Where to Drink the "Haterade"

There is certainly no shortage of venues on the web for consumers to complain or offer suggestions to the brands and the products/services they represent. The evolution of this behavior started with users complaining on simple message boards, in chat rooms, and various other archaic word of mouth formats that lived prior to the explosion of "social media." Soon enough, certain brands became so notorious for poor customer service that actual sites dedicated to bashing that brand started popping up (some excellent examples can be found in Joseph Jaffe's Join the Conversation). Specific sites being built contributed to the aggregator sites which gave consumers the power to sound off on essentially any known brand. Although entities such as Consumer Reports existed before, the consumers voice is now much more powerful collectively than that of an editorial staff.

Now we have come to a point where brands are finally acknowledging this mass of thought and feedback. They are building their own destinations that in many ways mirror the original complaint sites such as Dell Hell and instead position them as places for "ideation" and "improvement." There goal is to bring the conversation, as much as possible, out of the 3rd party sites and into a playground where they can watch and have the most prominent voice.

The above is only a small sampling of places to either voice their complaint or offer their advice. It is to iilustrate the various overlapping funnels that the consumer and brands can now engage in. These are very specific and do not include the thousands of other venues where ones opinions can be heard (Yahoo Answers, Twitter, Personal Blogs, Facebook, etc.)

Via Six Pixels of Separation, interestingly only a small percentage of consumers are actually complaining online.

According to a study conducted by Harris Interactive for Tealeaf Technology  ...it turns out that people complain a lot more in person (74%) or while on the phone with family and friends (50%) compared to leaving a rating or review on a Website (16%), an online message board (8%) or a Blog or online social network (7% - which also happens to be the lowest ranked).

Although the above statistic doesn't indicate the majority of consumers are drinking the "Haterade" online, it shouldn't be overlooked by brands. That 7% of individuals are creating complaints that do not go into a dusty wooden box on the desk of a CEO, they are complaints that are public and essentially everlasting. They have the potential to populate a brands search results, and spur further negative discussion.

The forward thinking brands that are building their own communities will neve be able to ensure ALL conversation about their product/services are under their own roof, but there are steps they can take to move it as close as possible to that direction:

1) Don't ignore any funnel of the consumer feedback environment. Have profiles on the GetSatisfactions of the World and monitor what people are saying and how they are sayining. Learn how your own consumer platform can give users the same chance to express themselves and how yours can be easier and more interactive.

2) Respond. Simple enough. But rarely done. In your responses, drive people back to your own community to get further assistance.

3) Make sure your community manager is scanning the web (hopefully using social monitoring tools) to find the niche sites and microblogs to find specific topics of discussion. Are there alerts or newsletters that can be catered to the entire customer base and one that drives to the brand based feedback venue?

4) Talk directly to the "loud mouths." If there is a person who is quite vocal in a negative fashion towards your brand, don't just try to fix the problem or silence them, offer them a job. Make them a community director on your own site. You would be surprised at people's willingness to get on top of a bigger soap box if they have a chance.

5) Optimize your SEO by being ACTIVE. There are hundreds, maybe thousands of posts about your brand every day. The combination of encouraging activity on your own site, as well as pushing out useful content will help bring a brand's voice higher on Google's result page than lets say...this.

Consumer Feedback Links:

Web Gripe Sites

Fortune 500 Brands that are Blogging

Massive Compilation of Brand Social Engagements