Last week I discovered some very interesting responses to a survey I had asked about 60 automotive employees to fill out regarding their dealership’s online reputation. Although I had suspected that many of them had a lot to improve, these responses were lower than I expected.

 

I asked them to rate their business on a scale of 1-5 (5 being the best) on the following questions.

• Your dealership’s internal process regarding your online reputation
• The execution of this process.
• Upper Management’s understanding of reviews and the current amount of review online.
• The customer service training that goes on in the business.

 

I averaged out the scores and here are the results.

• Business’s process:                           2.3
• Execution of Process:                        1.6
• Knowledge of Reviews:                      2.8
• Customer Service Training:               2.6

 

It is not surprising that the highest score is for understanding the NEED for reviews and a good online reputation. On the other side, it is not surprising that the lowest score was for execution.

 

These results demonstrate that getting started is the hardest thing for businesses to embrace.

So what can they do to begin creating their online reputation?

Before you focus online, focus on-site. Choose the level of customer service you want to deliver to your customers. One word of warning is that you cannot be everything to everyone. That is a losing strategy. Pick one or two things you want your customers to say or write about your business.

 

Example:

“They are prompt and very pleasant to deal with.”

Now you have to create the behavior in your team to deliver these results.

 

How can you deliver promptness?

• All phones must be answered within 3 rings.
• All emails must be responded to within 2 hours.
• Customers must be greeted as soon as they come in.

The list goes on but the point is you are educating your team on what SPECIFIC behavior is now expected. It makes it easier for management to follow up and there are no miss-understandings on what is expected.

 

Each week review your online reputation. Have someone on your team document all of the review sites you care to follow to see if the number of reviews increase as well as the quality. When you start to see the customers mentioning what you are focusing on (promptness and pleasant) then you can add on another focus point of customer service you want to deliver.

 

This is the first step to building an environment that encourages the whole staff to be involved with delivering excellent customer service, hence building your online reputation.

 

Next post, we will tackle how to get people to post.

 

Let me know your thoughts

Glenn Pasch is the COO of PCG Digital Marketing as well as an executive coach with Improved Performance Solutions.