I help entrepreneurs leapfrog over the typical potholes that derail most small businesses with inspiration, motivation, education, and support across a wide range of business topics drawn from over a decade of running my own business, teaching entrepreneurship for the City of New York, and coaching and consulting privately with dozens of women and minority small business owners. Honestly, why go it alone when help is an email away?
You’ve Been Served
If you don’t know, Atlanta restaurants are being dragged all over social media these days.
The beefing began when very popular TikTok food reviewer Keith Lee came to the Big Peach and couldn’t get served at several restaurants.
I'll admit that I like Lee. His reviews are always respectful, never snarky or mean. And, Lee himself is humble and grateful for his followers and the very real impact they have made together on small, independent restaurants from his hometown of Vegas to LA, Chicago, and beyond.
Lee's video explaining how and why his family did not get food at well-known eatery The Real Milk and Honey, which includes a run down of the restaurant's ‘house rules,’ set the ATL ablaze.
A day or two later the restaurant’s owner drops a video of his own, claiming not to know who Lee is and saying that people don’t go to restaurants for the service, they go for the food.
Woosh.
The backlash is so swift and severe that the restaurant takes down the video and issues a vanilla non-apology apology statement, which just pours more gasoline on the situation.
Hopefully, we can all agree that quality of service plays a critical role in the whole dining experience and is something any restaurant owner should care quite a lot about.
But this isn’t just true for restaurants and storefronts. It’s true for all businesses. No matter what you sell. No matter who your customers or clients.
If you’re not paying attention to the quality of your customer experience at each touchpoint, you’re missing opportunities to build and deepen loyalty and trust and so much more.
The situation that is still burning on social media is a great reminder that all it takes is one bad experience for someone to damage your reputation.
And, if they’ve got any kind of following, things can turn ugly fast, setting off a firestorm that can burn down your business before you even realize the match has been struck.
One way to protect yourself and your business is with a Reputation Management Plan that includes:
- Active reputation monitoring across all media.
- Brand values, principles, and content guidelines to govern your content creation and build your loyal following.
- Mechanisms for encouraging, collecting, and sharing positive reviews, testimonials, and feedback.
- Specific actions to address dissatisfied customers, complaints, and negative feedback or reviews swiftly.
- A crisis communication plan that is quick and easy to implement. The quicker the better.
None of us wants to be the center or subject of badmouthing or PR, which is why your plan should focus on both building and managing a great reputation in addition to how you'll respond to any threats.
It's also not a bad idea to have a reputation management consultant on your speed dial so you can engage a professional if things really do hit crisis level.
Of course, if you need help crafting your reputation management plan or something else, I'm here for you.
Until next time,
PS - If you missed it, last week I advised you and your AI to Take a Breather.
Sharing is caring. Please pass this message on.
Your success is our strategy!
No longer want to receive my newsletter but don't want to miss my special offers and announcements? Click here.
To completely unsubscribe from all future communications, please opt out below.
Easily Said & Done
I help entrepreneurs leapfrog over the typical potholes that derail most small businesses with inspiration, motivation, education, and support across a wide range of business topics drawn from over a decade of running my own business, teaching entrepreneurship for the City of New York, and coaching and consulting privately with dozens of women and minority small business owners. Honestly, why go it alone when help is an email away?
Hi Reader, Last week we had the first tornado warning in Manhattan and the second in New York City that I can recall. There was horrible air quality from the Canadian wildfires as well as torrential rains with their accompanying flood warnings the week before. Right now, Spain and France are suffering devastating wildfires and heat waves. I've written before about disaster preparedness, but I really want to drive home the need to think about and plan for the potential impact of natural or...
I promised I'd share some AI wins after bashing on it for the last couple of months, so here goes. An old client of mine runs a wine shop in Brooklyn. She's got some help but she's largely a one-woman show. She's been using Monday's AI features to help her analyze and manage her inventory and understand seasonal sales trends to purchase more smartly. She had to level up her investment and hire someone to help her set up the AI agents she needs but feels it's been money well-spent. Another one...
There are lots of thoughts spinning around in my brain at any given moment. Maybe you can relate. We're kind of living in whirlwind times where information is coming at us incessantly; it's like being caught up in a tornado. There's just no way to catch your breath and really marinate on anything for too long. So here are a few things I'm trying to give a little bit more thought and attention to these days: What impact will Pope Leo's AI encyclical have on governments, tech leaders, and...