This post orig­i­nally appeared on the Amer­i­can Express OPEN Forum, where Mash­able reg­u­larly con­tributes arti­cles about lever­ag­ing social media and tech­nol­ogy in small business.

We often say that social media is a con­ver­sa­tion, and what we mean by that is unlike tra­di­tional broad­cast and print medi­ums, which are often one-directional, social media is very much a two-way chan­nel. Not only can busi­nesses com­mu­ni­cate with their cus­tomers, but their cus­tomers can com­mu­ni­cate with them and with each other, as well. By and large, this type of com­mu­ni­ca­tion is a good thing — busi­nesses can form more per­sonal rela­tion­ships with cus­tomers and cus­tomers can become part of a com­mu­nity around the brands and busi­nesses they want to support.

How­ever, when you open the con­ver­sa­tion up to any­one, you can also poten­tially invite neg­a­tive crit­i­cism that you need to be pre­pared to deal with. Here’s a quick guide to deal­ing with neg­a­tive feed­back on social media.

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Iden­tify the Type of Feedback

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The first step to deal­ing with neg­a­tive feed­back is deter­min­ing what type of feed­back you’ve received. Neg­a­tive feed­back comes in a few dif­fer­ent fla­vors, each of which is best dealt with by a dif­fer­ent type of response. Deter­min­ing which type of feed­back you’re deal­ing with is an essen­tial first step toward fig­ur­ing out what is the appro­pri­ate response.

Straight Prob­lems – Some­one has an issue with your prod­uct or ser­vice and has laid out exactly what went wrong. This type of feed­back is neg­a­tive in the sense that it paints your busi­ness in a poor light, but it can be help­ful in expos­ing real prob­lems that need to be dealt with.

Con­struc­tive Crit­i­cism – Even more help­ful is when the com­ment comes with a sug­ges­tion attached. Many cus­tomers — includ­ing some of your most loyal — will use social media to sug­gest ways in which you can improve your prod­uct or ser­vice. While this type of feed­back may point out your flaws, and is thus neg­a­tive, it can be extremely help­ful to receive.

Mer­ited Attack – While the attack itself may not be mer­ited, the issue that cat­alyzed it does have merit in this type of neg­a­tive feed­back. Essen­tially, you or your com­pany did some­thing wrong, and some­one is angry.

Trolling/Spam – The dif­fer­ence between trolling and a mer­ited attack are that trolls have no valid rea­son for being angry at you. Also in this cat­e­gory are spam­mers, who will use a neg­a­tive com­ment about your prod­uct or ser­vice (whether true or not) to pro­mote a com­pet­ing service.

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Decide How to React

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Once you’ve fig­ured out which type of feed­back you’ve received, your next step is to deter­mine the type of response nec­es­sary. The num­ber one rule when respond­ing to all crit­i­cism, even the neg­a­tive type, is to stay pos­i­tive. Adding more neg­a­tiv­ity to the con­ver­sa­tion by let­ting your­self be drawn into a fight with a cus­tomer or user will only reflect poorly on your business.

When deal­ing with Straight Prob­lems, a response is almost cer­tainly nec­es­sary. Whether that response is per­sonal or a broad public-facing mes­sage depends on how wide­spread the prob­lem is and how many peo­ple reported it. Regard­less, if a real prob­lem exists, steps should be taken to fix it and cus­tomers should be noti­fied that those steps are being taken. Remem­ber that there will be times when such crit­i­cism is the result of a per­ceived prob­lem rather than an actual prob­lem (e.g., some­one who just doesn’t like the method by which you do some­thing). Even this type of com­plaint should be given a response, if only to say, “Thanks for bring­ing it to our atten­tion, but here’s why we do it that way.”

Sim­i­larly, Con­struc­tive Crit­i­cism also requires a response. Cer­tainly there will be times when you won’t want to imple­ment the sug­ges­tion given — prob­a­bly most times you won’t — but you’ll build loy­alty and trust by respond­ing to crit­i­cism with a pos­i­tive mes­sage. It is well worth the effort to thank those con­sumers who took the time to pro­vide you with a sug­ges­tion or point out your product’s flaws.

Mer­ited Attacks are a bit tougher to deal with, because they’re more likely to feel per­sonal. You should always try to keep in mind that this type of feed­back, as harsh as it may be, has a basis in a real prob­lem. It is best to respond promptly and with a pos­i­tive vibe (e.g., thank the com­menter for the feed­back and assure them that steps are being taken to cor­rect the issue or mit­i­gate their prob­lem, such as offer­ing a par­tial refund).

The final cat­e­gory is the only cat­e­gory of neg­a­tive feed­back that does not require a response. In fact, it is almost always best not to respond to Trolling or Spam. This type of feed­back isn’t really feed­back at all. It is designed either to bait you into an unnec­es­sary and image-damaging fight, or to siphon off your cus­tomers using under­handed tac­tics. You should always ignore this vari­ety of feed­back, and when appro­pri­ate, remove it as soon as you spot it.

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