The transition of business to the Internet did not prevent unfair competition. On the contrary, many companies have new tools to influence consumer opinion and remove competitors. This trend is observed in the field of eCommerce, where every day hundreds of people leave their reviews about sites and products and help other users to form their own opinion.
Customer reviews as a weapon
Reviews are an integral part of any eCommerce website and marketing specialists have learned how to use this tool not only to enhance the reputation of their website or product but also to fight competitors.
However, all the negative entries that are found about a particular company cannot be mixed together. We distinguish 3 main types of negative reviews:
- Natural negativity - when a review is written by a buyer who did not like the product, or service in the company.
- Trolling - people who have not made a purchase and create disputes/discussions with negative overtones in order to arouse the emotions of other buyers or business owners.
- Directed Negativity - types of negative comments that are purposefully created by competitors and most often are unreasonable. These types of comments are the most dangerous and unpleasant for the site owner.
In one of our articles, we talked about how to deal with natural negativity. Successful solution of the problem changes the opinion of the buyer and this is a good indicator for new customers.
Trolling is easy to neutralize by simply ignoring it. Such people leave the sites where they are not given attention and do not receive a reaction.
But with the directed negativity, you need to fight in special ways. The fact is that the more successful you are, the more negativity you will get in reviews. Nowadays, the Internet has become an easily accessible book of reviews and suggestions. Many competitors use this and leave dozens and even hundreds of negative reviews on sites to reduce the value of the product for a potential consumer.
Customers of your site may skim 5-10 unjustified negative reviews. But when there are dozens of them, they will begin to pay attention to the fact that too many users are unhappy. If you start to manually moderate the reviews and delete them, it will further empower your competitors. After all, they will be able to speculate on this and tell your customers that negative reviews are removed from the site, which means the company has a really big problem.
How to effectively deal with the directed negative reviews?
Unscrupulous competitors often use negative reviews, but in most cases this information can be easily disproved. Therefore, experts in public relations recommend combating directed negativity with reasoned responses that will encourage other users to wonder how real the feedback actually was.
The fact is that if your competitor left a negative review on the site, it is unlikely that he explained the essence of the problem well. In most cases, reviews contain inconsistency or information that is easy to disprove. Such reviews are easy to identify and there is 99% probability that these will be customized comments from your attackers. You only need one thing: respond professionally and simply to this review, explaining all the disparities and making a reasoned conclusion.
Surely, those users who could be repelled by a directed negative review will change their point of view and understand that this comment may not be true.
The second tip for effectively fighting ordered negativity is to use the Wiremo service. The fact is that most of the negative reviews from competitors are left in standard comment forms for products. They are difficult to track and often they remain unanswered. As we have said, with the forced moderation of reviews and their removal, it will be to the advantage of your competitors.
How does Wiremo help to stop negativity from competitors?
The main advantages of the Wiremo service are that only those who have made a purchase on the website, or those who are authorized through the social networks Facebook, Twitter or Google+ can leave feedback. And the best tool is just to hide the "Write a Review" button and show only the reviews that were got from Automated Review Request after purchases.
And if your competitors want to start a dishonest fight, then in order to post their negative feedback they will have to spend a huge amount of money on the purchase of your goods, or on the purchase of accounts in social networks. And even in this case, Wiremo will help you to correctly neutralize the negativity with the help of quick answers and respond to a review, or by effective and well-thought-out moderation.
The Wiremo plugin, which can be installed on your eCommerce website today, can significantly complicate your competitors' task and bring your sales to the top in your segment.
