Since the ‘Fake News’ uproar of 2016, the reliability of information on the internet deteriorated
drastically. Considering this, it is unsurprising to discover there is an abundance of unfair,
inaccurate, or untrue reviews online. This is because online reviews tend to reside on sites that
are widely unregulated. This can cause frustration for legal clients, as they try to turn to online
resources to find a trustworthy law firm. They can’t be sure which reviews are genuine. They
might think they’ve found the perfect law firm for their needs, until they stumble across a terrible
review… but what if it can’t be trusted? With no context and no regulation of these reviews,
which side should the uninformed client take?
Reviews that are distinctly ‘negative’ are often grouped together in an umbrella term, however
there are many different forms of reviews that can affect a firm’s online reputation.
These include:
● Biased reviews. If an individual had a law firm instructed against them, and this firm won,
they will have a negative perception of them- this is entirely unfair, as the law firm was
acting on behalf of their client, and shouldn’t be penalised for this.
● Defamatory reviews. A review left by a client that unfairly and purposefully damages the
reputation of the law firm without reasonable cause or evidence. Individuals that may be
upset that they did not achieve the result they wanted, and they may take this anger out
on their firm. Emotionally driven responses may often affect the reliability of a review.
● Non-client reviews. A review left by someone who has not personally used the services
of the law firm. An individual could pose as an unhappy client and leave a bad review to
purposefully hurt the firm’s reputation. This means a review is entirely falsified.
● Irrelevant reviews. These are often a result of a misunderstanding or a mistake, such as
reviews left for the wrong company, or reviews for a service the firm does not provide.
These have no place to be affecting a client’s decision-making process to instruct a firm.
● Litigation issue reviews. Some reviews contain content that may affect data protection
such as contact numbers and addresses. Alternatively, issues with a lack of context may
also affect the intended message of the review.
To combat this, ReviewSolicitors has implemented a series of effective strategies for law firms
that are signed up with premium accounts. A 48-hour suspension of negative reviews pending
investigation, and an email sent to the reviewer 15 minutes after posting. In most cases, this
results in the review being taken down. Furthermore, just by responding properly,
ReviewSolicitors has found that 70% of all negative reviews can be turned around into 5-star
reviews, or the client will remove it. ReviewSolicitors has also found that 92% of all negative
reviews can be resolved! Effective negative review handling can increase the likelihood of
resolving the issue with the client, giving your law firm a near perfect score on ReviewSolicitors.
Our dedicated team of Account Managers are trained specifically to help your firm deal with
your unfair reviews, which is an exclusive privilege for premium firms.
Are your bad reviews untrue?
Let’s make feedback reliable again.
Drop Adam Hall an email at ReviewSolicitors to find out more
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