Help Desk

Handling Negative Reviews

Negative reviews are unavoidable. Regardless of how well you serve every family in your care, you will at some point receive a negative review. Unfortunately, you can’t just go in and delete the review. Facebook doesn’t allow you to have any control over editing, or removing the review. However, you do have a few options on how to handle negative reviews.

Below are some suggestions on how to handle negative reviews on Facebook.

Report a review to be removed from your Facebook page

In order to request the removal of any reviews on your Page, you’ll need to report them. To report a review, you can follow the instructions in the Facebook Help Center: https://www.facebook.com/help/439579999521224/?ref=u2u . You can report reviews that don’t follow the Facebook Community Standards or those that don’t focus on the product or service offered by your Page. You’ll only be able to report star ratings that include reviews. Note that it is unlikely that they will honor your request and remove the review.

Turn off reviews for your Page completely

You can also turn off the reviews for your Page completely. However, the negative review will never be deleted completely. This will hide the reviews so that no one can see those reviews or post any more. Follow the steps below to turn off reviews for your Page:

  1. Navigate to the settings tab of the Page.
  2. Under Edit Page click Settings next to Reviews.
  3. After clicking Settings select the option to set Show Reviews Off.
  4. Click Save Changes after making the selection.

Below is a screenshot showing the settings for reference.

Comment to the review, and message the person directly (recommended)

One of worst things you can do is to do nothing at all. When a negative review is added, it is best to respond promptly and address the issue. So, when someone reads the review later they see you took action and responded.

Below is an example of a good response to a negative review. A simple response is best and avoid sounding offending or defensive.

One you have responded, send a private message to the person who left the review and ask them how you can help resolve the issue for them to remove the review from your Facebook page. They have the ability to remove the review.

Drown out the negative reviews with positive reviews (recommended)

The best approach to negative reviews is to collect many more positive reviews from community members and families you have served. If you have a lot of positive reviews, the negative reviews can actually be helpful. Think of purchasing on Amazon.com. Before making a purchase on Amazon.com, most buyers will look at the negative reviews and disregard them when there are many more positive reviews.

We have implemented techniques into the Growth Engine that will help you collect and distribute reviews. Click here learn more about the Growth Engine techniques.