Bad Google Reviews – What to do about it

Why Google reviews are so important

Getting a bad review on Google can always happen. You don’t even have to do anything bad about this. Often it is enough that your customer is having a bad day. Below we explain how you can delete bad Google reviews, how to deal with them and what other options and alternatives there are to bad Google reviews.

You probably know it yourself: You’ve had a long day, you’re hungry and looking forward to finally being able to go out to eat with a friend. When you arrive at the restaurant, you see one of your favorite dishes, order it and… it tastes terrible. The highlight of your day has thus “eaten” itself. You are so angry and want to vent so you give the restaurant a bad Google review. Zack, boom, out. A satisfaction for you, a blow for the restaurant. Everyone has probably experienced and reported on such a situation. However, the possibility of expressing this opinion publicly via a rating platform is still relatively newfangled. Everyone can find out about your experience via Google and everyone can rate companies (poorly) on Google, regardless of whether the person was really there, just doesn’t like you or has another reason. However, a bad Google review is no reason to panic and contact your lawyer directly. The correct handling of bad ones should be learned and can even help you to gain advantages with the right approach.

Content

• All about bad and good Google reviews
• Deal with Google reviews correctly
• Delete bad Google reviews
• What if the review isn’t deleted?
• Google Reviews Netiquette – How to deal with criticism correctly
• How to get more good Google reviews
• Summary

All about bad and good Google reviews

Each of us uses Google every day to find something. It doesn’t matter whether you are looking for products, answers to questions or certain companies. Google is as much a part of our everyday life as breathing. Since Google is very important in all of our everyday lives, it is of course also important for you and your company how well it is doing. For this reason, the publicly visible good and bad reviews on Google are a very important topic in online marketing. After all, Google reviews not only reflect the reputation of your company, but also help you to be listed higher up in the Google Maps excerpts in Google search.

Google reviews have a significant influence on customer behavior, because customers now trust these ratings just as much as they do recommendations from good friends. Accordingly, it can quickly happen that your success stands and falls with your ratings.

If you can show many good Google reviews, you will most likely attract many new customers who will probably be convinced of you. If you are rated negatively on Google, you are unlikely to be suggested to searchers and when they see your listing on Google, they are unlikely to come to you if you have been rated so poorly on Google.

The thorny issue with Google reviews is the nature of human beings. If someone is convinced of you, he / she will be happy and accept it and will hardly bother to rate you positively on Google. If the person is disappointed in you, as in the example described above, the motivation to write a bad Google review is great, because we all want justice and mostly in the case of a bad rating on Google.

The prerequisite for giving a Google review is that the author has his own Google account (which is always the case for users of Android smartphones) and that YOU are represented with your company on Google (if you are not directly, Google takes over that for you). The author’s Google account requirement does not include anything other than a username. No real name, no address. This means that Google reviews are usually anonymous, which makes it even easier for customers to rate you poorly, after all, the reviewer cannot be proven to be at fault.

What Google reviews can often make “dangerous” is that not only are stars awarded as a rating, but also that a text has to be written for the rating. If someone is really mad at you or that disappointed in your service, the ratings can often go very low, such as warning others about you and your service because it was so bad.

In contrast to the Google account obligation to write reviews, no Google account is required to view reviews, which means that everyone can see the good as well as the bad reviews.

Deal with Google reviews correctly

You get a notification that Person XY has rated you, see the rating and pause for a few seconds. Shortly thereafter, you realize what the person has written and your pulse shoots into a range that is almost unmeasurable. Of course, criticism is often unpleasant, but it is part of life. So don’t worry, take a deep breath and read on.

Now there are two cases of these negative reviews. The first case is that of a customer who genuinely objects to your service or offering and does so in a decent “tone.” Here you can score points as a company and talk to the Google reviewer, take care of the matter and look for a solution with the customer. Maybe you can even get the customer to change their rating.

This type of communication has the advantage that other customers recognize your commitment and choose you precisely because of this way of dealing with your customers’ problems.

The second case is more difficult and all the more annoying. Case two is about a person who left you a bad review on Google without justification in order to harm you and your company.
Here you have no choice but to try to have the bad Google review deleted.

Delete bad Google reviews

Getting bad Google reviews deleted can be difficult, but it’s basically possible, even without a lawyer.

To delete a bad review, you must contact Google and Google My Business Support directly. Google itself makes it clear which ratings are not allowed. You can find more information about this in the Google My Business guidelines (link).

In order to delete a bad review, the bad review must be one of the following:

• spam
• fake content
• Illegal Content
• conflicts of interest
• Off-topic content (like reviews that have absolutely nothing to do with your business)
• Click requests or links and promotional links
• Sexual content (harassment, etc.)
• Offensive Content
• Dangerous or derogatory content
• Identity theft (someone impersonating someone else)

If one of these circumstances applies, you can request deletion from Google My Business. To do this, visit your Google My Business account, select “Reviews” in the menu and in the respective review you click on the menu items (relatively small and inconspicuous) and report it as an inappropriate Google review.

Now you will be redirected and have to enter your contact email address and the exact facts of the violation of the bad Google review. Now all you have to do is click send and then wait, because it usually takes a while from the bad Google review to the deletion. What you can do until then is reply to the review in a nice and factual manner.

What if the review isn’t deleted?

If your rating is not deleted, you still have two options:

1. Take action with a lawyer against the bad Google review, which is often difficult, however, since the user cannot usually be found.
2. Respond correctly to the review and collect more good reviews to increase your average rating on Google. You can use our Google review cards for this, for example

What you shouldn’t do

What you shouldn’t do is buy Google reviews to increase your rating average, because unfortunately this is illegal and can cost you dearly. Rather use legal ways through your real customers, such as with the aforementioned Google review cards and Google review campaigns.

Google Reviews Netiquette – How to deal with criticism correctly

The correct handling of Google reviews should be skillful.
Before you react to reviews, please always note the following points:

Be nice and friendly!
No matter how nasty or mean a Google review may seem, always respond in a friendly manner. If you react in a bad mood, this only confirms the bad Google review and deters new customers.
Don’t justify yourself
Often one tends to react with a “Yes, but…”. However, that doesn’t get you anywhere in real life or on Google. Accept that something went wrong and vow to get better.
accept mistakes
Criticism is always important for your progress. If the bad Google review is justified, then own up to your mistake, acknowledge it and convince the customer that next time it will be better.
No standard answers

Surely we all always have little time in everyday business, but you should never reject your customers (regardless of whether they are good or bad Google reviews) with standard answers. That reflects badly on you.

say thank you

If someone has rated you positively on Google, then say “thank you”, because it is the right thing to do and strengthens customer loyalty.

In order to get more good Google reviews, you should always encourage your customers to do so, because no customer knows that they are important to you. You can talk to your customers about it and ask them to rate you, but this will often come to nothing because they will simply forget about it.

We at truzzer offer you a good and simple solution to get your customers to rate you positively on Google in the form of Google review cards, which ask your customers to rate you positively. In order to offer your customers a further incentive for the rating, we also offer you the option of linking deals and competitions to the ratings.

Summary

Google reviews are joy and sorrow at the same time. Positive reviews push you forward, negative ones keep you down. Communication and, in an emergency, reporting to Google My Business Support help to take action against negative Google reviews.