At some point in your business or career, there will be a client who writes a negative review about you online.  It could be during your first year of business or it could be in your tenth year in business.  There are clients who will never be pleased with your services no matter how hard you work or how much effort you put forth to plan the perfect event. Some people are simply impossible to please.

Here are 3 tips to managing your reputation online:

1) Encourage positive reviews

If you did a great job and know that your client is happy, invite the client to write a review online after the event. Happy clients love to rave about great wedding and event planners. Also, it’s much better for your reputation if you have ten positive reviews and only one negative review.

2) Respond to a negative review

Thank the client for writing the review, apologize for their less-than-stellar experience and address the issues in the most polite and unassuming response. If you did make a mistake, accept responsibility, share what you learned from the experience and be clear that it will never happen again.

3) Take a breather

I literally thought I might die when we had our first (and only) negative review posted. We wrote a lovely response taking responsibility for the one detail we made a mistake on. We also cleared up the bride’s accusations on the details that we did NOT screw up even though she tried to blame us in the review. Luckily, I didn’t die from embarrassment or humiliation. The negative review stung but it didn’t kill us or damage our reputation. We learned from our mistake and so will you if this happens to your planning business.

It can be hard to keep up with online reviews and keep track of your reputation on the internet. Take a few minutes to set up a free Google Alert to notify you anytime you or your business is mentioned online.