Hi guys, today let us talk about something that every freelancer or seller dreads…. a bad review. The information that I will be providing works for every freelancing platform including Fiverr, Upwork, freelancing.com, Legiit etc. Throughout this article, I will be referring to Fiverr even though the information would be for the other platforms.
A bad review on Fiverr or any other freelancing platform is any review left by a client or buyer to show his or her dissatisfaction with the session that he or she had with you. The bad review that the buyers leave might be due to the quality of work you provided to them or your communication during the period that the session took place.
The first thing that comes to mind when you get a bad review is “Oh I am ruined, nobody would choose to work with me again, my freelancing career is over”. A lot of emotions would be going through you, especially if this was your first time of getting a bad review.
Before we delve into the things that you should do when you get a bad review, I just want to assure you that a bad review on Fiverr does not signify the need end of your freelancing journey. In fact, many people have been where you are before and they have been able to overcome this obstacle and have gone on to have sprawling freelancing careers, if they have been able to do that then you can also be able to overcome it, so now let us delve into what you must do when you get a bad review.
The Instructions I am going to share works for experienced freelancers with five-star reviews and freelancers who are just starting out. These details are foolproof and I have no doubt that you would get back to getting a lot of orders even after that one bad review.
If you are a freelancer with a lot of reviews, who has gotten his first negative or one-star review then I would advise that you read the full article to the end, this is because the last suggestion that I have provided would definitely solve your problem.
- Stay calm
The first thing to do when you encounter a bad review is to stay calm. This is a very important thing to do at that stage since you might be fuming and believe that you do not deserve the review that you have been given, and around this period, you might end up aggressively contacting the buyer and you might say something to him that you would later on regret, so staying calm is very important. There have been instances where buyers who have given a bad review have later gone to think about what they wrote about the work, so being calm and composed might help if the buyer was still thinking about the review that he had written.
2. Never beg the buyer to remove the review, don’t even ask him why he gave the bad review.
Do not under any circumstance reach out to the buyer and ask him why he gave you the bad review, there is a high chance that the buyer would ignore you when you reach out to him at that moment, he can even block you at that moment. Also, Fiverr says that It is against its’ Community Standards to manipulate, pressure, or ask for the removal or modification of a published review or rating. You might be barned when you ask the client why he gave you the bad review and Fiverr would indicate to you that asking a client why he gave you a negative review means you are trying to manipulate the buyer into changing his review. Also, do not beg the buyer to change his review that would also get your account banned or restricted.
3. Scrutinize the negative feedback.
This is the most important part of the process. The reason why you would need to scrutinize the review that you have been given is that there is a possibility that Fiverr support can remove the negative review if the review is found to be misleading and goes against it community standards. Fiverr states that reviews that are left by clients can be removed by them under special situations, so you need to scrutinize the review that the client has left and see if it falls under any of the conditions that Fiverr deems fit to remove it. Now let us take a look at what to look out for when you are scrutinizing a review that has been left by the buyer. When scrutinizing the review you must look out for threatening and malicious words from the buyer, if the things that the buyer said in his report are threatening or contain bad language then there is a possibility that the review that has been left by the buyer would be removed. If you believe that the review left by the client goes against Fiverr’s guidelines or the client has an ulterior motive for leaving the bad review, you would then have to contact Fiverr support and make a report to them explaining what has occurred. In your report make sure you speak the truth at all times, this is because Fiverr support has the chat that you had with the client about the order in the order page, so there is no need to lie about your interaction with the client as you would be found out. There is a strong chance that the buyer’s review would be removed if it is found to go against Fiverr community guidelines. With regard to this point, it is important to note that if you contact Fiverr support without any solid proof that the client was lying, then there is a high probability that your account will get banned or restricted for misleading customer support, so always make sure that what the client said in his review of your work was either a blatant lie or it goes against the community guidelines. If after combing through the review left by the client, you come to the conclusion that the review falls within the guidelines set by Fiverr, well don’t worry there is still a lot you can do, let us take a look at the last and the most important step you can take, when you get a bad review.
4. Respond politely and professionally to the review that had been left by the buyer.
This is the most important step to take, the step that would indicate how you are going to fare after the bad review that you have gotten. If you are going to continue getting clients after the bad review that you have gotten, it will depend on how you respond to the review that you have gotten. The first thing that you must do when responding to a bad review that has been left by a client is to avoid attacking the buyer, attacking the buyer in your response would tell potential clients that you are guilty, they may assume that this is how you are going to react towards them too if they deliver a bad work and you rate them, this would make them avoid working with you. In other to avoid this, make sure to explain in your response to the feedback this is a one-off incident, also inform potential clients to take a look at your order reviews if they want to get to know you. Indicate that you do not joke with your work. Another important thing to do when replying to the review is to be sincere and explain what happened. If you were in the wrong make sure you apologize to the client in your response and indicate the measures that you have put up to prevent the incident that happened from ever occurring again. Potential clients know that most sellers would just attack the buyer when responding to a negative review that had been left by the buyer, so responding politely and respectfully would make potential clients assume that you can be trusted.
EXTREME GUIDELINES
5. Delete and recreate the gig again.
If you are a new seller with reviews less than five then I suggest that when you get a really bad review that you believe would adversely affect the number of orders that you are getting, then I would advise that you delete the gig that you have gotten the extremely bad review. After deleting the gig, I suggest that you create the exact gig again, the new gig that you would be creating would not have any reviews so you would be having a clean slate. I believe that if you have been able to get five or six ratings within a short period then if you delete the gig and you are starting out again, then you can get those reviews back again. I would advise for you to do this when the rating that the client is so bad that it would negatively affect your sales.
6. Join the Fiverr seller plus program.
Now let us take a look at what you should do if you are a seller with over 50 positive or Five-star reviews who gets an awfully bad review. Most often when a buyer gives you a bad review, Fiverr makes sure to place that review among the top of your other reviews, what this means is that if a potential buyer clicks on your gig, he or she would quickly see the bad review. In this case what you should when you find yourself in this situation is to quickly subscribe to the seller plus program. Let me tell you why it is important to subscribe to the seller plus program in this situation, the seller plus program enable sellers or freelancers who have subscribe to the program to be able to rearrange their ratings in any order that they want, so if you are able to subscribe to the program, you would then rearrange your reviews and place the negative review that you have gotten in the last place.
As I indicated earlier, I got a bad review due to a cancelation of an order, and I have gone on to have a great freelancing career, I believe that if you follow the advice above, you will also be able to overcome a bad review and go on to have a great career.
