One-Star Reviews: What To Do When You Want To Set Fire To The Salon

I got a one star review once that said, not only did I ruin someone's hair, heck I'd gone out to ruin her entire life. And I sat there at midnight with my boxing gloves on, ready to write a reply that would've absolutely ended my business. Terribly glad I didn't send it. Here's what we do instead. Your salon. My salon friends, Phil Jackson here, your Queen of Salons coming all over the internet with another dose of my Wise Owl wisdom. How on earth are you achingly well, I hope. I'm going to try and keep this upbeat and perky because we're talking about getting one star reviews. But before we jump into it, every Monday this month, I'm running an episode on the 10 minute Money Fix. Last Monday was fix number one, the expense that really costs you 10 times as much. If you missed it, go back and have a listen. The link to the product is at 10 minute money fix.com. 10 minute money fixx.com. Can you believe I managed to get that.com? Well done me, snaps for Phil. Today though, we're talking about a thing that's ruined more salon owner weekends than anything else I can think of. And that is the delicious one star review. It happens. It even happened in my coaching group last month. But before we get into what to do about them, let me say this: reviews matter. They matter more than almost any other marketing you'll ever do. When someone's looking for a new salon or a beauty therapist or an aesthetics clinic, they don't just go to Instagram, they don't just look at your websites. They don't even just believe their friends. They're going to check your reviews on Google, on Facebook, maybe on Treatwell or Fresha. Wherever you sit, that's where they're going to go. And they're not reading the five star ones. I do it myself when I'm booking a hotel, I might see 155 star reviews and then three one stars. And guess what I'm going to be looking at? I want to know what happens when things go wrong, and one star reviews hurt because as hairdressers, as beauty therapists, as aesthetic press practitioners, we are here to make people feel better. We want to build connections with people, we want to get on with people. We are people pleasers. And it hurts because you care. It hurts because you've poured your life into this business and a stranger has just told the world that you've shat on her barbecue, and it hurts because for a second maybe you believe her. And that's the bit, that's the dangerous bit, because what you do in the next five minutes can either turn that review into a marketing asset, or it can turn into a long-term rut that's going to set your reputation on fire. Let's be honest for a minute about what happens when you read it. Your stomach's going to drop, your face gets hot, you feel rage, you feel hurt, you feel panic all at the same time. And you think about every client who's ever going to read it. You think about all the work you've done, all the hours, all the times you've bent over backwards for your clients. And now this, and it feels unfair. It feels unjustified, and is worse for us than a lot of industries because our work is on display. But also it's subjective, it is personal. So when someone says something like you've ruined them, it doesn't feel like a complaint about a service, it feels like a complaint about you. And that reaction is normal. Everyone has it. But the mistake is acting on it in the moment. And here's what I nearly did. I nearly sat there with my laptop and drafted a reply that said, "Actually, you brought in three different photos. Actually, you approved the colour that we said. Actually, you said you loved it before we left, and you haven't followed any of the advice that I gave you for aftercare. Actually, this is unfair." And every word of that was true. Every word of it would've absolutely destroyed my salon, though. That's what I call the midnight reply. It's the one that you feel like writing when you are furious, it's defensive, it's a point-by-point takedown, and it feels brilliant to write, but it's poison because the people reading that exchange don't have the context. They don't know about those photos or the strand test or the aftercare. They just see a business owner fighting with a client, and nobody wants to book with a business that fights with people online. It also keeps the drama alive because by engaging in that kind of way, you turn a single complaint into a long-term spectacle. You are handing the bad review oxygen, and you're keeping it at the top of your feed. It doesn't win. Ultimately, it feels like winning, but ultimately you are losing. So here's the rule: you don't reply within 15 minutes. Actually, that's not true. I'm going to backtrack that a little bit. You do reply within 15 minutes with something really bland. "Thanks for bringing this to my attention. I'm going to look into this and get back to you when I have all the facts in front of me and I've looked into it properly." That's it. We're not feeding the fire, but we are acknowledging that a complaint has existed. And this is where one of my coaching clients went wrong last month. She knew she needed to cool down, but in that cooling-down period, the client had taken that as being ignored and basically become more riled up and gone further with the complaint than perhaps she would've done. So write that really boring reply and then walk away, have a glass of wine, have a cup of tea, have a row with the dog. Whatever you need to do, just do not push post on anything else, because that first draft is your ego, it's your reaction. The second draft is what we're going to do for your business. And we're not aiming to win an argument because what we're trying to do instead is win the trust of the next thousand people who are going to read that review. So the next morning with a clear head, we're going to write a different reply, and I'm going to give you a bit of a three-step formula that works for an awful lot of the negative reviews that you're ever going to get. The first one is to acknowledge and apologise. "I'm sorry to hear that you were disappointed with your experience." We're not necessarily taking responsibility, but what we are doing is agreeing with the fact that she's upset. We're not agreeing with necessarily her version of events, but we're acknowledging that she had a bad time, that she's upset, when that alone can take the heat out of a situation. Step two, reiterate those standards. One line: "Our goal is for every client to leave feeling fantastic and we take all feedback extremely seriously." Now that sentence isn't for her, it's for everyone else who's reading it, tells them what your salon stands for, and it quietly positions the bad review as the exception, not the norm. And step three, get it offline, end with a really clear invitation: "Please contact us directly on this number or this email so we can look into this properly." Or, "I've reached out to you. Please reply to my email. It should be in your inbox right now." And this is the killer move. It does three things at once. Firstly, it shows that you are proactive and it moves the conversation out of the public view, and it stops any further public ranting from that client looking reasonable because you've already offered a much more professional solution. That's it. Three steps, four sentences, nice and calm and brief and professional. No defensiveness, no excuses, no more fucking drama, darling. We don't need drama online. But here's the reframe that really helps me when you reply to a review. It's not for the person who left the review. It's not her that's going to be reading it again and again. She's going to move on. She's got her one star review, she's vented her spleen, she's getting on with her day. She might well read the reply once, but she's not going to reread it again and again. You are writing for the next person who's thinking about booking with you. The one scrolling your reviews on a Sunday night, deciding whether to try your salon or the one down the road. That's the audience. That's the one who matters. Once you understand that, everything changes. You stop trying to win the fight and you start performing for the right crowd. So what happened with my one star? We managed to turn it back into a regular client. Nope. But what did happen was this: over the following few months at least three new clients told me they'd seen that review. And every one of them said the same thing. It was the way you replied that made me book with you. It looked professional, it showed what would happen if anything went wrong with their visit as well. It made them feel like they were in safe hands. So that review actually made me money properly, because the review turned into a piece of marketing better than anything I could have paid for. It takes a while to understand that a wall of five star reviews, though, looks fake. It looks bought. People know that nobody's that perfect. So one or two bad reviews or even just mediocre reviews, handled properly, make your business look more authentic. They make you look human and they give you a public stage to demonstrate exactly the kind of business you run. When things go to plan, of course you don't want bad reviews, but when they come, and they will, you can use them. Reviews are one of those things that affect your revenue without you even noticing. They are about five of those in every salon, and I've put a lot into one place. It's called My 10 Minute Money Fix. This is not one of the money fixes, it's not money-wise. I've done all the maths for you in my money fixes. It's about an hour of your time, and it's going to cost you nine quid. Head over to 10 minute money fix.com. The link is in the show notes too. I will see you on Monday with fix number two. And in the meantime, please reach out and let me know what's going on in your salon business. I love hearing from my salon owner friends. My email address is scrolling at the bottom of the screen right now. Also reach out if you'd like to be a guest on an episode of the Build Your Salon podcast in the future. I'd love to be sharing your story with my salon owner friends. Reach out if you are struggling to deal with some reviews. I'd love to be helping you on that journey. Just a few short days until fix number two coming on Monday. And until then, take care.