the review that they gave, again, part of that customer service aspect, and then you're giving a solution. You are giving them the opportunity to tell you what they would like to see done. You don't have to do that. But you can at least open that door and continue that conversation. See we're not getting defensive. We're not denying anything. We're not going down that road. And we're not getting pulled into an online battle with this kind of statement. At the end of your statement. You can say please eat Millis here. So we can have a more in depth conversation,
Meghan 20:03
something not to do when you get a bad review is begging for positive reviews to hide the negative review,
Collin 20:10
we have all seen this, somebody gets a one star, somebody gets a two star and they immediately flood their social media or they call all their customers and they say, please go give me a five star review, so that my rating overall rating doesn't drop.
Meghan 20:26
And while internally, this may be what we want to do, it does not look good for your business. Again, we want the reviews to be genuine, and hopefully positive, but we don't want any fake reviews because people will see right through that.
Collin 20:40
The most important part is not that you've got the one star review. It's what you did in response to it. That's going to speak to your character, how you run it, operate your business, and how you personally receive feedback.
Meghan 20:54
The first step with dealing with it personally is recognizing that it's a process. So when you have A one star review, you're going to go through a bunch of emotions. Because you're going to be angry that somebody gave you your five stars, you're going to be sad that your rating went down or that both future customers will see this. You're going to have to process a lot,
Collin 21:13
but it's necessary.
Meghan 21:14
Yeah, it's unnecessary process. Focus on your good clients, focus on your good reviews. Because you can't please everyone. And at some point, you're just going to have to let it go. As much as you may want to. Don't dwell on it. If it's very nasty and unwarranted, you can apply for it to be removed. But if it's not going to be removed, and it's just going to sit there, you have to kind of just move on from it. At some point. It won't help you or your company to dwell on it.
Collin 21:45
The wonderful thing about online reviews is that everybody can see your five star ratings. The terrible thing about online reviews is that everybody can see the one stars we have to take both the good and the bad with this and know that And trust that your future clients will be able to see and recognize the difference in the kind of reviews that are being written about you and view your response in to them.
Meghan 22:12
Right. I was just about to say particularly if you responded in a professional and kind manner,
Collin 22:17
right, that that will speak volumes above and beyond that one star review. In your response.
Meghan 22:23
We didn't want to end this episode without also talking about what to do when someone leaves you an excellent review.
22:28
Yep, good point.
Meghan 22:30
Because there are lots of them out there. So thank them, be appreciative, posted on social media and tag them. At the same time, though, don't get too high on the compliments because then you get too low on the insults. So just thank them, appreciate it. And also move on just like you would don't don't dwell and get yourself caught up in all the five stars that you have. They are awesome and they are wonderful, and you should appreciate them. So I'm going to say Again, if you feel that we have earned it, please go Leave us a rating and review on Apple podcasts. We appreciate all feedback. And thank you so much for taking the time to listen to this today. And now for our pet business coach segment with Natasha O'Bannon, where she is going to answer a listener question. So how
Collin 23:19
do you know when it's time to hire and pay them so that you can still make money? And then I think a second part of this question is, how do you make sure you hire the right people?
Natasha 23:28
I would say right away before like, basically, when you get your business plan, you want to kind of have your end game going. So we all know that, you know, Rome wasn't built by ourselves and one person couldn't do it. But you should always look at your business the same way. If I started tomorrow, for instance, okay, how many dogs can i realistically take on by myself? And I would even say that's only like a four to $5 situation a lot of people take on like 10 to 20 before they even hire Once you've had like four dogs, you should be researching and thinking about adding someone almost immediately. And that's the best way that you're going to be able to scale right away. Because if you're out there doing all the man labor, you're not going to be growing your business. And if you're not growing it, you're not going to be in an option to step away. So I would say, to think about hiring almost immediately, you can put your flyer out, put your ad out, start filtering different candidates, and that way you're not pressed, you're not pressed for time and say, Oh, goodness, I have too many clients now or, you know, I want to take a day off. You're doing it in your own leisure time, which is nice. And then the second part of that question is how do I hire the right people? Take a full glance at your audience. You know, you want to know if you have mom and pop type client if you have more, you know, upscale clients, you want to take a gander at your full profile and look at yourself what you want to represent your company. And what that person looks like to you, everyone runs different business everyone has a different style. But when you want to add your culture add or someone that's going to complement your system, I know some people say they hire the opposite of them. They don't want to hire, you know, they're duplicate, which I love hiring to duplicate, I think they're great. So, you know, you might want to think about what you needed that very moment. Because the first person you hire someone who can actually replicate yourself and do it in you know, kind of implement your vision and your business plan. And then the second person you hire is going to bring a little more creative aspect or the third approach you hire is going to bring a little more business mind so you want to look at like the recipe of what you're trying to accomplish.
Collin 25:45
And then how do you balance hiring somebody and paying them and yet you still bringing in money for yourself?
Natasha 25:51
Great. So this think about that the very, very beginning most people already have a job. They have their own nine to five job Before they decide to, you know, quit and go full blown into the pet care industry, I would say that's probably like 75% of people are already working in some capacity. That's the best scenario to be in. Because you're not stressed for time. You're not stressed for money. I have a client that I'm coaching right now that has a full time job. And she asked me, she said, should I quit? I said, No, do not quit your day job. You're in the perfect position to hire someone online and do all the work for you. She's like, really, I shouldn't quit. I say No, stay right where you are. Keep your benefits. hire someone else, because now you're going to understand how to manage them from afar, you're going to understand what it looks like to not be the person running the show. And you'll have more confidence to see someone else can do the exact job that you don't need to personally physically do. So that would be the perfect scenario. Is this a true job? hire someone else you can that you can obviously use your own income you're making money. Your other income sources to do marketing, the more advertising so you see how that works, you're not really pressed for money, you can make a lot more strategic moves. But if you are a person like myself who did go balls to the wall and just quit and took a sabbatical and then started their business, and go ahead and take an assessment of your bills and what you have and what it's requiring you to pay. One thing I did is I downgrade everything. I was living in a penthouse apartment, I was driving a luxury vehicle, I got rid of all of that. Got to a very, very basic basic apartment. I traded in my luxury vehicle for a Prius, and I was living minimal. I knew what I wanted to do. I wanted to spend all my money in my business and I wanted to have the least overhead as possible. So if you can do the spring cleaning and sell what you can and what you don't need, you're going to feel much better about your spirit anyways because you're decluttering but then you can start putting this income now. To your staff, and you don't require for yourself any longer. And the same thing almost 30 days later, if you're doing your marketing correctly, you get that money back. And so funny I look at my old life and I'm like, remember when I had to downgrade and sell everything, I got it all back now. So it's just a temporary solution. For long term gain if you if you don't want to, you know, do venture capital or get any business or bank loans and you just want to, you know, build your bricks from yourself. That's the way to do it step by step.
Collin 28:34
If you would like Natasha to be your pet business coach, head on over to start scale sale calm and check out her services and you can use the code PSC 20 for 15% off all that she offers.
Meghan 28:46
If you would like to call us and share your story you can at 636-364-8260 please join us next time for another episode. Thank you. Thank you.
