Mentally Tough: Bad Reviews Ep. 014

 Has your business or you personally ever received a bad review online? Maybe you thought about purchasing something? You saw it online, you were totally influenced. So you go check it out. You see one product just like it has 4.5 stars and this particular product happens to have 4.9 stars. You head over to the reviews and read what people think. What was their experience like? Or maybe you were aimlessly scrolling your favorite social media platform and you saw a post. And a community group that you're a part of. You quickly glance and it has 632 comments. 

So you race right over and realized someone just went off on a local business. So you're here with your popcorn and diet Coke in hand, and you're ready to read the latest and greatest dish. About this business that somebody totally obliterated online. This is stuff I've done. I've scrolled. I've looked, I've reviewed. And I completely loathe it. I think to myself, some people must live a really miserable life. I mean the way some people review things, it seems like maybe they've just never, ever had a good day. 

Welcome to dentistry support the podcast. This is episode 14 and my name is Sarah Beth Herman. 

I'm your host today. You are listening to our second to last episode in this first season  and our third episode in our mentally tough series. I've got a big punch to pack today, and we're going to talk all about bad reviews, good reviews, how you can be for your community. Ways. 

I've totally screwed up and a study I conducted on my own. Right here on our favorite social media platforms to see what everybody else thought about being for our communities. So let's get right into it.

 I had a lot of places I wanted to start. I wrote out this podcast and I perfectly articulated every single bullet point that I wanted to make. And then I recorded the first version.  And then I rerecorded that version a couple of times because I didn't quite get out exactly what I wanted you to hear. So I'm leaving this little part of the blurb in, so that. I don't know. 

Maybe you can connect with me and a little bit different of a way. When we talk about building mental toughness and the face of bad reviews. It feels like that's impossible. The second, you get a review that isn't perfect about your business, or even a review in person about your own performance or how you've talked to someone. We're on the defense. 

Our mind goes into fight or flight mode because we haven't been taught how to handle things from an emotional intelligence standpoint. And so because of that, We fly off the handle. We immediately feel like we are failing at everything and it takes. Uh, 24 hours of being able to go to sleep and wake up again. To even feel normal , so we can actually address whatever the issue was. I have lost myself many times reading bad reviews about my company or reading bad reviews about other products. 

I've chosen not to go with a company or chosen not to purchase a product based on reviews. Not something that I actually went through. But just reading what someone else went through.  Being a reviewer who has made bad comments about other businesses that I definitely shouldn't have put online.  Makes me cringe, but I've done it. 

And I know you've done it too. 

As leaders and small business owners, we are in a digital age and digital feedback is very real. I want to teach you today, how we can get through this. I want to also teach you today. How you can look at reviews. Totally different. You don't have to look at it as, oh my goodness. We need to ask every single patient, every single customer to put a positive review online. Yes, reviews are important and you totally can do that. But you don't have to kill yourself over it. There are other ways that you can work with your community to get people, to review your business, people that have known you your whole life. People that went to school with you, people who have worked with you that know what it's like and can attest to their experience with you as a person. 

 This last week, I went on a popular social media platform and I chose four different groups that I was going to create a poll. And a post that simultaneously would get feedback from people and also encourage people to communicate with me. 

On this particular social media platform. I am part of probably 250 to 300 different dental groups. I hired team members worldwide. So I'm constantly sharing job openings and free trainings we offer. And I really love to be for the community of dentistry. So I'm all over the place. 

I picked the top four groups that I am a part of. One of those groups is a group that I personally own. And I created called the dental collaborative. If you're not part of it, please come be a part of it. There's a lot of good stuff in there and we don't charge you anything to be part of it or to post in it. 

There's a ton of free resources. And we do a lot of chatter about the podcast episodes in there to get more feedback and to carry and continue on the conversation. The post that I created went something like this. Hi, my name is Sarah Beth Herman. I've been in dentistry for 25 years and 10 years ago when I started my company, I promised myself that I would be for the dental community and I would express this in different ways. 

And one of those ways. Is that I would work with anyone, even if they were competitors of mine, I would be someone who would trust that money would always come in. And that no matter what it meant for me to be for another business in dentistry, I would do it.  So if you have a dental business, go ahead and comment on this post. Give me a link to your business. I'll connect with you and we'll do a peer to peer review. Now I already knew the kind of people that were going to read this. If you've been in dentistry for any length of time, it's an industry that has the most dramatic people in it ever. 

 And I know that probably sounds very rude if you're not in dental and you're listening to this podcast right now, 

it's just that if you're in dental, you totally get what I mean. It's like offices and the dynamics of them tend to thrive on the office drama. So I already knew I was going to get one of three different kind of responses when it came to this post, I was going to get one. Small business owners, people who just started their own dental business of some sort, they were going to share links because this is an opportunity for them. To work with someone, get reviews, have this collaboration because small business owners, they love that kind of stuff. 

Like, man, if you can work with me, if you're going to give me a review, if you're going to help me out, if there's a place I can post a link. I am here for it. I am that person too. I love it. Right. So I was going to get either that kind of person.  The lurkers, the ones that just give me a thumbs up, thumbs down. 

I support heart. But I don't really comment anything. And I'm just kind of here perusing or the third one, which is that drama filled toxic hater. That absolutely can't stand. I just posted this. 

Let me tell you that the majority of what happened on every single one of the pages. With haters.  The post that I made quickly went viral in those groups. And I actually ended up going and taking it down because it got completely out of control. One girl specifically said, how dare you do this? This is unethical in every sense. 

You giving a positive review on another business without doing business with them is like throwing a new person or a baby to the wolves. Quickly many more haters made that post go viral commenting and cheering her on and how dare I do this and how dare I be someone who makes false reviews. I am lying to people. 

And what was I saying to the rest of the community that we can just go make fake reviews on other businesses? 

If you could just go and read all of the comments that were on there, you would have been blown away. But I knew that I needed to take these posts down because I never want to be part of negativity. But I thought maybe there would just be this off chance that I would post in these public groups and people would be kind, they would be helpful. 

They would rally around each other, but we don't live in this kind of culture. And I'm telling you right now that my whole dream and being a generational leader is that I will make changes. I will make the changes. Required for us to be successful. As teams.

 My whole goal, my whole dream and this journey of leadership is that I will create communities  and those communities. Won't just be for dentistry, but every industry out there will have communities that work together, help each other out that it's not this I'm better than you, so I should make more money than you. No, we can do this together. 

That's why this very podcast is appropriate for any industry because every business has the same fundamentals. We're just in an industry. Now before I go any further, I want to make it very clear that I do see a place and a time for reviews. Like, for example, if you are in the clothing industry, you want to know how clothing fit. 

So you read other reviews on you should size up, or maybe it's a food place. And you want to know if it's an authentic Indian cuisine. You'd like to know what other people thought about that kind of cuisine.  The kind of reviews that I'm talking about are the ones that actually tarnishes a business name. Or they give you the illusion that someone is bad, but innately. 

I don't think we're all bad. I think that every business owner out there deserves to have a chance. And so that's what I want to create in the community that I'm talking about. 

 All right now for something that you may not know, and maybe after me telling it to you, you really didn't want to know, but I think it's important for where I'm headed with today's podcast. Did you know that big corporations are paying 50 to $75,000 a year for you to work from home? So  you can review products online  you've never tried before. It's a real thing and it's actually happening. 

So all of those people who commented on the post that I made about being there to support the industry, that I'm part of. And said you're making false reviews. Well, no, when you're doing a peer to peer review, when you're getting to know someone having a conversation with them, or if it's someone that you do actually know in the industry and you're giving them a review, you're doing so based on your experience with that person, And every time you said, how dare you do a fake review, 

you are throwing people to the wolves. Do you know how many fake reviews you've read? Do you have any idea how huge this is? If you don't believe me search any kind of work from home explanations that you might find on your favorite social media platform? There will be these little video clips telling you all about how people are doing these very reviews. 

So here's a thought. If you see something that you don't necessarily agree with, try asking the person about at first. This is a way that we can totally change the industries that we work in. This is a way that we can be there for each other instead of immediately trying to push our opinion on someone else. Because what I'm trying to do is create a culture around collaboration and being there for others that are just starting in the industry, or just starting the world of business.  If you look at a Google page or you scroll through Amazon reviews, you might see that there's 10,000, 40,000, 50,000 reviews. But that doesn't always mean that that many people paid for those reviews. 

In fact, there are different. Software's you can attach to your product. That will state that they confirmed a purchase was verified. But all it is is a monthly service that track the number of visitors that came to that website. But it says that it was a verified purchase. There's a lot of research you can do out there to actually know what's happening and what's going on. So try to limit your view of your own reviews on your business with a different lens and understand  you are just a small percentage of people that actually get real reviews.  Sometimes people just had a really bad day. It doesn't mean that you're a bad person. 

It doesn't mean that your business is going to fail and it doesn't have to totally crush you. 

 I'm not saying that there is never a person that would ever do a positive five star review. I've done positive five star reviews. But there truly is a whole marketing tactic for how reviews are done. And I just want your eyes to be opened to realizing  you're a small business and it's totally okay if you get a bad review and it's totally okay. 

If you decide to ask your patients or your customers or those who purchase your product to do a review for you, but you will never be on the scale that some of these people or corporations are on, who actually pay people thousands of dollars a year. To do these reviews.

 It might feel like I'm kind of going off on a tangent about reviews, but I really want you to understand exactly how these impact your office, exactly how your business can benefit from your views and what you can do to keep yourself mentally sound, to build that mental strength when reviews happen for your business. 

Good and bad, we can celebrate the good and we can celebrate the bad. And I promise I'm getting to it. Stick with me. 

First, let's talk about what you can do to work with your consumers of your product or those that do business with you for a service. Now I will say that it is very rare that someone is going to bring up reviews for you. Or reviews. They've read about your business. 

There's a certain type of person that's going to do that. You aren't going to run into a million of those as you're doing business throughout your entire career. But when it does happen, I want to share with you what I do.  I have chosen to have what's called an affiliate program where I actually pay businesses who have done business with me $200. 

If they refer a nother consumer to my business, to purchase. From me and they enroll in my service. Now, there are some qualifications for that, and it's all listed on my website. So you can definitely go take that idea from me and implement it into your business. 

 Let's talk about why I decided to create an affiliate program. I work in a service industry. Because of that, I would estimate  one out of every 10 dental offices I speak with. He asked me for a reference. They want to know how everyone else's experience has been with me. Whenever I'm asked that question. 

I always ask them what they're afraid of, what has happened that led them to asking me for that. I'm willing to give them a reference of someone from my affiliate program.  But more than anything, I want to just know. What's so scary. 

What's going on? That you need a reference. Let's talk through it. Ask me why someone leaves my service. Ask me how I've made a consumer mad. Talk to me about it. Why does it, my service work for dental practices. I want to go through that with you. I know I'm never going to make every one of my clients happy. But I can be very forthcoming and honest. 

And I'll tell you every dental office where I made the shift of panicking to find someone that would give a reference to, Hey, talk to me about that. And I was open and honest with them about things that may happen, that we can prevent from happening by doing XYZ. They've been with me for years. They've appreciated the open and candid conversation. 

 I'll tell you, even though I have an affiliate program. It is so hard for my prospective clients to actually connect with someone from my affiliate program. And I have over a hundred members of my affiliate program.  Why is it so hard? Well, it's so hard because people don't want to sell your business for you. Even though I have a legitimate affiliate program and all of these people have legitimately done business with me or continue to do business with me. 

They don't want to have to reiterate how great it is to work with me.

I've worked really hard to make sure that my perspective clients get the information from me that they need. And I still give out those contact information's, but I will tell you, I also disclose that I compensate them for giving me a reference. Because I know everyone's time is valuable.  You may consider doing that when you have someone who's asking for a reference or you may offer to have a section of your website that just literally goes over people reviewing for you.  I will caution you that if you are someone who's listening to this and you're thinking. Wow. 

I could hire someone to do reviews for my business online and give the illusion that I'm some great company pause right there, because in the United States, you actually cannot do this. You would have to hire someone overseas through another agency because even the work from home or outsourcing websites that exist in the United States have rules and regulations against hiring someone to do that. 

It is false advertising and you definitely don't want to go down that road. So  be really, really.

Careful when you decide what you want to do. I want to teach you how I'm doing it, and I would love for you to follow that model, but we'd never want to cross the line of actually being dishonest. 

 We're about 18 minutes into this episode and we're wrapping it up pretty quickly. I'm going to teach you three things. So get your pad of paper, grab the notes app on your iPhone, whatever you've got to do.  The next three things you're going to learn will transform how your business is successful today. 

 If you aren't already an entrepreneur. And you are  a leader in a business that you work for. You have a great space in front of you, and I want to make it comfortable for you to start a business. If you want to. I want to pave the way for our future generations to be able to feel successful and not like they have every single card stacked against them. I know how you are viewing reviews. I know how everyone on your team views them. I know how every business owner. Views them. But today we're going to start doing this differently. 

The replies that I got from that post I made are exactly why so many people are afraid to start a business. It's why they're so intimidated about starting their own gig. And going into leadership in general, because there's so much negativity. There is no one supporting the efforts of all of these people. 

 I heard something yesterday. Someone said being number one is great. But knowing that we are changing the future generation is the very best mission I could be on in my life I think we all need to be considering that. 

I we need to be willing to change our minds. We need to be willing to recognize that we are not getting anywhere alone. Even though I run multiple organizations, I've built several multi-million dollar companies. I still require a team. I still require efforts. Other than the existence of my soul self. Anyone proclaiming I'm a self-made millionaire. 

No, you're not. You had a whole team behind you that helped you wear every single hat. To get where you are right now. There's a lot of buzz going on right now, as far as the whole non-compete clause that you can no longer have. It's no longer an effect for team members who are not part of a C-suite or make less than $150,000 a year. I believe there's about a 90 day time limit of sorts on it. You can  research the specifics. 

There is a threat that people owners, leaders are feeling. Because they haven't positioned themselves in a way where they are actually supporting their industry. People need to be free to do what they want to do in their business and in their future growth.  I'm not saying that there isn't a time and a place for a non-compete when you have trade secrets or you are developing a new software and you don't want that shared with your competitor. 

Of course. 

 For the majority of small businesses, the money is going to continue to come in. 

Here's your first tip. The way we can handle negativity. Is going to change right now. Every time someone gets a bad review. There's only one choice. Instead of it making you crumble. You're going to use it to get inspired.

 Bad reviews and employees leaving your company does not mean that your company is going down. 

If I could quantify. Count up the number of times that people have lied to me. Done something terrible to me, betrayed my trust, told me a sob story that really wasn't true. Played some sort of trickery on me or misled me to leave me or to leave working for my company. And I could attach a dollar amount to those. 

I would be very wealthy.  



You are going to have adversity in business. 

It's just the way it goes.  Reviews do exist for a reason. And we don't want to throw some unknowing small business to the wolves by presenting them a business that really does operate poorly. But I have to err on the side that I don't think businesses ever begin with the intent that they're going to destroy people.  The average small business in America, which means anyone who has less than 500 employees. They started a business because they had a vision of something that they wanted to create. 

Something that they were really great at, and they just wanted a better life for their family. A place that other people could do business at that they haven't been able to find before. 

Small businesses don't get bad reviews because they're bad companies. They get bad reviews because  there's a break and their processes or their systems. I've gotten bad reviews before and I've read many about other companies. 

Sometimes I got a bad review because someone just didn't like an employee that I had working for them. 

And that employee represented my brand and my company. So now all of a sudden my company is bad because that employee messed it up for me. 

I will have disappointed clients. I had them before. I'll have them in my future. I'm going to continue to make mistakes because we exist on a planet and in a world where we're not perfect and we can't foresee every single scenario that's coming our way to make sure that it doesn't happen. We will experience adversity and trials and tribulations and our businesses, because those are moments that we need to be inspired to learn and grow. There is something bigger meant for us on the other side of a negative review. 

And that's what I want you to see right now. That's where I want you to be at that's where I want you to exist. To understand that even if something didn't go perfect, it doesn't mean that you can't take a chance, it doesn't mean that someone else isn't going to still take a chance on you. 

I'm sure if you're growing a business, you would really appreciate someone giving you a chance to show them why you created your business. Even if someone else didn't have a great experience with you. 

People get really tough behind a computer screen fingers, tapping on the keyboard with so much confidence in front of them. Because they don't have to look up at the eyes of a small business owner. And there are two kids who are in dance and another one playing peewee football. They can just stand behind a screen and say all the things that they would never have even said to a person in person. They can stand on a soap box and express their anger and frustrations towards another company. 

Having no idea at all. What that person is going to do to internalize that. 

The other part that I want you to remember is that we have no idea what the person who left that review is going through. That led them to communicate the way they did. So, what are you going to do? What's the first tip. That you're going to do to transform how you handle reviews. 

Step One

Step one, I want you to set your perspective. 

I'm encouraging you to integrate every negative review into your team meetings. Even if it's embarrassing. The customer doesn't always have to be right, but we should always be willing to consider them as opportunities for case studies. 

 This shift in approach transforms a potential morale crusher. Into a catalyst for collective improvement. You are teaching your team. We will improve. We are going to reshape our perception of negative reviews. We will acknowledge it happened, but it's not a setback. The goal isn't to determine who's right or who's wrong, rather it is to harvest the information from your team in these candid snapshots of what our service or experience was like. Then figure out what the team thinks about it. 

What do you think went wrong? What could we have done differently? I imagine each negative review as a chapter and a case study one that we dissect not to assign blame, but that we unearth the roots of the misunderstanding or the miscommunication. It's about turning what might dampen our spirits and to fuel for collective growth and excellence. 

This is called constructive, reviewing. 

 We make it a standard practice to bring all reviews into our team meetings, not as personal critiques,  but as opportunities for professional development. 



You're going to invite your team in, look at every review, identify the negative truth that they do contain because there's always some element of truth everywhere. 

Right? It may not feel like it at first, but there is, then we're going to use these little nuggets as springboards for brainstorming. As we're brainstorming, we're going to actually give great feedback. 

You have to remember feedback that doesn't glow often shines light. On where our services might have strayed from our client's expectations. So if a client provided feedback and it doesn't glow. Then where is it shining light at? 

Looking at all of our reviews this way we build mental toughness. We teach our team members to have a quote unquote growth mindset. 

We're instilling a belief in ourselves and our team that our abilities are not set in stone and we can change, modify and grow. We view feedback through a lens where each comment becomes a stepping stone towards mastery. It's not a stumbling block. We haven't lost everything. 

Without feedback, our blind spots would remain just that. Unseen and unimproved, when we recognize the value of every single critique. We acknowledge the gift and perspective. It brings. It enables us to continually refine and evaluate our services and our reviews. 

Quick reminder. 

HIPAA REMINDER

If you are in the dental or healthcare industry. Any bad reviews or good reviews need to not be acknowledged publicly because it is a violation of HIPAA. So you need to have a standard review reply. This is for good and bad something to the effect of, we cannot confirm or deny that you are a patient of record. 

If you have questions about this review or any of the services that we provide, please reach out to our dental practice or medical office list your phone number and email address and move along. 

You can also say something to the effect of, we appreciate this positive review about our company. We cannot confirm or deny that you are a patient of record, something to that effect to always protect your business. 

STEP 2

Number two is to set boundaries and responsibilities. 

You need to understand and accept that. 

Not every customer interaction and will be perfect. And it's okay. You and your team are human. What matters is how you're learning from it. Communicate with your team.  Excellence is the goal, but perfection is not expected. Assign a specific team who has the rule of responding to and learning from feedback, bringing that to the entire team on a monthly or quarterly basis, strengthen the resilience of your entire team by focusing on what you can control your response to feedback and the actions you take to improve it. This helps and reducing the emotional toll that negative reviews can take and it reinforces your role as a leader and guiding your team through growing  responding and embracing what happens in the future. If a negative review is always negative, then your team will have a lot of anxiety about that. 

STEP 3

Number three. Is to set perspectives for a supportive business community, create a network with fellow business owners and leaders where everyone commits to bolstering each other up. Not only with positive reviews. But also with shared insights on navigating criticism. You can share what has not gone well in your business. 

This is going to help other business owners learn. Hey, what can I do to prevent that problem from happening in my company? Make sure the team you have around you understands. Where you're going, where you're headed, how you want to handle  things. 



When you have a network of fellow business owners, it changes the game for reviews. 

We're all in this together. And we can help each other become better, grow more, live a happier life and business. This is my challenge to you. A strong community culture, buffers, the blow of negative feedback. It reminds us that while our businesses may occasionally falter our collective strength, remains unshaken, creating the network becomes a wellspring of perspective. 

Encouragement. And constructive feedback. You choosing to engage in positive actions consistently. Is something that will give you more joy, more contentment, more encouragement than money could ever buy. 

This practice instills a mindset of abundance. And communal support. By contrasting sharply with the competitive and often scarcity driven business world. I know that the business world looks like that. I know we have a lot of negative Nellies out there. But my goal in even creating this podcast is that you'll see how positive the world around us can be when we focus intentionally.

Building mental toughness is a journey and it's not a destination. I know I've repeated that in the last couple of episodes. You viewing negative reviews as opportunities for growth and setting clear boundaries and responsibilities and setting up your business. And a supportive community means that we're not just overcoming psychological hurdles. We are actually laying the groundwork for a resilient and adaptive, supportive business culture. Leadership is about setting an example by approaching feedback with openness and gratitude. You are inspiring your team and peers to do the same. You are creating a cycle of continuous improvement. 

TGM

Your that's good moment today. It's that you remember the grit in the oyster creates the Pearl. Every tougher view is like that grain of sand. It's not always welcome. But it's integral in the creation of something beautiful. It's amazing to be number one, but how incredible to be so good that it changes the trajectory of businesses for generations to come. When you are great. 

Great, great grandchildren are starting businesses. They're more successful because of how you chose to lead the way. When we establish and set our perspectives intentionally. Every challenging moment. Of those tougher reviews must be seen as grit. They are catalysts for growth, the instigators of improvement, the tiny irritants that lead to the luster of excellence. If you see a business with only positive reviews. 

Or you work for a business or a competitor with only positive reviews. Something is wrong. There is no rainbow without the rain. There is no Pearl without the grit. If someone doesn't have an issue with someone or something or some place of business. 

Something's wrong. It's perfectly normal to not ACE everything.  In every word of critique. There is an opportunity to refine our service, to strengthen our resolve and to grow our generational leadership. Thank you for joining me today on this journey of mental toughness, dealing with these bad reviews. And creating positive outcomes. Keep leading with heart. 

And remember that every moment, especially the tough one.

Holds within it a chance to be better than we were yesterday. That's the good stuff. I'll catch you on the next   episode.