How to Respond to Negative Reviews on TripAdvisor
Responding to a negative review can be tricky. TripAdvisor is one of the largest review platforms for the hospitality, travel, and entertainment industries. As a result, getting a negative review on there can seem like a major disaster.
To best respond to a negative review on TripAdvisor, take a deep breath and follow these steps:
- Find the Review Quickly
- Thank Them for Their Feedback
- Verify Your Business’s Standards
- Invite Them to Speak to You Privately
Responding to a Negative Review on TripAdvisor
1. Find the Review Quickly
The most important step to online review management is actually finding the review quickly. Reviewers are always alerted when a business responds to their review. If they’ve left you a negative review, your chances of rectifying the situation are much higher if you respond quickly.
To get started, log into your TripAdvisor account and select “Reviews” on your Management Center dashboard.
2. Thank Them for Their Feedback
Though it may not feel like it, negative reviews can actually be very valuable. With each negative review, a customer is giving you the feedback you need to avoid such a situation in the future.
Start off your response by thanking them for their feedback. It may be hard to get over the surprise of someone leaving a bad review about your business, but you should thank them regardless.
3. Verify Your Business’s Standards
Part of your response should focus on the standards that your business works to uphold. You should reiterate that you strive to provide the best service and experience for all of your customers.
Though the reviewer had a subpar experience, you can let them know that their experience is not the norm and that you’d like to make things right with them.
4. Invite Them to Speak to You Privately
Finally, make sure that you are ending your review response by inviting them to speak to you privately.
If they choose to follow-up and contact you, you will then have the chance to discuss their experience. Talk about who they interacted with and how you can improve things in the future.
At the end of your conversation, you can invite them back to your business for a second chance. Many business owners choose to offer a slight discount as an apology for a poor experience.
All of these details, however, should be discussed in private. Your review response should focus on giving the reviewer and potential customers a professional and polite response. Your response should not be the time to argue back or go into every detail from your side of the story.
Responding to a negative review in a tactful way can make all the difference. It’s not unheard of for an upset customer to change their negative review to a positive one after the business responds to their review and makes things right in their book.
