I bought a new kettlebell for my personal gym this weekend.
Since it’s my personal gym, I had some very specific criteria I was looking for. Very different features than my supply of kettlebells in my CrossFit gym.
A chrome handle and a rubber coating were high on my list.
Of course, I wanted something that would take a beating and last for a long time. To make certain I was making the best choice possible, I researched the product and specifically looked for Google reviews – customer feedback.
Everything I found on this item was positive and I proceeded with confidence.
We would have to be living under a rock if we did not think our prospective customers do the same research on us before they spend money on our programs.
We are living in an age when customer feedback rules the day.
What do you do if you get negative feedback about your programs?
A quick Google search on the word feedback produces this definition, “information about reactions to a product, a person’s performance of a task, etc. which is used as a basis for improvement.”
The key, once we have information from our customers, is to use the information for improvement.
Not all feedback is equally relevant or trustworthy but negative feedback is negative feedback. It may or may not affect your business, depending on how you manage it.
First, our mindset needs to be that all feedback is good. There are always conflicting opinions about everything in this universe. Makes for an interesting world.
Negative feedback is better than no feedback at all.
No feedback leaves the business owner without a clear understanding of their product and their ideal customers.
If you don’t have frequent feedback, good or bad is irrelevant at this point, your first job is to seek it out. Use the strategy I outlined in this post.
Our next step is to review everyone’s input. Chances are good you’re going to find at least one uncomfortable surprise, usually more. Read through all the responses and look for common themes and trends. Categorize everything as either negative or positive.
Let’s start with the negative column. Your actions will make the situation better, or far worse.
Your priority is to decide what things you can address. Sometimes there are things that simply don’t lend themselves to solutions. We’ll come back to this in a minute.
Next, look at the one or 2 most pressing issues. Hopefully that covers 90% Of the negative feedback.
The first step in solving this problem is to figure out what you can do. Next implement your solution as quickly as possible.
The most important part of solving this problem is to communicate, communicate, communicate. If you got results from a survey, publish your findings to everyone. When publishing your findings make certain to let people know you appreciate their feedback and you are going to address the following items. List those items along with the action steps you are taking, or have already taken.
Report back to your customer several times over the next month with updates on the progress you are making.
Usually during this time, you get feedback from people who have noticed the changes. This is a really good time to ask them for a Google review or a testimonial that supports the change you made.
If you are following through with intended changes and reporting back to people, they will be very appreciative an understanding of all your efforts. They will become some of your strongest fans.Now, there may be some things that you received as negative feedback that are simply things you can’t do anything about. Usually these are rare, but if they appear it’s a really good idea to deal with them.
The bottom line is that people are very understanding if you identify the items that you can’t do anything about and at the same time, you are also identifying the items and action steps you have taken regarding the things you can do something about. Then you have gone a long way toward building goodwill with your people.
Of course, all of this starts with a mindset of believing that feedback, of any kind, is vitally important and necessary for you to grow your organization. Once you have mastered this mindset there is no such thing as negative feedback.
In fact, you will find yourself constantly looking for a feedback and using it effectively to improve your organization.
