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3 Tips to Overcome Negative Online Reviews Without Lying
54 Plays4 years ago
Tune in now and don't forget to sign up for www.solciety.co!
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to the Solarpreneur podcast, where we teach you to take your solar business to the next level. My name is Taylor Armstrong and went from $50 in my bank account and struggling for groceries to closing 150 deals in a year and cracking the code on why sales reps fail. online teach you to avoid the mistakes I made and bringing the top solar dogs, the industry to let you in on the secrets of generating more leads, falling up like a pro and closing more deals. What is a Solarpreneur you might ask a Solarpreneur is a new breed of solar pro that is willing to do whatever it takes to achieve mastery and you are about to become one.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
What's up Solarpreneurs Taylor Armstrong here to change your life as a soar sales professional, we are back with another show today, got an exciting topic, and we're going to jump right into it. I hope you enjoyed the previous episode. We have Lenny Gray the master of door to door on. So if you didn't go listen to that, go check it out. He's written two books, amazing episode have gotten great feedback. So thanks again, Lenny, for coming on the show with us in this episode, we're going to do something that I don't think I've actually done before. And that is actually take a topic suggestion from our audience, from our Solarpreneurs. So guys, if you have a topic suggestions, people you want to bring on things you want to talk about things you want to jam on. Hit me up. I'm on Instagram, I'm on Facebook trying to be more active on there.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
So I'm send me a message. Let me know if you have suggestions, feedback, just anything really appreciate the comments and tips that you guys give me. And it's nice to be able to interact with, with my crew, with my solar peeps. So this tip actually comes from, um, someone that doesn't actually have their name on Instagram and talk to him. So I apologize that I never got to your name on here, but Instagram is WVRRVN. Give them a shout out if you want to go follow them. One of our solar friends and he sends me a message. Um, so it was about three weeks ago. He says, Hey brother, been listening to your podcast over the past few months, getting tons of value, have an idea for a topic, no one discusses too much on overcoming negative online reviews. Is this something you can help the community discuss?
Speaker 2 (02:34):
Well, my man WVRVN I hope that's not your real name unless you're some kind of droid. Okay. But, um, that's his Instagram handle. That's what we're going to cover today. We're going to jump into it. And it's something that has at times come back to bite me negative reviews. I know a lot of people, especially guys with our bigger companies. Sometimes they struggle with these and it's something that, um, guys have to learn how to overcome. Guys, have to learn how to really turn in a strength. How can we overcome this objection? So I've got three tips. I want to share with you going to be quicker episode. We're going to jump right into it. Share three tips. Things that I do that have helped me and things that I've also heard from guys at larger companies specifically, specifically at Vivint Solar. I know that's a huge company.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
I have a lot of friends that are managers over there. Um, I guess I should say Sunrun now because they are now Sunrun direct, but they're a large company. Um, had some pretty terrible reviews. I know that I looked him up and one time I was considering going in selling with them and this was something I always came back to is like, how do you guys sell with so many negative reviews? Like I lose deal
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Transcript
Taylor Armstrong's Journey
00:00:03
Speaker
Welcome to the Solarpreneur Podcast, where we teach you to take your solar business to the next level.
00:00:08
Speaker
My name is Taylor Armstrong.
00:00:10
Speaker
I went from $50 in my bank account and struggling for groceries to closing 150 deals in a year and cracking the code on why sales reps fell.
Podcast Goals and Audience Engagement
00:00:19
Speaker
I teach you how to avoid the mistakes I made and bring in the top solar dogs of the industry to let you in on the secrets of generating more leads, falling up like a pro, and closing more deals.
00:00:31
Speaker
What is a solarpreneur you might ask?
00:00:33
Speaker
A solarpreneur is a new breed of solar pro that is willing to do whatever it takes to achieve mastery and you are about to become one.
00:00:43
Speaker
What's up solarpreneurs?
00:00:44
Speaker
Taylor Armstrong here to change your life as a solar cells professional.
00:00:49
Speaker
We are back with another show today.
00:00:52
Speaker
Got an exciting topic and we are going to jump right into it.
00:00:56
Speaker
I hope you enjoyed the previous episode.
00:00:59
Speaker
We had Lenny Gray, the master of door-to-door on.
00:01:02
Speaker
So if you didn't go listen to that, go check it out.
00:01:05
Speaker
He's written two books, amazing episode, gotten great feedback.
00:01:09
Speaker
So thanks again, Lenny, for coming on the show with us.
00:01:12
Speaker
In this episode, we're going to do something that I don't think I've actually done before.
00:01:17
Speaker
And that is actually take a topic suggestion from our audience, from our solopreneurs.
00:01:24
Speaker
So guys, if you have a topic suggestions, people you want to bring on, things you want to talk about, things you want to jam on, hit me up.
00:01:32
Speaker
I'm on Instagram.
00:01:34
Speaker
I'm on Facebook.
00:01:35
Speaker
Trying to be more active on there.
00:01:37
Speaker
So send me a message.
00:01:39
Speaker
Let me know if you have suggestions, feedback, just anything.
00:01:43
Speaker
Really appreciate the comments and tips that you guys give me.
00:01:47
Speaker
And it's nice to be able to interact with people.
Handling Negative Reviews
00:01:50
Speaker
with my crew with my solar peeps so this tip actually comes from someone that doesn't actually have their name on Instagram talk to him so I apologize I never got your name on here
00:02:06
Speaker
But his Instagram is WVRRVN.
00:02:10
Speaker
Give him a shout out if you want to go follow him.
00:02:12
Speaker
One of our solar friends.
00:02:14
Speaker
And he sends me a message.
00:02:15
Speaker
This was about three weeks ago.
00:02:19
Speaker
He says, Hey, brother, been listening to your podcast over the past few months, getting tons of value.
00:02:24
Speaker
Have an idea for a topic no one discusses too much on overcoming negative online reviews.
00:02:30
Speaker
Is this something you can help the community and discuss?
00:02:34
Speaker
Well, my man, WVRVN, I hope that's not your real name unless you're some kind of droid.
00:02:41
Speaker
But that's his Instagram handle.
00:02:44
Speaker
That's what we're going to cover today.
00:02:45
Speaker
We're going to jump into it.
00:02:47
Speaker
And it's something that has at times come back to bite me, negative reviews.
00:02:53
Speaker
I know a lot of people, especially guys with our bigger companies, sometimes they struggle with these.
00:02:59
Speaker
And it's something that guys have to learn how to overcome.
00:03:04
Speaker
Guys have to learn how to really turn into a strength.
00:03:07
Speaker
How can we overcome this objection?
00:03:10
Speaker
So I've got three tips I want to share with you.
00:03:12
Speaker
It's going to be a quicker episode.
00:03:14
Speaker
We're going to jump right into it, share three tips, things that I do that have helped me, and things that I've also heard from guys at larger companies, specifically Vivint Solar.
00:03:26
Speaker
I know that's a huge company.
00:03:27
Speaker
I have a lot of friends that are managers over there.
00:03:31
Speaker
I guess I should say Sunrun now because they are now Sunrun Direct.
00:03:35
Speaker
But they're a large company, had some pretty terrible reviews.
00:03:39
Speaker
I know that because I looked them up.
00:03:42
Speaker
And at one time I was considering going and selling with them.
00:03:45
Speaker
And this was something I always came back to.
00:03:48
Speaker
It was like, how do you guys sell with so many negative reviews?
00:03:51
Speaker
Like I lose deals myself with negative reviews.
00:03:54
Speaker
But how are guys over at Vivint Solar, some of these larger companies, they're selling dozens and dozens of deals.
00:04:01
Speaker
every quarter and I mean they they seem to be just fine with the negative reviews so I'm gonna tell you a few things that I heard from these guys few things that have helped me and hopefully they help okay so let's get into it tip number one is bring it up before they do
00:04:20
Speaker
And a lot of guys have heard this.
00:04:22
Speaker
Hopefully you've had training in your sales organization that something we all should be doing is bringing up objections before our customers, our clients can.
00:04:33
Speaker
If you have a great book on this, go read Sam Taggart's ABC's A Closing.
00:04:38
Speaker
He has a whole section on this.
00:04:39
Speaker
He calls it eight-miling your customers, right?
00:04:43
Speaker
It comes from the eight-mile movie where Eminem is bringing up all the
00:04:50
Speaker
objections the rappers can throw at them that he grew up in a trailer park they use white trash all this stuff so we need to do the same thing and this is something specifically specifically for this objection that i think works great bring up that you have negatives before they can because if you bring it up and if you bring it up while you're in the home they can't go look it up matter of fact pull it up on your computer right there while you're in the home with them and mr customer i know we don't have the greatest reviews here's here's why
00:05:21
Speaker
And then you can explain to them what's going on.
00:05:24
Speaker
A lot of the reviews you see anyways are just completely false, like things that never happen.
00:05:30
Speaker
So, okay, so that's another point is know your online presence.
00:05:34
Speaker
You should always know exactly what is written about you.
00:05:37
Speaker
You should always know exactly what potential negatives your clients, your customers could find about you.
00:05:44
Speaker
you should know what dirt they can dig up on you.
00:05:47
Speaker
So go look that up.
00:05:48
Speaker
I'm constantly Googling my companies, my installers.
00:05:52
Speaker
I'm Googling all that because I want to know exactly what people could possibly find that's negative.
00:05:58
Speaker
You've got to be in the know because if you don't know it, then it's going to be a surprise to you when they bring up a negative.
00:06:04
Speaker
And then that's when you're screwed.
00:06:07
Speaker
Okay, so bring it up.
00:06:08
Speaker
Know your views.
00:06:10
Speaker
A good example of this, I know a lot of guys, myself included, are selling Sunnova, right?
00:06:15
Speaker
Sunnova as the financer, as the lender.
00:06:19
Speaker
So if you go look up Sunnova, they don't have great reviews.
00:06:24
Speaker
hey and so you got to know this when people when I sell a deal through Sun Nova PPA or alone I almost always will bring it up hey so know where they're the lender for this just so you know you can look them up but yeah unfortunately they've done
00:06:43
Speaker
They've done their own installs, they've done deals all over the country, so they have a huge client base, but they are just the ones financing this, in case you're not working with them.
00:06:54
Speaker
And really stress that they're working with the installation company, so no is simply the lender.
00:07:00
Speaker
and then focus it on the installation company on the installers it's not something I do when I deal with Sunnova specifically okay so tip number two is bring up how many customers you have this is something that comes from again I mentioned my Vivint Solar guys my buddies that sold with Vivint Solar while these larger organizations they're gonna have tons of negatives it's a no when it's a no way as an example of that
00:07:28
Speaker
That's just the fact of the matter.
00:07:30
Speaker
When you get hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of customers, of clients, you're always going to have negatives.
00:07:36
Speaker
So what do you do?
00:07:37
Speaker
Bring up examples.
00:07:39
Speaker
Do math with them right on the spot.
00:07:42
Speaker
So you can go, I mean, in the Sun Nova example, they have thousands and thousands of customers across the country, right?
00:07:51
Speaker
So if you look on there, you're going to see, what, maybe a couple hundred negative reviews.
00:07:57
Speaker
So for example, let's say there are 100 negative reviews.
00:08:02
Speaker
Maybe you've done 5,000 installs.
00:08:03
Speaker
You have 5,000 customers.
00:08:05
Speaker
You can do the math on that.
00:08:05
Speaker
100 divided by 5,000.
00:08:06
Speaker
What is that?
00:08:07
Speaker
That's only 2% of your customers, right?
00:08:15
Speaker
So, I mean, do the math, show them on the calculator.
00:08:18
Speaker
You look, Mr. Customer, this represents about 2% of the people we've done.
00:08:24
Speaker
So yeah, I understand there's going to be mistakes.
00:08:27
Speaker
Unfortunately, there's issues that happened.
00:08:31
Speaker
But let me ask you, Mr. Customer, how many times have you had a positive experience and not written about it?
00:08:37
Speaker
Like you probably went to Starbucks yesterday, got your coffee just fine.
00:08:41
Speaker
Did you write them a good review?
00:08:43
Speaker
Probably not, right?
00:08:44
Speaker
So how many people are out there that had a fantastic experience that everything went super smooth that didn't write about it?
00:08:52
Speaker
And guess what?
00:08:53
Speaker
Those people weren't working with me.
00:08:55
Speaker
I'm going to take care of you.
00:08:57
Speaker
We're going to make sure everything goes smoothly.
00:08:59
Speaker
I can pinky promise you if you want.
00:09:01
Speaker
You want me to pinky promise you?
00:09:03
Speaker
Okay, great.
00:09:04
Speaker
So we'll make sure everything goes good.
00:09:06
Speaker
So right now we're just going to get a few documents submitted.
00:09:08
Speaker
Boom.
00:09:10
Speaker
That's how you do it.
00:09:10
Speaker
Okay, so bring up the math.
00:09:13
Speaker
Bring up, ask them.
00:09:15
Speaker
Ask them how many times they've written positive reviews.
00:09:18
Speaker
And that's going to call them out on the spot.
00:09:21
Speaker
I mean,
00:09:22
Speaker
99.9% of people do not go writing positive reviews about every interaction they've had.
00:09:28
Speaker
That's just the fact of the matter.
00:09:30
Speaker
So if you can do the math with them, if you can get them to realize that people do not just, you know, write pure positives, that it's a business, then that's going to help.
00:09:40
Speaker
Okay, so that's the second tip.
00:09:41
Speaker
Bring up how many customers you have, do some math with them, and then get them to realize that there's going to be negatives, but we're going to get it figured out.
00:09:51
Speaker
And then the third and final tip I have is tell stories of neighbors close by.
00:09:56
Speaker
And this is where testimonials come in.
00:09:58
Speaker
If you haven't listened to the episode from a couple weeks back about video testimonials, go listen to that.
00:10:04
Speaker
And that's going to change the way you sell.
00:10:07
Speaker
And that's going to probably prevent you from even having to overcome objections like this.
00:10:12
Speaker
So if you can show them solid video testimonials of neighbors, especially people in the neighborhood they're in,
00:10:20
Speaker
then they're not even going to bring up these things because they're going to trust people in their neighborhood way more than anything they can find online, right?
00:10:28
Speaker
That's why I suggest getting a video testimonial with everyone you can.
00:10:33
Speaker
And then another thing I learned from a lot of my guys over at these bigger companies, Vivint Solar, is pull up maps.
00:10:41
Speaker
If you can, start tracking.
00:10:43
Speaker
Have your company start keeping a spreadsheet or keeping track on a map of all your installs.
00:10:50
Speaker
A reference sheet, utilize them.
00:10:53
Speaker
Make sure you have pins on a map, something, where you can pull up, hey, this is how many people we've done in the area.
00:11:00
Speaker
Do you think this many people would have gone with us if things were terrible?
00:11:04
Speaker
Probably not.
00:11:05
Speaker
And that's what's so powerful about some of the software that's Vivint Solar, some of these other companies have access to.
00:11:13
Speaker
Sunrun is on their proposals or in their knocking apps, they can see every past customer.
00:11:19
Speaker
How powerful is that?
00:11:21
Speaker
If you're in a home, you can say, Mr. Homeowner, this is all your neighbors that actually are already on the program.
00:11:29
Speaker
So yeah, there is negatives, but look, there are six people just in your neighborhood that are already on the program.
00:11:36
Speaker
So rather than trusting all these online shenanigans that may or may not be true,
00:11:41
Speaker
Why don't we drive by, we can go look at the people that are installed in your neighborhood and we can go off of that.
00:11:48
Speaker
Obviously if you're a smaller company and you don't have installs, then you're not going to say that.
00:11:54
Speaker
But I mean you still can use references in the neighborhood though.
00:11:58
Speaker
Even if it's from another company, you can say, Mr. Homeowner, do you think your neighbor across the street would have solar if things were all terrible?
00:12:07
Speaker
You can talk to these people beforehand.
00:12:10
Speaker
I've gotten lots of times people that aren't even with my company that just have solar on the roof.
00:12:15
Speaker
Hey, would you recommend your solar to your neighbors?
00:12:18
Speaker
Great.
00:12:18
Speaker
Do you mind if I use your name as a reference?
00:12:22
Speaker
There you go, you got a name, you got a person you can use as a reference right there, and that's gonna help out a ton.
00:12:29
Speaker
So make sure you're just collecting as much social proof as possible.
00:12:33
Speaker
Get pictures as a last resort.
00:12:36
Speaker
Something I heard from my friend River Skinner,
00:12:40
Speaker
If he's listening to this, I'm referencing him from one of his Instagram stories.
00:12:46
Speaker
But what's really cool is he will send out a thank you card with his picture and the customers in it.
00:12:52
Speaker
This is kind of off topic, but that's something super powerful you can do.
00:12:57
Speaker
Get pictures with your customers.
00:12:59
Speaker
SendOutCards.com, I think, is a website where you can actually just create online cards.
00:13:05
Speaker
You can throw your picture in there, send it to your customers.
00:13:09
Speaker
So sort of off topic, but make sure you're collecting all the social proof as possible.
00:13:13
Speaker
This is going to help reduce cancellations and help you continue to dominate out there.
00:13:19
Speaker
So thanks again for the topic recommendation.
00:13:22
Speaker
Let me know what you guys thought.
00:13:23
Speaker
Let me know if you guys have any other ideas on overcoming negative reviews, things you have done, and love to hear your feedback.
00:13:34
Speaker
Again, shoot me your topic suggestions.
00:13:36
Speaker
Let me know what you thought and send me your guest suggestions as well.
00:13:40
Speaker
If you guys know of anyone that is absolutely dominating that we need to have on the show, let's get them on.
00:13:45
Speaker
So hope that helped.
00:13:47
Speaker
Hope you will tune in for the next show and we will see you on the flip side.
Introducing Sol Society
00:13:53
Speaker
Hey SolarPrinters, quick question.
00:13:55
Speaker
What if you could surround yourself with the industry's top performing sales pros, marketers, and CEOs and learn from their experience and wisdom in less than 20 minutes a day?
00:14:04
Speaker
For the last three years, I've been placed in the fortunate position to interview dozens of elite solar professionals
00:14:10
Speaker
and learn exactly what they do behind closed doors to build their solar careers to an all-star level.
00:14:16
Speaker
That's why I want to make a truly special announcement about the new solar learning community exclusively for solar professionals to learn, compete, and win with the top performers in the industry.
00:14:27
Speaker
And it's called Sol Society.
00:14:29
Speaker
This learning community was designed from the ground up to level the playing field and give solar pros access to proven mentors who want to give back to this community and help you or your team to be held accountable by the industry's brightest minds for, are you ready for it?
00:14:44
Speaker
Less than $3.45 a day.
00:14:47
Speaker
Currently, Soul Society is closed to the public and membership is by invitation only, but solopreneurs can go to soulciety.co to learn more and have the option to join a waitlist when a membership becomes available in your area.
00:15:01
Speaker
Again, this is exclusively for Solopreneur listeners, so be sure to go to www.solciety.co to join the waitlist and learn more now.
00:15:13
Speaker
Thanks again for listening.
00:15:15
Speaker
We'll catch you again in the next episode.