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unwanted forum post - what to do?

by robshaw33
8 replies
hi guys
nightmare.
you have a clickbank product recognized as one of the best in the niche.
sales are always slow but you work harder and harder to clinch the sale.
out of the blue someone posts a forum post on a forum of the product you are promoting asking about your clickbank training product and one of the few people who had a negative experience, didnt understand the product and asked for a refund posts a completely negative message slagging you and your product off.
the post appears at the top of google search for the url of your website.
sales plummet!!
the forum owner states that the post cannot be tampered with (ie the url of your website removing) as it would compomise the integrity of the forum.
is there anything i can do to shift this forum post from appearing at the top of google?
will it drop on its own?
do i have to beat it down with loads of links on higher ranking websites?
initially i thought about responding to the post itself but my experience is that negative posters become very hostile and a flamewar results.
guys have you got any ideas??
many thanks as always
rob
#forum #post #unwanted
  • Profile picture of the author Sumit Menon
    Why don't you help him use your product.

    Then request him to delete the post.

    Sumit.
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    • Profile picture of the author dean_holland
      Originally Posted by Sumit Menon View Post

      Why don't you help him use your product.

      Then request him to delete the post.

      Sumit.


      There is NO better answer than above my friend.

      Ok you feel the customer is wrong in their opinion of you and your product, don't take any offence here as it is not intended but your customer support in dealing with his issues may have not been the best.

      I say this only to help and to further back up the above suggestion.

      You are thinking of ways of basically 'hiding' this person thoughts on your product and masking over it.

      You are NEVER going to get every single customer being 100% happy if you are doing a good level of sales. Just like you will always get refunds in most cases.

      This is the social world we are in, people can post thier PERSONAL experiences online for others to review.

      The trouble you have and correct me if I'm wrong but you have 1 customer saying bad things but no one saying good reviews?

      You should encourage your buyers to post online reviews maybe, video testimonials / reviews on youtube etc...

      More importantly as stated above, you need to do the best you can possibly do to put right any wrongs this customer believes he has experienced with you.

      This is business but the benefit with this situation is this is a digital business which means it can possibly be put right with some simple gestures of good faith that cost you nothing.

      Just some thoughts -

      - Contact them asking the issues
      - Work to put them right
      - Refund the customer if needed
      - If you have other products of relevance consider giving them one free

      There's a few things.

      However with that said there are always customers that arn't shall we say 'the best' customers, you may just need to accept this.

      Ultimately if you have a good product then 1 single persons bad experience and negative review should not ruin your product sales.

      If however this 1 bad review is the only review of your product then you will of course have problems.

      Hope that helps, good luck with it !!

      Dean
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  • Profile picture of the author ruch1v
    the best thing to do, is not be rude or agressive towards him, reply to the post, be as polite as possible and explain what he is wrong about, most people know that when they look at hotel reviews for example, there are usually a few bad ones, but realistically, how many times have you stayed in a hotel with pleasant experiences and never reviewed it, the best thing you can do is leave a helpful response, this will surely help to counteract some of the damage

    hope this helps
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  • Profile picture of the author NateDesmond
    Originally Posted by robshaw33 View Post

    is there anything i can do to shift this forum post from appearing at the top of google?
    I am not sure what the best option(s) would be, but these are my ideas:
    • Reply to the negative poster offering full refund, help, etc. (Although, as you said, a flame war could start if you are not very careful.)
    • Get the forum moderators/admins to remove the post (Sounds like this has already been tried.)
    • Build SEO for ten positive pages (Forcing the negative thread to the second page)
    • Ask your happy customers to post about their experiences in the same thread (Although this could have the flame war problem again.)
    • Build up lots of testimonials on your own site (To counter act the negative publicity.)
    • Wait for the thread to naturally drop out of the SERP (This might not happen for a long time and could be quite costly.)
    Please let me know if this helps!
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  • Profile picture of the author ocon9316
    I'd go with what the other two mentioned. I would also be willing to bet that after a few weeks the post will drop off of page one of google.

    In addition to that - make sure it really is the top search for google. With google's new customization (you don't have to be logged in anymore), it could show up number one for you because you always (or more often than not) click it when you google search for the url. Based on your web history, google thinks that is what you want so it lists it first. Turn off customizations on google and re-search for the url. It could very well be that the forum post is not "truly" number one
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    • Profile picture of the author NateDesmond
      Originally Posted by ocon9316 View Post

      In addition to that - make sure it really is the top search for google. With google's new customization (you don't have to be logged in anymore), it could show up number one for you because you always (or more often than not) click it when you google search for the url. Based on your web history, google thinks that is what you want so it lists it first. Turn off customizations on google and re-search for the url. It could very well be that the forum post is not "truly" number one
      Very good point!
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  • Profile picture of the author Christophe Young
    You could try doing the right thing or you can try and be sneaky and make it go away. I vote for the former.

    I'd post on the forum right below this negative post and just be honest and polite as possible. Apologize to the customer and offer to help them get better results from it via coaching, or something else. Be understanding and professional. Really, this is all I could do. It will either work or it won't but at least I stayed true to myself.
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    • Profile picture of the author robshaw33
      guys
      as always you are outstandingly helpful - what a forum this continues to be.
      i've discovered that ocon9316 is right and that the post was at number 1 because i'd clicked it the day before.
      it is still at number 10 - bottom of 1st page - so still not great - anyone thinking of buying my product seems to google the website as you do to see what people are saying and its the obvious choice to click ie it says -

      "has anyone purchased this product - url - what do you think??? blah blah blah"


      i'm going to try 3 strategies from NateDesmond - theres definitely no point trying to placate the people in the forum - i've seen it before i would just get shot to pieces and doubtless more copies of my url and so higher and higher in google.

      what i thin i will try is seo my own pages with the phrase, i'll put the term in my articles on ezine, build new content and hope to knock the post off page 1

      i know why its gone to page 1 its just so incredibly relevant totally fresh content with my keyword in the title in the content several times - the url - the name of the product etc etc etc - i'm hoping that as fewer and fewer people read it - ie its not promoted any further that it will fall away and never be found?

      My other strategy is that i'm helping the guy who asked the original question on the forum - has anyone bought this product? -

      its the negative comments that came in response from a couple of guys who are just against the whole genre that are the problem but the guy himself is the one who put my url in there which is causing the high google ranking so i'm going to see if he will edit the original post or see if he can get the moderators to do it - and then it might fall out of serps more quickly??

      anyway great advice guys many thanks
      rob
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