jecasc - 4:39 pm on Mar 18, 2011 (gmt 0)

if all you ever got was "best in the world" "these guys rock" and so on I would steer clear of a site such as this.

We only get reviews like this. Some people even write things like "lovingly wrapped" - whatever that means. We use paper for wrapping, not love but what the heck. I guess it's because we use colored paper for wrapping the products and white paper for stuffing - but that only is because some people used to throw out products with the packaging material and then complain they had not received everything.

Anyway, back on topic: The best way to combat a negative review is with positive reviews. We signed up for one of those review websites and ask our customers to post a review there. This has several positive effects:

- Reviews are not scattered around the internet. To post a review they only have to click a link we send them so they are more likely to leave a review on this review site we pick then on some other random website.
- One negative review has not a big effect if you have hundreds of positives. Of course if your have lousy customer service and your customers are not satisfied then you are screwed anyway in the long term.
- The reviews show up in Adwords and on Google product search.
- The review website we picked offers moderation. So if someone posts a negative review you can temporarily veto it and then it is removed for some time and you can try to resolve the issue.

Until now we did not have a negative review but if we get one it is not such a big deal this way.