Michael Podolsky interview - The Power of Curated Complaints

Speaker A: Trading at Schwab is now powered by Ameritrade, bringing you an expanding library of education with even more ways to sharpen your trading skills. Access new online courses, insightful webcasts, articles, engaging videos, and more, all curated just for traders. Plus guided learning paths with content designed to fit your unique interests. No sifting to find exactly what you need so you can spend your time learning to trade brilliantly. Learn more@schwab.com trading hi, it's David Averin, and this is the why Customers Leave podcast. You know, we used to rant about poor customer service to our family and our friends. Well, today we share our experiences with everyone and there's no shortage of online options for where to share our experiences, both good and bad. The bigger question is how do we share in a way that our concerns are actually addressed and ideally resolved? Well, my guest today has created a unique solution to that is a godsend for some, but a genuine pain in the ribs for others. Today on the podcast, I'm talking to Michael Podolsky. He's the creator of pissed consumer.com and we're going to talk about the empowered consumer and what it takes to get the attention of companies. Today, it's David Avran on the why Customers Leave podcast. Back in 20 seconds.

Speaker B: Are you ready to future proof your business? Well, sit back because customer experience expert David Avrin brings you the why Customers Leave podcast, featuring outspoken thought leaders and business builders as they share their creative strategies for serving a new generation of customers and clients. Listen in or you can watch the video version of the conversation. Now, here's David Averin. Hey.

Speaker A: Ah, and welcome to the why Customers Leave podcast. I am your host, David Averin, and this week's kind of interesting because, you know, I think if there's a conversation that is frequently, uh, had by so many is the negative experiences that we have. And everybody has them. Uh, even some of the companies that feel that they do it well have negative experiences with others. And we just rant because it's cathartic and it's what we always do. But of course, the situation is different because the environment exists, the platforms exist to share those experiences with so many others. We used to say that, uh, we used to call it guest relations philosophy. And it went like this, right? And we've all heard it before that the average person with a positive experience tells two or three people, but somebody with a negative experience tells 10. Well, of course, none of that is true anymore. Today we tell thousands. Today we tell millions. So my guest today, Michael Podolsky, has created an online resource. Now there are other resources, trustpilot, uh, and of course, all the social media sites and the review sites. Next, uh, door or not next door? Well, next door, I guess, is part of it as well. Um, but the, uh, TripAdvisor and Rotten Tomatoes and Glassdoor and all of those. Yeah, all of those as well. Google reviews. But what Michael has created is the first negative review site. But he's got a real method to the madness. I'll do a quick introduction and we'll say hi to him. Michael Podolski is the co founder and CEO of pistol consumer.com. it's a review platform and consumer advocacy website. He's got 20 years of experience at Wall street and has become an independent entrepreneur, actively involved in entrepreneurship, technology development, search optimization, leadership, customer service, and consumer advocacy. Michael Podolsky,

Speaker C: thank you. Thank you for the introduction, David. It's a pleasure to be on the show.

Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. So talk to us before we talk about the site itself. And I want to talk about the methodology behind it because some people might see it as a purely cathartic exercise to, uh, bitch about companies that made a map. But there's a real opportunity for organizations as well. But let's go back up a little bit. First, tell me how all of this started and where did you get the idea for it?

Speaker C: I got pissed once. Don't get me pissed. I'll, uh, bring 10 million people per year. Uh, to watch it. Sorry, 10 million people per month to

Speaker A: watch it per month. And to clarify, this is the largest negatively oriented review site in America. 10 million viewers, uh, users per month. So tell us, how did it start?

Speaker C: Uh, 16 years ago, roughly. Me and my wife were sent to a really bad vacation spot in Dominican Republic. I tried talking to the hotel, I tried talking to the travel agent, I tried talking to the credit card. I took the guys to small court. I lost everywhere. I had no, um, pretty much, uh, the answer I got. You got what you paid for. But I certainly paid much more than not to have towels in the hotel. So my complaints were very basic. On day number one, I didn't have towels. They had exact number of towels per number of guests in the hotel. So in the morning they would took, they would take away your towels to bring the towels in the evening. I guess you're not supposed to use towels during the day. Um, so my complaints were, um, I had no recourse. I couldn't do anything. So that's when I went to my partner and we agreed to do something. Uh, I Would attribute name to actual. Actual to my partner, because he asked me, mike, how are you feeling? I mean, I told him, look, I'm pissed. So he said, okay, let's call a pissed consumer. And that's how the website got born. Uh, it was a hobby. For three years, me and my partner were just coding in the back room, uh, on Saturdays while working on the job. Three years later, we had funds to start hiring people. Now it's an organization servicing millions of people per month. That's how it started.

Speaker A: So talk to us about. For those who haven't. And I would assume that those who are listening or watching this podcast, um, might be on the side looking it up right now. Pissed consumer dot com. Uh, talk to us about the structure. How do you individuals use it and how do organizations use it to identify potential deficiencies and, and address those who feel like they have no recourse. Uh, so how does it work?

Speaker C: Our name is certainly negative. And CMOs usually divide between themselves. Some CMOs say, I have. I want to do nothing with this website. I don't want to even touch it. Uh, they're kind of putting a blind eye to all those complainers that are out there. There are other CMOs that understand that there are negativity out there about their brand, want to listen to it. CMOs Customer, CXOs, Customer Experience Officers. Right? People that are responsible for communication. So the risk, people react differently to the name Pest Consumer. But what we are all about is we honestly want to build a bridge between the consumer and the company. Uh, typical consumer would not go to the pestconsumer.com until they exhaust most of the options with the company first. So if the consumer came to Pest Consumer to put a complaint in. I'm sorry, guys, for those who are on the corporate side, you lost attention of the customer. You haven't done enough to satisfy him or her. Um, but you can return them. You can return those customers that are best, and we've seen them. So, um, what we want is to establish better bridges between companies and consumers. We want companies in the industries to learn from each other. If you look at a particular industry, let's take furniture industry, for example. Logistics is a problem across the entire industry. It's not a problem of one company, but company that can do it better will succeed. Let's take Amazon. Why did that happen? Amazon has plenty of negative reviews too. Sure, they do a little bit better than others.

Speaker A: So would you say that for, for most people, and I think, to sort of reiterate your point, these are People who really are on their last nerve. They've tried everything and now they're saying, how do we now? But let me ask you the question. Is it just an exercise of catharsis? Is that they just wanted to get off their chest? Do they want to hurt the company or they legitimately trying to get their attention and they found no other way to do so? Or do you see a combination of all of it?

Speaker C: There is a little bit of psychological effect. Person has a way to let out, uh, a little bit of steam. By writing out, we do give an opportunity. That review on the request of a consumer will be sent to the company. So company will become aware of the issue. And yes, consumers come to our site when they exhausted all the options. Why is consumer doing it? Is it to hurt the company? No, we've done a research several months ago. Um, don't have all the numbers at hand. Um, David, you can get it from uh, my PR department. But over 50% of consumers actually want a company to improve. That's the gist of it. A consumer is actually wishing company well. That's, that's largest category, second largest category. We want to alert consumers, other consumers, that this problem exists. It's being done so that company can improve and warn other fellow consumers. Now if company comes out and says, yes, we've had the logistical problem during COVID trucks were not moving well enough. There was logistical problem. Please forgive us, we are much better now. We have improved our process. That's what consumers want to hear. Recognize your issues, fix them, show it and you will preserve consumers. Consumers today are much smarter than 10 years ago.

Speaker A: Yeah, well, because we have access to so much more information. But how much of this is. Because I think part of it is a function and we see this across all of the review platforms is that people just. It's a couple of things, I think. One is that they just want to feel heard because they feel invisible. And the other one is that they, and maybe it's just a function of our times is that they demand to be heard. Um, I think if I was going to articulate what you hear behind the scenes is you hear a lot of. They have no idea who they're dealing with here. Do they think I'm just going to roll over? They have no idea. Now they're going to be sorry now that, well, that person used to rant at 2 o' clock in the morning in their pajamas to their spouse or somebody else. Well, now they go online and they reach like your site, millions and millions of people and I think as I go through the site and I look at many of those, I think a lot of it, I don't know that I would give them as much credit as you do about them wanting the company to be better. I think they want their situation to be better. And even in warning others, it's an act of, look what I went through and everybody needs to know this. The challenge of course is you could have a company with great service, great everything, and one 16 year old on the front line gives a, uh, negative experience because they don't care and all of a sudden it affects the entire company. So what's your advice for companies to be able to address those? Because I think you really do create an opportunity for companies to intervene quicker. Um, but let me ask you this question, I started asking another one. I'll ask you this one instead. How do companies know that somebody is ranting about them on your site? Do they just need to have somebody dedicated to doing a word search on your site on a regular basis to identify those situations to intervene and address earlier? How do companies become aware that somebody's complaining about them?

Speaker C: We have a lot of contact details of the companies itself and uh, very often we forward the reviews to the companies.

Speaker A: Okay, so you actively reach out and let them know that someone has been. That's a great service. Um, and what is your intention in doing so? Is it to create, ah, foster a conversation where there was just a one sided conversation before, to assist in the resolution and to develop a reputation for helping to resolve issues? Because are you more than just a platform but are you also a service?

Speaker C: Uh, can you repeat the question please again?

Speaker A: Yeah, well, I think what I'm asking is, is the purpose of this just to give a platform and a voice to those who are disgruntled? Or do you really want to take an active role in helping individuals and companies come together and resolve issues via service?

Speaker C: We really want to help companies and we want to advise companies on how to do things better. Uh, it's part of our solution packages. It does exist on the site. We want companies to become better. We want to grow ourselves out of the business. I'm sure it will never happen, but in reality I want all the consumers to be satisfied.

Speaker A: How are you seen by businesses? Are you seen as just a pain in their side, um, creating this venue for people to rant about them? Um, do they embrace what you're doing as an opportunity to identify those who've had challenges so they can intervene earlier? How does the business community look at you?

Speaker C: It differs. It differs. Some companies don't want to deal with us just because of our name. Um, some companies are praising us for what we do. They work with consumers, they respond to reviews, um, they get uh, they raise their ratings from 1.2 to 4.4. Um, I'll name one company, they are on the least expensive plan that we have as a company. They're paying $50 a month to get access to contact details of consumer. Just for $50 a month a company can get access to name, first name, last name, phone and email and have an opportunity to publicly respond to, to a consumer. That's all I'm asking for. And the companies that I'm talking to is chain. It's one of the largest Chinese closing brands. Right. They want to pay for the high end plan but they, over a period of six to nine months, by working closely with consumer and they have a flood of reviews, they were able to raise their rating from 1.2 to 4.4. It's a great job. Yeah, they've done a great job. Applauses uh, to Shane, um, just by talking to consumers, responding and addressing the issues that otherwise they would never hear about or they would have lost those customers. What is your so full disclosure? Shane is paying me 50amonth and they're regular client. They didn't pay me anything to disclose their name on this podcast.

Speaker A: Do businesses have the opportunity to respond to those people without paying or is that sort of part of your business model? I mean we're all in business to be sure, correct?

Speaker C: Uh, yes. Uh, there are some businesses that don't want to pay $50 uh, per month. They can respond. They will not have contact details of consumers when they respond. Uh, unfortunately due to the moderation type of things, I will be forced to remove phone numbers and emails from their response. Unfortunately. I can explain why we have to remove phone and email from a person who is putting comments in. I would upload any company to respond. I'm just forewarning you guys out there on the corporate side because of the uh, legal and streaming issues that have we experienced in the past, we have to remove phone numbers and emails from the uh, comment section. And those companies that choose not to pay us, um, they will not be able to leave their contact details back to them.

Speaker A: But they, but they can still respond. I mean they're still absolutely right and that's certainly what we encourage them to do. But let's talk about that sort from a broader perspective. Um, and the challenges that businesses face is that you've got a Combination, you've got more demanding consumers, more demanding expectations. Because we can get anything anywhere, anytime that we can afford to do so people's expectations have gotten higher. What's the ramifications of not responding? Because every business is going to have people who are not happy to some extent.

Speaker C: Right.

Speaker A: There's not, we can't address every kind of a situation. What's the danger for companies who let those negative reviews fester online in the uh, uh, on the Internet? The uh, what's the danger for them when there's a growing chorus of negative voices that are, that are unresponded to

Speaker C: 85% of consumers according to statistics, read reviews before they make purchasing decisions.

Speaker A: Absolutely.

Speaker C: Um, some people search for the keyword reviews. Smarter users starting to look for keywords complaints. Seven years ago a consumer would be unaware of a small little fact that some companies purchase reviews. You're aware of that, David?

Speaker A: Of course, of course.

Speaker C: Um, consumers are getting smarter. Uh, consumers uh, do understand that when they go to a platform and they see only shining, uh, reviews, um, they may ask themselves a question, is it a truthful review? And they will look for other uh, more truthful platforms to listen to. So uh, there are, ah, you can as a counter argument, you can say Michael, but uh, your website would be used as a black PR instrument where one company can bash another company again, purchasing of the reviews. It's around us. We don't condone it, we clean it up, we moderate our content and everything. But it is a constant battle for every platform.

Speaker A: It's a constant battle.

Speaker C: Correct. But when the consumer comes to a website, uh, and sees only positive reviews, they start asking questions.

Speaker A: Sure.

Speaker C: They became much smarter. So let's take this consumer. It's mostly negative reviews. So a consumer comes into our website to read and see what company is doing about negativity. And the consumer, prospect, prospective consumer comes in and says, okay, do I want to deal with this issue? Do I want to deal with this issue? Do I want to deal with this issue? Or perhaps this is a recent apology from the company that says, oh, we fixed it for this customer. Our uh, apologies please carry forward. Prospect would have a much better feeling about it. Hey, company cares. Company addresses the issue. And another item that I want to point out. Negative reviews are uh, separate and special. You cannot say thank you and carry on, um, as you would do with a positive review. Sure. Typical company on the social media to any review has a habit of saying thank you and carry on this negative review. You have to spend a little bit more time on My recommendation, you have to dig in, into the situation. You need to understand what happened.

Speaker A: Right. Well, and I think that's. Isn't that one of the benefits you can look at as a benefit of a negative reviewer? Reviewing those is they tend to add much more specificity as to what had transpired. Positive ones, so, and so was great to work with. Highly recommend. Right. The negative ones, this happened to me and then this happened to me and then I tried to do this. And then the, the person who is, who is looking at reviews because they're potentially going to do business, they can ascertain whether or not that scenario is similar to theirs. Uh, you can also see oftentimes when the person is being very unreasonable about, uh, or very petty about, you know, getting onions on their burger and they ask for no onions on their burger, it's easier to dismiss those. But isn't it more the preponderance of the evidence? When you see review after review saying the same things, that's a really good indication for that potential customer or client that this is a company to be aware of.

Speaker C: Correct. You have to look at the amount of evidence that, uh, is collected for a given company. If it is one review, it could be a mistake. If it is two reviews, that's an accident. If it is free reviews in a matter of five days. Oh, there is an issue.

Speaker A: Yeah. Or that week. Or it becomes a trend or it becomes, you know, it's when, when an airline, you know, is on tv, the, the CEO for the fifth time saying, this is not who we are. Well, it's clearly who you are because you've had to say that five different times. Right. It's time to address all of that. Um, talk to me about, about how you've seen it and over the years, how you've seen these kinds of reviews, uh, change or shift. Have they become more negative? Have they become more specific or. There are certain industries that used to be good and now we're seeing a lot of complaints. What are you seeing on your end,

Speaker C: people? There is no industries that they can pinpoint. It differs it. I know that I will, uh, receive a lot of flower complaints around Valentine's Day and Mother's Day.

Speaker A: Sure.

Speaker C: So there is regular issues, um, that do come up, uh, at specific calendar period. I'll tell you one item from the history that is very important and cost company over $3 billion. In 2008, a bank named Wells Fargo on Best Consumer started receiving complaints of extra accounts being open.

Speaker A: Yep.

Speaker C: I remember Wells Fargo did nothing. They didn't care in 2010 Senate made uh, CEO to quit and the company paid $3 billion in restitutions to consumers. If that CEO would have paid attention to pissed consumer two years prior, he would still have his job. So costs of not listening to consumer could be extremely high in certain cases. Sure. Um, let me ask you a question.

Speaker A: Is your platform searchable? If somebody was looking for reviews of so and so because like if you were looking up reviews um, for a restaurant or a movie, social media is not going to come up because those are password protected login platforms. This, the content is as public as Google reviews and others.

Speaker C: Yes, absolutely. It's all transparent, it's all on Google. Um, we are brand based. We are not yield for example is location based. We are brand based. Uh, it's a very important distinction because we are talking to the entire brand at once. Um, where I see issues, uh, could be actually I was at the franchise show a couple of weeks ago here in New York. Um, franchise has a problem with me, with this consumer. The problem is as following, uh, they let franchisees manage their own reviews. This consumer doesn't, would not allow Arkansas. Um, uh, franchisee manage New York's review. We want headquarters to manage reviews. On the corporate level, sure, we are not very convenient for location based businesses but at the same time when the consumer uh, makes a complaint, they're making a complaint against the brand.

Speaker A: That's how the entire website is based 100%. And I think it's a really important distinction as well is that when someone has a bad experience, I'm just going to throw out a name. This isn't an accurate one. At a Subway restaurant they're not uh, people are thinking oh I got to stay away from Subway in Duluth, Montana. It affects the whole brand. So I think it's a great cautionary tale for brand managers and directors on the national or international level that they have a responsibility to monitor and to, and to address these situations. Very convenient for them to push it back down to the franchisees franchisee level. But as consumers we don't know the difference, we just know the brand. So I think that's actually great advice for, for brand champions on the organizational level that they have to uh, they have to get their arms around this and keep current with what's happening because anything can happen on a local level that affects the national brand. If there's a, if there's a salmonella, you know, outbreak, um, at a, at a Taco Bell in Eugene, Oregon, people think there's a problem with Taco Bell nationally and once again not suggesting there is, but that's the kind of example that's incredibly important for them to uh, to, to stay on top of this.

Speaker C: So actually you putting out an interesting thing review is location based complaint is your brand level.

Speaker A: Oh, that's a great way to put it.

Speaker C: That's the way to put it.

Speaker A: I'm just writing this down for those. Um, let me ask you this, um, because this one's kind of interesting for me. I think the complaints as we grew up, you and I are probably around the same age. Um, actually for most of history have been individual based. You had a bad experience with somebody or maybe even some location. How much has that changed? And this is certainly what I'm seeing in my research and my speaking consulting as well is that people are. There's uh, a growing dissatisfaction with process, so growing dissatisfaction with struggles of logging into to apps and websites and navigating that where a person isn't even involved. But there's still a major frustration not being able to talk to a real person, being forced to go through a chatbot or some automated mechanism. Are we seeing more reviews and posts on piss consumer about people getting frustrated with a company in a process that maybe didn't necessarily involve an individual?

Speaker C: It's a big question. It's not. It will take longer than whatever time is left on this podcast.

Speaker A: I was just saying are you seeing more of that, um, uh, or not.

Speaker C: Business has, business has changed. A lot of customer service has shifted to the uh, locations, uh, outside of the United States. Um, you still see demand may speak to the manager on the US soil. Um, the next level is ChatGPT. Will ChatGPT bill be empathetic to human need? How much would ChatGPT understand the empathy and would they be allowed to have it? Um, unfortunately a lot of companies look at customer service as a function that I put it over there in the corner and they don't want to hear from them. I don't want to. I, I see, I see it's happening. But customer service needs to communicate back into the organization to improve.

Speaker A: Sure.

Speaker C: And that's what I'm advocating for. And it's not happening as much as it used to. And the bigger the organization gets, the harder it is to put the communication back from the consumer into the product or service line. So we need to work on the processes on the corporate side to actually improve communication within the organization to move those complaints up the chain from customer service to the production level. And we are losing it. We are losing this battle it's not getting better.

Speaker A: Right. Well, I think as we were talking before about the whole idea of ChatGPT or automation, we're already seeing this and it's coming now with many fast, uh, food drive thrus that aren't just corporate location virtual individuals who are managing the drive thru. Well now they're shifting to artificial intelligence.

Speaker C: Right.

Speaker A: And so, and that's only going to grow in the next year. For those who are watching and listening, watch for it. Because I've had conversations behind the scenes, it's coming in a significant way. Um, we're not naive. We know that that's what's coming. Um, but you're right, it's how well do they really understand. How do they understand accents? Right. Which is another challenge as well. Right. You're, you're Polish with a, with the, with Russian language or accent. Um, for me, because that's part Ukrainian. Everything else is part of my heritage as well. But there are accents that are harder to understand. What happens when I am Ukrainian. Yeah, I, I am Ukrainian as well. That's what I was saying. The Russian language, I was saying. But Ukrainian, I am as well. That's where my background is. But how well are they going to understand the language? And what happens in that frustrated moment that you're right, it's not getting better, it'll likely get worse. But I think organizations are making that calculus that it's not that they don't care about customer service, is that they truly believe this will be better, there will be fewer misunderstandings when you take out the human element. But of course there's a risk in all of that. And the risk is people getting so frustrated that they go to pissconsumer.com and they tell the world. Right?

Speaker C: Absolutely. And I'll tell you asked me in the beginning of this podcast, you asked me, um, levels of monetization, uh, how we monetize. Right. Um, I want to add something to it. I am a businessman. Um, I'll give you an example using the two names of the company. They are not actually clients of mine, but I'll use the example.

Speaker A: Sure.

Speaker C: So, David, let's say you are a Verizon customer and you are unhappy about their service or something prompted you to go to test consumer to read reviews about Verizon. Uh, do you think T Mobile would be interested to purchase an audience from me of people that are unhappy or reading unhappy, uh, reviews about Verizon?

Speaker A: Of course, it's market research.

Speaker C: It's not just market research. When someone buys an audience, they buy an audience for advertisement. So T Mobile can actually come and get, uh, an audience of people that in the past 30 days have read negative reviews about Verizon.

Speaker A: Right, right. There are people who are, who are at risk with Verizon who are primed for an alternative. It's brilliant. Listen, and I've said this before, I'm an unapologetic compassionate capitalist. Uh, there's an opportunity and we meet that opportunity. But I would also submit that the value for someone like T Mobile of looking at all is that they can identify the things that piss people off and review their own business practices to make sure that they aren't guilty of the same thing. And maybe I'm Pollyannish about this, but ultimately that should raise the level of service for all. Right. If we become more cognizant of the things that frustrate people to the point where they're sharing it with everyone, that we can compare that against our business practices and ask the question, are we guilty of that? Is that something that some are dismissive and say that's just the cost of doing business or we're willing to sacrifice X or Y. But ultimately the more information that organizations have about what their customers like, or as my book says, why customers leave, um, ideally they take that information and they improve. That's the hope. Um, I would assume over the years. Do you have any, um, specific examples or case studies where somebody recognized something and changed policies as a result, or are you not necessarily privy to organizational policies uh, internally?

Speaker C: Uh, there was one example. Not going to name the company. It's a company that distributes coffee, uh, on a subscription basis. Okay. It's a Connecticut based company. Uh, they never were our client, but they are on our website on test consumer. Um, I spoke to the business owner about importance of responding to reviews, how to address issues and stuff like that. You listen to me. Six months later, uh, he came back and he said, michael, I listened to you. Instead of responding to consumer reviews, I just went ahead and redid my customer service. He learned from his mistakes. He chose not to respond to the current existing negatively affected consumers. I'm probably against that.

Speaker A: I said as well.

Speaker C: But I am extremely happy about the fact that the person was able to greatly improve his business. He grew three times, um, in a period of year and a half, uh, from the point of when he realized that he has a problem to the point where, um, he redid his customer service. He put his customer service to a different level.

Speaker A: I think if you look at this, this is really a phenomenal Resource for businesses who pay lip service to the idea of listening to their consumers. Well the ones I mean it's going to be skewed negative. Those who have a profound experience, positive or negative are the ones who are more likely to post something. But what a gift it is for companies who look at it that way. A gift to look at. What is it that their customers are saying about them. No, it doesn't mean that everybody is rational and there's certainly amount and I went through a lot of the reviews on this site and some people are just complainers but most of them have a legitimate gripe, they have a legitimate complaint. And I'm one of those people because I do this for a living as well is I think it is a gift to organizations to really understand specifics of things that make their customers unhappy because uh, because everybody has a bullhorn that reaches around the world. So I would encourage everyone who is in business, all the review sites, Yelp and TripAdvisor and Rotten Tomatoes and Glassdoor and of course piss consumer.com review on a regular basis. Set up Google News alerts, set up alerts so that you can identify, go back and address. Uh, it doesn't mean everybody gets what they want but at least everybody who is heard. Let me ask you one last question. Um, once again talking to Michael podolsky from piss consumer.com? is um, what percentage of the complaints that are articulated on your website? What percentage of those are um, do companies respond to

Speaker C: greatly differs. Um first of all um, sometimes company can realize the problem by reading a review and then go back directly to consumer if they can identify the consumer.

Speaker A: So you don't always know who would if who was responded to, who wasn't.

Speaker C: Uh but what I know is uh, we have about 15% of results complaints consumer has an ability to mark the issue as result.

Speaker A: Got it. Um, just want to leave it out there because they want to be heard and I understand that as well. But I, but I. Go ahead.

Speaker C: One important feature that this consumer has to advertise the features is um. A consumer has an ability on pissed consumer to go back to the review and change one star rating to five star rating if company reacts to it.

Speaker A: Very important.

Speaker C: It's not impossible to get a high level ranking on best consumer and I would recommend companies to do it. It's totally recommended.

Speaker A: I do as well and we're running out of time. But one of the things that I'll say for, for my audience as well is one of the things that I always when I'm consulting or I'm speaking with organizations is I always encourage them to respond publicly because others need to know that you're responsive. But then take the resolution to and the conversation private. The specifics for that. Um, so sorry, you're dealing with this. Here's my information. Please reach out to me individually so we can resolve this. And then the question is always. It's a question. What will it take? We're sorry this happened. What will it take to make this right? And oftentimes the response is unreasonable. I want it free. I want this and this. And then your response is always this. Let me tell you what I can do. And then anything that follows that that is helpful, that helps them to be heard. What if we do blank and blank? But I always ask them to make a deal if we do blank. Right. They feel like they're getting something out of it. Would you be willing to take down the review or change the rating or to market result? Let's make that a quid pro quo. If we're willing to do blank and I want to make you happy, doesn't mean that we give away the farm. Um, but respond publicly so everybody knows that you're responding. Take the conversation private and then ask them, what's it going to take to resolve this? Just that taking down 50%, 30% of negative reviews that might be online could be significant for your business. Because as Michael said at the beginning, Everybody goes online 80 something percent and looks at a company first. Right. Because we're looking to avoid making a bad decision. We want to make sure that other people didn't. I think sites like this are incredibly helpful. I think it's unfortunate that they're needed for individuals to be heard, but they are because individuals. And I've been that as well. I've had that voice in my head. You have no idea who you're dealing with here. And my wife's like, hey, big deal, go take out the trash. Ran later. Um, Michael Podolski, if people want to, uh, learn more about you or get in touch with you, how do they do that?

Speaker C: Bestconsumer.com we have a for business section. As always, a consultation request. I'll be happy to consult, work with people, chat with people. David, thank you for this opportunity to be on podcast. I am happy to be here. Let me know if you need me again. Um, I would just also mention that we have a YouTube channel, several YouTube channels. Um, one of them is this Consumer Reviews. Uh, it's a visual proof of how consumers put it to the faces of the companies when they're having issues. Um, research not only your own company, but research your competitors as well. It is a very competitive market. Maybe you can do better than your competition can as far as customer service is concerned, and that will prove to be profitable over the long term.

Speaker A: Absolutely. Knowledge is power. Don't bury your head in the sand. Find out what people are saying. Doesn't mean they're rational, but, uh, it affects your business in a big way. Michael Podolski, thank you so much for being with us. Hang on. Stay right there. We'll talk on the other side of this. I want to remind everybody that they can pick up copies of my book and my books by Customers Leave and my newest book, uh, the Morning Huddle. Everything's on Amazon or other online sites. Most of them are also available on audiobook as well and in multiple languages. Um, be sure to click to like this podcast subscribe. Leave your comments below and then click the little bell icon to receive notifications of new episodes. You can learn more about my keynote speaking and my consulting and watch a Preview video@widavron.com thanks for tuning in to the why Customers Leave podcast. Remember, leave a comment on this and subscribe. Big thanks to my guest, Michael Podolsky. David I'm David Averin. Be good.

Speaker B: This has been the why Customers Leave podcast with David Averin. Be sure to leave a comment and click the like button. You can listen to or watch past episodes and be notified of future ones by hitting the subscribe button on your favorite podcast platform or check them out on David Avern's YouTube channel. David's popular books are all available online and also in Kindle and audiobook form as well. You can learn more about David's keynote speaking and business consulting at, uh, davidavron. Com.

Speaker A: This podcast is a part of the C Suite Radio Network. For more top business podcasts, visit c suiteradio.com.