Customers complain about companies and their products and services more than ever. With a smartphone, they can complain online from almost anywhere and at any time; there’s no cooling off period now after a customer feels offended. Aggrieved customers can spread their comments quickly across multiple social media networks moments after an incident when they’re still boiling.

There’s another reason why customer criticisms are so common, and it’s not because products are worse. Research reveals two distinct types of critics, writes Jay Baer, president and founder at Convince and Convert, in a MarketingProfs post. “Offstage” attackers are more private. They complain through email or telephone. They expect the company to respond and resolve their issue.

“Onstage” critics complain on social media and online review sites. Many seek vengeance rather than a solution to their problem, Baer says, citing his research with Edison. Many don’t expect the company to respond. They want attention. They whine about companies to solicit interactions from friends and digital acquaintances. After all, they have to post about something.

Facebook in particular is a hater haven. Most frequent complainers have Facebook accounts, and hardcore Facebook fans are three times more likely to be frequent complainers than non-Facebook fans. Heavy social media users across all platforms tend to complain more online.

Different Types of Complaints

Customer service professionals believe people who write an email take time to think about their message, unlike social media commentators who post emotional comments. “It’s almost like, if they took time to think about it and actually write about it appropriately, it might not be as emotionally charged,” said Mason Nelder, formerly director of central insights and social business at Verizon.

Complaints of onstage critics, who Baer also calls haters, are short, generally lacking in substance, and typically emotionally charged, even outlandish and out of proportion to the perceived injury. Baer says they are more like “often simply expressions of the current situation” than complaints. They often seem like unwarranted tirades.

The Real Problem: Ignoring the Haters

Haters are not the problem, however; ignoring them is, Baer emphasizes.

Finding those online complaints and responding to them is critical to maintaining corporate and brand reputation. Each unanswered online complaint leaves a bad public impression. That bad impression compounds with multiple ignored complaints. Monitoring social networks for mentions of the organization and its brands identifies complainers and issues; responding publicly to online complainers helps heal the situation – and creates a good impression. Responding to complainers and haters has now become an essential customer service task.

Case in point: When British Airways lost his father’s luggage, Hasan Syed went to the airline’s Twitter account to complain. Unfortunately, the airline was not monitoring its account in the evening. Its customer service department was open only 10 hours a day. The angry Chicago-based businessman purchased promoted Tweets to publically lambast British Airways. According to Time, he spent more than $1000. Besides his 400 followers, 50,000 Twitter users saw the tweets.

“I’ve seen complaints about airlines and other services via Twitter all the time,” Syed told Time. “I thought maybe it might be interesting to see how promoted tweets might work and if that would get anyone’s attention.”

Despite the fanfare, the airline gave a standard reply: “Sorry for the delay in responding, our twitter feed is open 0900-1700 GMT. Please DM your baggage ref and we’ll look into this.”

Customer Service Best Practices

The episode illustrates the importance of continually monitoring social media and responding promptly to customer inquiries and complaints. The simple act of responding cools down the hater and demonstrates to others that the company cares about customer issues and tries to resolve them.

Customer service best practices call for brands to promptly apologize, be brief, and continue the conversation offline if possible. Above all, keep your cool and remain professional. Employ social media listening to monitor mentions of your company and products across all social media channels.

Monitor at all times — not just when a specific event or attack forces you to respond. Some social media monitoring services, such as Glean.info, measure corporate reputation by grading sentiment in social media posts and analyzing trends – providing on-going insight on consumer feelings toward the organization and its brands.

Bottom Line: Research from a leading digital marketing expert provides valuable insights into why certain people vociferously criticize companies online. Understanding different types of complainers, or “haters,” and why they complain can help brands respond to customer service issues and protect their online reputations.

Glean.info grants permission to republish this article provided that the republished version contains a link to the original article on the Glean.info Blog.

William Comcowich

William J. Comcowich founded and served as CEO of CyberAlert LLC, the predecessor of Glean.info. He is currently serving as Interim CEO and member of the Board of Directors. Glean.info provides customized media monitoring, media measurement and analytics solutions across all types of traditional and social media.