Open Discussion – How to deal with Negative Feedback
Receiving negative feedback can present challenges, particularly during the initial phases of your account. In response to negative feedback from buyers, we encourage our Selling Partners to initiate contact with the buyer to address and resolve any concerns they may have.
We would like to welcome our members to share their insights and experiences regarding strategies to effectively address and resolve negative feedback.
Comment down below and share any experiences you have had in which you effectively managed negative feedback from buyers, ultimately turning it into a positive outcome through collaborative efforts. Your insights and examples are greatly appreciated.
- Roberto
Open Discussion – How to deal with Negative Feedback
Receiving negative feedback can present challenges, particularly during the initial phases of your account. In response to negative feedback from buyers, we encourage our Selling Partners to initiate contact with the buyer to address and resolve any concerns they may have.
We would like to welcome our members to share their insights and experiences regarding strategies to effectively address and resolve negative feedback.
Comment down below and share any experiences you have had in which you effectively managed negative feedback from buyers, ultimately turning it into a positive outcome through collaborative efforts. Your insights and examples are greatly appreciated.
- Roberto
Seller_CW0P5hgbsiqWX
For 25 years we have viewed feedback differently, In fact, we consider the feedback one of the best forms of free advertising that online selling offers. Negative or positive we have always responded to every one left by a customer.
By responding to everyone, we are telling the potential buyer a lot about our business.
For the positive feedback, we thank the buyer and elaborate what we did to make the buyer feel that way.
For the negatives, there are two different types. The first is the problem we or the shipper caused. We have no problem saying the buyer was correct, and we let the buyer down. The second is the misrepresented negative feedback making the buyer feel superior with the ability of leaving revenge. To those we simply set the buyer straight mostly pointing out the buyer was the one who did not want to follow Amazon's published policies.
The advertising aspect enters the picture when the potential new buyer checks the sellers feedback, usually as the very last step in deciding to buy from us or not. Just by reading what is currently posted on the first page, they can get an excellent idea of just who we are and what we stand for. Even when that negative stands brightly at the top of the page, the buyer can see through it.
33 replies
Seller_CW0P5hgbsiqWX
For 25 years we have viewed feedback differently, In fact, we consider the feedback one of the best forms of free advertising that online selling offers. Negative or positive we have always responded to every one left by a customer.
By responding to everyone, we are telling the potential buyer a lot about our business.
For the positive feedback, we thank the buyer and elaborate what we did to make the buyer feel that way.
For the negatives, there are two different types. The first is the problem we or the shipper caused. We have no problem saying the buyer was correct, and we let the buyer down. The second is the misrepresented negative feedback making the buyer feel superior with the ability of leaving revenge. To those we simply set the buyer straight mostly pointing out the buyer was the one who did not want to follow Amazon's published policies.
The advertising aspect enters the picture when the potential new buyer checks the sellers feedback, usually as the very last step in deciding to buy from us or not. Just by reading what is currently posted on the first page, they can get an excellent idea of just who we are and what we stand for. Even when that negative stands brightly at the top of the page, the buyer can see through it.
Seller_uoz2Yedol1LZP
I'm fine with legitimate negative feedback, as it allow me to improve the product (where possible) or educate the users.
My problem is that amazon allows feedback from people who haven't even purchased the product. I still don't understand why this is a thing. It just allows abuse from competitors or trolls. I realize that they put the "Verified Purchase" tag on reviews from actual purchasers, but I'm not sure how many people see that, plus it does nothing for the overall score.
Would like to see amazon limit product reviews on amazon product pages to ONLY people who have actually purchased the product through amazon.
Seller_3EdGfu6l2nfnR
I only got a few feedback and contacted the buyer by offering replacement. I never asked to remove the feedback, but it never happened that the buyer changed the feedback. In relation to the reviews, I got some that violate Amazon policies, how can I report them to Amazon ?
Seller_EGAYxdv2MmpO0
I get one negative a year. Never fails. The one drops off and another pops up, usually on a $10 used record. Of the 1-2% of people that leave feedback a large chunk is from accidental orders who were happy with quick refund--but I digress.
Having the opportunity to respond to negative feedback is a great feature that can turn the negative feedback into a positive.
Seeing sellers with FAR inferior feedback in the buy box for higher prices than my identical item let's me know to not be too concerned.
All you can do is offer the best service possible and hopefully in the long run the positive feedback will win out.
Seller_4kUhESl9CKdjV
I'm a FBA seller and I am also a victim of unfair and false reviews. With negative reviews the customer almost always block all reply messages, therefore, the seller has no way to address the issue. This is very unfair to the seller.
Some years ago the seller could post a public reply in response, but this option is no longer available. The seller should be able to publicly explain what measures they have taken to address the issue, or point out the infraction of the review. Everyone should be treated equally.
Seller_HiTXE2Jfg6hnF
I managed negative feedback when a customer gave me 1 star for an item showing up late thanks to lousy USPS service, despite my sending out the package within 24 hours of the sale. My account went into critical. It was one of my only rare and lucky times to reach out to a customer and have them respond and alter their feedback.
Other than that, telling sellers to reach out to customers is a useless feat. Most of the time, the customers don't check their emails, and if they do check, they don't care to engage. Emails are used as a tool for registration to use the platform. Customers don't care to communicate unless they reach out first. Even if they reach out about a complaint, it's a 50/50 chance they may see your response or resolution to an issue. There is also no way for sellers to check if these customers even open their emails. The communication system here is a gamble. Also, in my experience, customers usually don't care to give feedback on Amazon unless they are angry or disgruntled about a product or service. Getting a customer to leave feedback about a positive experience with a product or service is like pulling teeth. Fix the feedback system so you won't have to deal with the negative feedback that sellers complain about.
Negative feedback wouldn't be an issue if it was offset by positive feedback. The feedback system for satisfactory ratings for seller services on this site isn't effective. My solution to offset negative feedback is to take from Mercari's feedback system, where when a customer doesn't leave feedback after some time, the system automatically rates the seller's service five stars. I've been shipping out 24hrs for years but still have less than a handful of feedback. I have one okay piece of feedback, and now I look like a D+ seller when that isn't the case. I ship same day consistently. If I could get automated 5-star reviews for the hundreds-thousands of orders I've had over the years, I'd look like an A+ seller. One lousy negative feedback can send your account into critical if you have little feedback to begin with. It's not fair! That needs to be fixed, especially for those who have been selling for some time and have a proven track record. Automate the system to rate us if customers don't rate us automatically, and we will look like vital stores that buyers can buy confidently from. If you implemented that system, most of the negative feedback you hear about wouldn't be such an issue for sellers.
Seller_ynT9EBcDZ6aY3
I've been work here for 4 years, and 80% our feedbacks were fraude.
Seller_nJaoTv36URd2M
I have received 10 negative feedbacks in the last six months. 6 of them are not valid and go against Amazon policy, however I cannot get them removed.
The biggest problem in resolving negative feedbacks is the fact that customers to not get our messages. We message every customer that leaves a negative feedback, asking how we can make it better, and we only get a response about 10% of the time.
When the customers leave negative feedback, they should be forced to specify if it is an issue with the product, the shipping service, or the seller's behavior. This would weed out a lot of feedbacks that go against Amazon policy. Have a second layer of feedback showing product and shipping issues that a seller has, that can be seen for customers that want to dig deeper, but leave them out of the shown feedback percentage.
Lastly, the feedback score should be based on number of orders, not feedbacks received. We all know that almost every customer with a bad experience leaves a negative feedback. 99% of customers with a good experience do not leave feedback. over the last 90 days we have had about 13,000 orders. 95% positive is our score, even though we have only received 5 negative feedbacks. Our feedback score should be 99.962%
Seller_nJaoTv36URd2M
I had an additional thought that would help sellers. Have a special team of feedback experts that will review feedbacks for sellers. Give each seller one "review request" for each 2000 (or whatever number) orders they have. If the team reviews the feedback and after an in-depth research determines the feedback is not valid, or something our of the sellers control, the feedback gets removed.
Of course that team would need to be monitored, to ensure they are not able to remove tons of feedback from one seller and such.
Having a feedback expert to talk to would make a lot of sellers happy, and ease the extreme frustration of dealing with Seller Support on the issue, as well as the frustration of getting a Product Feedback in your Seller Feedback, and not being able to get anyone to remove it.
Seller_5fGFO0SkdxjDg
If it is negative feedback received while using the merchant channel and not the FBA, best of luck on having those remove.
