No matter how hard you try to create a great company with great products and services, there is going to be that one person that doesn’t like what you have to offer, and they’ll turn to their friends, family, and Internet strangers and let them know how much they didn’t like their experience with your company.
When businesses receive negative feedback or know there’s someone out there talking bad about them, they tend to panic. After all, doesn’t negative information about your business mean it’s going to fail?
No. The old adage, “there’s no such thing as bad PR” continues to ring true today. The following are just a few ways that the negative press, review or post about your business can actually improve your brand.
Negative information makes people curious.
People tend to listen to the opinions from friends and family members. If someone you know suggests a business for you to visit, you’ll take that recommendation to heart and probably check that business out. But this dedication to word of mouth doesn’t ring true for negativity. For example, if your friend warns you about the bad experience they had with a certain business, you may use that information to refrain from shopping there, or it may entice you to check that company out for yourself to see exactly how bad the experience truly is.
Negative information tends to make people curious because it puts that business at the top of their mind. They want to know why something is so bad, and they want to see it for themselves. For example, when schools ban books, there’s an increase in that book’s sales because people want to find out why the book was banned from that school.
You see this a lot with online review sites too. Companies that receive a great deal of negative reviews or one stars often see an insurgence of customers because people want to find out why that company is so bad. And if these people have a good time, they’ll end up telling their friends about it, writing a review about it, and completely negating the initial negative review.
Negative information can go viral.
Negative information has the ability to spread like wildfire, and this is something you couldn’t do on your own. People tend to spread the negative information via word or mouth, or they even turn to their social networks to share the information. Their friends then share the content, and their friends share the content, and it continues to be shared until the negative information about your business is all over the Internet within minutes.
Sure, your company may not like it, but you can guarantee that interest in your business is going to rise. People who never heard of your company are now going to visit your website and perform basic Google searches on you, all of which will improve your traffic (and could even possibly lead to sales). There are plenty of marketers out there today struggling with understanding how to make content go viral, but one negative comment about your business can help boost your visibility.
About the Author: Jade Biggs is a professional marketing agent. Jade works with her clients to help deliver their content and message in multiple forms that include video, podcasting and their transcribed form which allows the business to reach the largest possible audience.
Photo credit: David Brown
