Devoted to Managers and those that seek to improve their management skills

With the blogging world exploding and consumers interacting in forums all over the online world, it has given the opportunity for mad and angry consumers to vent their wrath on a company.

What do you do when this happens to you or your company? Interestingly enough it's really not that hard to handle once you know that the issue exists.

First of all, the good news is that your response depends upon how the individual is attacking or writing about your company. Are they really a customer or a ranter that has personal problems. I've been in a number of situations in management where those ranting really don't have any desire to address a real problem, they are trying to demean an individual or a company because they are simply hateful, miserable people. These types of people I don't consider as customers.

One thing about those that really don't want to solve a problem is that they won't post why they are saying negative things. In this case you don't really have much to be concerned with because readers want their to be some substance behind what is being written. In this case it is the ranter that looks bad.

What usually happens is that those that attack without good reason pretty much self-destruct in the court of public opinion. You really don't need to waste time with them.

Now in the case where points are specifically brought up, it is your job to dig and find out what it is they are upset about. Sometimes they are very specific, and other times they are general. In other words they may bring up a specific circumstance and say how the company failed them, but leave out a lot of the details. You want to show that you're interested in those details.

Next post we'll look at the what you should and shouldn't do with specific complaints.