GOSO

By: Chris Garrett Co-Author of Best Seller of ProBlogger, our celebrity blogger, Chris has helped thousands of individuals, non-profits, small businesses and blue chips make the most of the web.

I was reading a comment thread over on another site where a Facebook fan page for a local auto dealer was being reviewed.

In my view the article was quite balanced, mostly favorable, and the author seemed open to a dialog about how the fan page could improve from the starting point that had been reviewed. All good, all friendly, and all constructive. Great.

Then a troll wades into the comments with the usual stuff:

• They should have this feature.
• Why is there only this, that and the other?
• Waste of money when the company could have used such and such software for only $xx
• The technology is wrong, instead of using this technology should have used this other competing technology.
• Competitor1 and Competitor2 have a better product because of these features.

I am sure you have experienced a similar loud mouth complainer making a big noise about something they feel both entitled to talk about, and expert enough to have all the answers.

Social media, being social, gives everyone a voice, even if they do not really have anything constructive to say. They can drown out the valid advice and your customers needs if you are not careful.

The problem is, while there may be free speech laws in your geography that protect the trolls right to have the opinion, this person is NOT entitled to sway your decision-making!

While there may be an obvious bias-motive behind attacking the Facebook page and agency behind it, there is also an obvious frame of reference at conflict with what the end user actually wants. These trolls do NOT speak for your dealership customer, and that is who you are aiming to please.

Is the troll in the market for the cars you sell and service? No?

Does the troll have your customers best interests in mind? No?

Then ignore them.

The people who you need to be listening to are the people who are in your target market. What do they want to see? How do they want to be treated?

You need to focus your energies on meeting and exceeding their expectations.

Trolls can talk all day about features they think are cool or necessary, but it is a customer-focus that will win you fans, not flashy gimicks and wizz-bang features that they do not need.

There are a lot of loud mouths in social media so forget about matching anyone’s expectations but your customer’s