This blog will discuss how to deal with negative comments/trolling on social media and in particular YouTube.
YouTube is the second largest search engine in the world and has one billion unique monthly visitors meaning one out of every two internet users is on YouTube. As evident from this infographic, which has all of it’s sources referenced thus all the information can be checked.
Source: (cdn.uploadvr.com, 2016)
Kincy (2011) identifies responding to negative feedback online as an important step in planning a social media campaign. It should be noted that Companies that combine marketing messages and “fun” postings attract significantly fewer negative comments (Dekay, 2012).
It has to be considered that the study by Dekay (2012), was conducted regarding negative comments on Facebook.
Facebook and YouTube are quite different but the essence of negative feedback remains the same from one social media to another.
Social media has helped develop businesses in many ways but it also opened up the possibility of negative feedback, and for it to be seen by any potential customers a brand might have. This might deter potential customers.
Negative feedback is now a regular aspect of a brands social media communications (Sharma, 2016). Dealing effectively with negative comments/trolls/feedback is very important in the age of the internet. Firstly every business with a social presence must have a strategy in place for dealing with negative comments.
Owning up to your mistakes if there are any is a good place to start off along with,
- Recognizing the complaint
- Apologizing for the inconvenience caused to the customer and
- Showing intent to resolve the issue
Criticism should be faced head on rather then passed on (Sharma, 2016).
Young entrepreneurs council (2015) also identifies that 90 percent of users who reached out to them with a problem just wanted to be heard.
It would be foolish to assume that negative comments and feedback is a one-off event, so planning accordingly is important. This means that a system should be in place which constantly monitors for brand mentions (Sharma, 2016).
Communication with a customer plays a big role in mitigating backlash from negative comments and this should be taken into consideration by all companies with a social media presence.
There is a difference between negative but constructive comments and trolling and the first should never be mistaken for the second.
Negative but constructive comments should not be viewed as bad or negative as Chris Kneeland the CEO of Cult Collective said “ I learn more from negative feedback than positive. It’s easy to give a compliment. It usually requires both courage and clarification to be critical, especially when it’s not anonymous” (Mcguire, 2016)
Same cannot be said of trolls, who leave comments that are designed to hurt you or your brand and often use over-the-top offensive language (Brown, 2018).
Brown (2018) also identifies that engaging trolls is not productive and that “if you respond, they win” also mentioning that “ your outraged responses are what trolls want”.
There seems to be no way to win with trolls, but Bob Gower the organization design consultant for The Ready put it pretty bluntly. Some feedback or in this case a comment by a troll is simply not useful and need not be taken seriously “Treat feedback as a gift, take it in, and be willing to let go when it doesn’t work” (Mcguire, 2016).
In my opinion another very interesting way to approach negative feedback on social media and in this particular case YouTube is to look at what Wendy’s does.
Wendy’s is a American fast food restaurant with a simple social media campaign, super responsiveness (Tice, 2013).
According to Tice (2013), “Every comment, even complaints about customer service at restaurants, is pleasantly and promptly answered”.
But if we dig deeper we stumble upon a very important fact. Wendy’s answers some comments in a rather informal way.
As Gallucci (2017), put it Wendy’s doesn’t play by unspoken social media rules that other companies adhere to.
Resulting in creative and engaging social media posts from Wendy’s, like the one Katy Wellhousen posted on her twitter page.
As Tice (2013), mentioned in her blog “Making a social media marketing campaign patently ludicrous seems to help shield it from being a target of rude comments on Twitter”.
In my opinion this is a very effective way to respond to negative feedback and feedback in general.
As mentioned Twitter, Facebook and YouTube are certainly different kinds of social media platforms and this should be taken into account. But ways of responding to negative feedback/trolling on these platforms don’t vary significantly.
To sum it up negative comments and trolling are a part of social media that no brand, big or small can escape. Thus they might as well start looking for ways on how to minimize their effects and at the bare minimum respond to them in an effective fashion.
Or as the case with Wendy’s turn negative feedback and comments into a very effective social media campaign.
This Blog on “dealing with negative comments and trolls on YouTube” was done as a part of an marketing assignment by a student.
References:
[1] Brown, L., 2018. filmora.wondershare. [Online]
Available at: https://filmora.wondershare.com/youtube-video-editing/how-to-deal-with-haters-negative-comments.html
[Accessed 24 February 2019].
[2] Dekay, S.H., 2012. How large companies react to negative Facebook comments. Corporate Communications: An International Journal, 17(3), pp.289-299.
[3] Gallucci, N., 2017. mashable.com. [Online]
Available at: https://mashable.com/2017/01/05/sassy-wendys-social-media-manager/?europe=true
[Accessed 27 March 2019].
[4] Kincy, J. 2011, “Dealing with negative feedback”, ABA Bank Marketing, vol. 43, no. 3, pp. 38.
[5] Mcguire, S., 2016. venngage. [Online]
Available at: https://venngage.com/blog/negative-feedback/
[Accessed 24 February 2019].
[6] Sharma, A., 2016. blogbrandz. [Online]
Available at: https://www.blogbrandz.com/tips/deal-negative-feedback-social-media/
[Accessed 24 February 2019].
[7] Tice, C., 2013. forbes.com. [Online]
Available at: https://www.forbes.com/sites/caroltice/2013/10/28/wendys-social-media-success-secretmassive-stupidity/#74fa82be265e
[Accessed 27 March 2019].
[8] Young entrepreneurs council , 2015. Inc. [Online]
Available at: https://www.inc.com/young-entrepreneur-council/9-effective-ways-to-handle-negativity-on-social-media.html
[Accessed 24 February 2019].
[9] cdn.uploadvr.com, 2016 [online]
Available at: https://cdn.uploadvr.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/youtube-logo.png
[Accessed 28 March 2019].
