No business owner or marketer wants to have to deal with social media complaints. But then a snowball effect ensues if you ignore them. One single complaint can trigger many negative comments and reviews. In the end, your business reputation will be hurt and you may have to work for months to fix it.
Playing the Devil’s Advocate Concerning Social Media Complaints
Instead of ignoring these complaints or fearing them, try to put yourself in the person’s shoes. They paid for a product or service and they did not get what they wanted. Or they wanted to ask something and they did not get an answer for days. If you were in their place, wouldn’t you feel hurt and annoyed?
And there is something else. Leaving aside trolling comments, when someone takes the time to leave a social media complaint, they are giving you a valuable feedback. You may not be aware of this problem. And once you acknowledge it and fix it, you may even win the customer’s trust again.
What Is the Current State of Social Media Complaints?
Recent surveys brought to light very important and valuable details about who and why complains on the social media. These surveys cover all the salient aspects of social media complaints and offer a clear picture of the matter.
If you recognise your industry, some of the issues or customer age groups in the information below, you should strive to perform an in-depth audit of your business and identify all the issues that may lead to a complaint. In being proactive about solving them, you are showing your customers that you are actively listening to them and taking their feedback seriously.
1. Top and Bottom Reasons for Social Media Complaints
Here, there are no surprises. The first reason for people to write a complaint on the social media is dissatisfaction with a product of service. This is closely followed by:
- Poor customer service
- Overpriced products or services
- Dishonesty.
Surprisingly, very few people complain about knock-offs and cheap imitations of major brands. The least likely reasons to complain on the social media also include:
- Annoying ads
- Political endorsements/views
- Endorsing a potentially dangerous product.
2. Industries with Most Social Media Complaints
The hospitality business is at the highest risk of receiving complaints from customers on social media platform. After restaurants, retail shops and internet providers complete the top 3 industries with most complaints.
The survey also shows that people allow their prejudices to influence their social media complaints and ratings. For instance, the automobile industry is on the fourth place of the list because a lot of users distrust/dislike car dealers.
3. What Customers Expect Their Complaints to Achieve
Without a doubt, the leading expectation (53%) is that the business will change its practices/policies. It is followed closely by:
- 52% raising awareness about a problem
- 50% helping other people avoid the problem
- 21% receiving a refund.
Very few people act out of spite (15% inspiring a boycott) or for personal gain (8% receiving a free product or service). This should reassure you and determine you to take social media complaints seriously and without thinking that the customer is out to get you.
4. Who Is Most Likely to Complain
Here, there are some surprises in store. By sex, the top complainers are men (53%). Only 50% of women choose to post a social media complaint.
By age group, the younger generations, who are more aware and proactive in claiming their rights, leave the largest number of social media complaints:
- 53% Millennials
- 52% Generation X
- 44% Baby Boomers.
5. Top Social Media Platforms for Leaving Complaints
Last but not least, let us see where most users go to leave social media complaints. Leading by a large margin, Facebook is the number one platform with 61% of complaints. It is followed by:
- 30% Twitter
- 11% Reddit
- 11% Instagram.
It is interesting to note that LinkedIn does not appear at all in this top. This may be due to the fact that it is mostly used by B2B companies and, in this environment, complaints tend to be of a more serious nature, which involves legal action.