The marvellous Em Melrose takes over our blog this week and she reflects her DISCussion with Mel Evans as part of DISClive Pro in March.

Mel Evans, from Insight6 is an expert in the field of Customer Experience and generously shared time and wisdom with our community focusing on review platforms, their importance, and the consequences if we leave them unattended.

90% of people will look at a review platform before they decide to engage with someone or make a purchase. 

I can relate to that, especially when it comes to making a larger purchase or engaging someone’s services for the first time.

“Review platforms are like your shop window”, keep them fresh and attended to. If someone is looking for something you want them to be attracted to come and take a closer look, and if left unattended….. well, the answer is pretty obvious, isn’t it? Her advice was quite clear if you are going to use review platforms, commit to it and be prepared to dedicate time to respond.

When customers are unhappy, there’s a 91% chance they won’t do business with a company again (Lee Resources). What is worse is that dissatisfied customers typically tell nine to 15 other people about their experience.

Nowadays, all of your potential customers have access to information about your business at the click of a button, it’s no surprise that the possibility of negative reviews can be one of the biggest reasons that businesses shy away from using review platforms, but Mel is pretty clear that she does not believe that this fear is a good enough reason to avoid inviting and sharing feedback publicly.

Where to Start?

So we know that you need a review mechanism in your business – Where do you start? Mel shared some insight and also offered 4 tips about what to do:

1. If you don’t like asking for a review – keep it really light, give them the option and tell them how much you value their time to do it.
2. When do you ask? Take the opportunity when the client is “in the moment”, they are happy with your service and strike whilst the iron is hot and ask!
3. What goes around comes around – If you want people to give their time to review your services, do you same for others?
4. What do you ask? Ask questions that will showcase your services and consider what kind of feedback will be most useful to any prospective customers.
5. How do you ask? Thinking about the behavioural style of your client use words that will resonate with them best:
   • Ds are interested are action-orientated and want to crack on. “What results did you get from the interaction?”
   • Is are interested in the experience, “was it enjoyable for them?”
   • Ss will be seeking assurance that they are making the right decision, “how did you support your clients to make the decision to choose you?”
   • Cs will expect efficiency and quality and expertise. “Did your services deliver on this for them?”

Things to think about

Not content to stop there, Mel offered us some further food for thought:

• If you decide to use a review platform, be prepared to put the effort in to keep it fresh and proactively ask your clients for feedback.
• When a client leaves a review, be it good or not so good, take care to respond. Think of the shop analogy – If someone walks into your shop and says something but you don’t respond, how would that make you feel?
• When a review is negative, acknowledge it! Comment publicly, politely and quickly, then seek to take the conversation offline and engage them one-to-one to seek to resolve the matter.

If you would like to hear more from Mel connect with her on LinkedIn

Keeping things simple in a complicated world.

To learn more about the DISC tool and how you can learn to identify different DISC styles. Come along to one of our free lunchtime sessions. They are full of powerful insight into the world of Everything DiSC® (part of the Wiley group) and in just 30 minutes you will learn something! We run a learning session every Monday and a Pro session for professionals already working with DISC every other Thursday.

If you are a people development expert, independent consultant or coach and would like to benefit from a like-minded and supportive network of people get in touch at discover@discsimple.com to find out how you can become a partner.