How to Overcome that dreaded 1 ⭐ Review

[catwriter]

I had a repeat buyer who would leave less than 5 stars even though they had no complaints and kept coming back. Thanks to Seller Plus, I saw that the average rating they gave was 4.8.

When I delivered new work (after the previous order that got me 4.7 stars), in the delivery message, I said something like "I hope you'll like this one better than the previous one!"

After that, the buyer was very very careful to leave 5 stars and praise me in the reviews.

[sunboatrecords]

@vickieito Thank you for sharing your experience! It gives us another valid viewpoint.

In this case, I think that Fiverr could add a confirmation message before the review is sent.

E.g. Are you sure that you would like to rate Vickie from the Ito Industries 5*? Ratings are final.

Or something like that!

[donnovan86]

25 minutes ago, vickieito said:

As a seller, I would  tell my Success Manager what happened and share my screenshots with her. She's usually very helpful (even if the mistake can't be corrected).

Well then there's no point in talking with someone if there's nothing that can be done..  It helps that I am high volume, yes, but it still hurts that I have my hands tied and there's nothing I can do here. If I report this to customer support I receive a warning, if he goes behind my back I receive a warning as well. So I just decided to share my experience here and vent my sadness a little bit. And who knows, hopefully it helps others too. 

24 minutes ago, catwriter said:

After that, the buyer was very very careful to leave 5 stars and praise me in the reviews.

He mistakenly placed those stars (or not), regardless he also sent me a message after reviewing asking me to add extra stuff to the content. I am adding that now, I'll just move on and not work with this person again, even if they are a repeat customer. I spend a lot of time doing the work for you, so it's only fair that you check how you review the content, because it's clear from his review and our previous orders that he just randomly put stuff here to rate the order. Not sure why, because you have 8 days to review stuff, why would you review right away if you're tired.

[breals]

@donnovan86  I'm sure a lot of us on here would feel exactly the same as you. What a kick in the teeth for a really good established seller such as yourself. 

Personally I would tend to agree with @vickieito  This is what we pay our success managers for right?  Otherwise it is a monthly payment for what? 

We talk on here a lot about improvements that can be made on the platform, and this is one of them. Why can't a buyer reverse a review if there is a clear and unintentional mistake?  Whilst I don't think CS will reverse the review, maybe a suggestion of removing it from your metrics may help?  At the minute. if I have a cancelation that isn't down to me, Fiverr have been kind enough to strike it of my numbers so it won't affect my future business as they can see it's not my fault.  Maybe suggesting something like this may help? 

I guess they can always say no, but it's worth a try, and if people don't speak up then Fiverr will never know it's an issue! 

 

[donnovan86]

2 hours ago, breals said:

This is what we pay our success managers for right?  Otherwise it is a monthly payment for what? 

Last time I had a review that a person mistakenly clicked on was a 3.3 star review, the buyer went behind my back and asked for its removal. I ended up receiving an account warning. I don't want to endanger my account for a random dude that didn't know where to click. But yes, it hurts... quite a bit. The worst part for me is that I feel my hands are tied. But it is what it is. I just hope he didn't leave a private negative review as well, and my placement in search is not affected. I replied to the review stating it was a mistake, clearly.

Edited December 27, 2022 by donnovan86

[shalock]

Sorry to hear this!

I know that asking for a review change is forbidden, but I think that there should be a way where a buyer that made a mistake like this can ask for a review revision, after all, CS can access to all our chats and see that there were no asking for it.

I know it would be extra work for them but with all the recently changes in the system (some unbalanced to say the least in my opinion), I think that certain policies should be revised.

[mabelma]

Great tips! Yes, definitely reply it will allow you to tell your side of the story. Also I think it's fair to point out that a bad review in many cases can also mean a flaw in your procedure, that can be quickly remedied with more progress updates and included small revisions. In my case I've seen a lot of potential bad reviews turned positive after I started sharing sketches of the illustration and asking more questions at the beginning phases of the work before I jumped directly to finalizing the art. This gives buyers more time to correct issues and always ends up in better customer service which makes for better reviews overall. 

Great post!