BizEase Support Solutions HomepageBizEase Support Solutions

  • Home
  • About
    • The Team Behind the Business
    • Compatibility
    • Rates & Terms
    • In Retrospect
  • Services
  • Time = Money!
  • BizEase Blog
  • Client Raves
  • Contact Us
    • Privacy Policy
    • Cookie Policy
  • Cool Resources

When Bad Things Happen to Good Business Owners and Entrepreneurs!

January 14, 2010 By Terry Green

by Michelle PW

MPW_web_02_03It’s an unfortunate fact of life (and business). Out of the blue you get a nasty email from someone. Sometimes it’s about an article you’ve written. Sometimes it’s accompanied by a refund request. Sometimes it doesn’t seem like it’s tied to anything at all.

Or maybe you discover someone writing malicious things about you on a blog or a forum. Or maybe some other negative things suddenly start getting tweeted or posted to Facebook about you, your products or your business.

Stuff happens. As a business owner and entrepreneur, the more successful you become, the more you open yourself up to criticism, negative feedback or just plain being attacked.

As someone who is both a writer AND a business owner, I know all about what happens when you’re dealing with unwelcome criticism. (I write fiction so yes, I’ve dealt with my share of negative feedback.) But if this is something new for you, or even if it’s not new but you’re feeling like you’ve just been sucker-punched by something out of the blue, I thought I’d share a few insights to help you get through it.

1.  Know you’re not alone. We’ve ALL been there. And I mean exactly that. It doesn’t matter how small or big your business is, stuff like this is going to happen. So know that no matter what just happened to you, there are a lot of entrepreneurs and business owners out there who will both sympathize and emphasize.

2.  See it for what it is. All criticism is not created equally. Sometimes what someone is saying has absolutely nothing to do with you and everything to do with their own issues. Sometimes they have a legitimate complaint but the person is so unhappy with their own life they blow it completely out of portion because they just want to strike out at someone and you’re the one they picked.

And sometimes they have a legitimate beef AND they handled it fine, but you just didn’t want to hear it. An example of this is some of the criticism I’ve gotten from some of my stories. The people were thoughtful and absolutely right. And I hated them. (Until I got over myself and slunk back to the keyboard to make the edits.)

Now the third option doesn’t happen too often (unless you’re a fiction writer) but the first two do. You just have to see it for what it is. If there’s something buried in the anger and name-calling you can use to improve your products, services or business, by all means use it. But know the rest of it has absolutely nothing to do with you and everything to do with them.

(And you’ll know when the criticism is right. Trust me. Your gut will tell you.)

3.  Be kind to yourself. When these things happen, it can hurt. And that’s okay. Call a friend. Or better yet, your mother (if you can). Write about it in your journal. Take a walk. Don’t bury your feelings, let yourself feel bad and then let it go. Don’t tell yourself it doesn’t matter and let it fester inside you, deal with it. Get it out of you. And then let it go.

4.  Let someone else deal with these things. Whenever possible, have someone else in your business be a filter for stuff like this. Let other people take care of refund requests or just read the nasty emails and they can decide if there’s a legitimate complaint buried in there or not. Protect yourself, there’s no need for you to see everything or deal with everything. Yes you’ll have to step in if something big happens, but let other people take care of the small stuff. The small stuff is what wears you down anyway. Save yourself for the big things and don’t worry about the rest.

Michele PW (Michele Pariza Wacek) is your Ka-Ching! marketing strategist and owns Creative Concepts and Copywriting LLC, a copywriting and marketing agency. She helps entrepreneurs become more successful at attracting more clients, selling more products and services and boosting their business. To find out how she can help you take your business to the next level, visit her site at http://www.MichelePW.com

Print Friendly, PDF & Email
Terry Green
Terry Green

In business since 1991, Terry Green is the founder/CEO/President of BizEase Support Solutions, an American-based, online marketing support company comprised of a team of talented professionals from around North America. BizEase excels at providing speakers and business coaches worldwide with seamless online marketing solutions, from setting up ecommerce solutions, membership sites, web design and maintenance, to writing blog posts and managing Social Media and PR campaigns. BizEase clients (who span five continents) take great joy in allowing the BizEase team to take care of the details so they can get back to doing what they do best! Click here to get our bi-weekly tips ezine delivered to your inbox every other Friday, with tips on plugins, apps, and tools to make you more productive today!

Filed Under: Communication, Customer Service Tagged With: copywriting, Customer Service, michelle pw, terry green, terry l. green, virtually this and that

Comments

  1. Christina says

    January 24, 2010 at 9:15 am

    Love your post. Not only good for business owners and entrepreneurs, could also be applied on a personal level.

Let's Connect on Social Media!

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn

Get Free Blog Updates!

Never miss a blog post again. Enter your email address below and we'll let you know each time we publish a new post!

Thanks so much!

You're almost set to receive your blog updates! Watch your inbox to confirm your email address and you'll be good to go!

Check out our most recent posts!

  • How to Engage Creatively on LinkedIn March 3, 2021
  • How Not to Be a Desperate Marketer! February 24, 2021
  • 5 Easy Ways To Give Away Useful Content In Your Marketing February 17, 2021
  • What Are You Doing and Who Are You Doing it For? February 10, 2021
  • How Healthy is the Financial Health of Your Business? February 3, 2021

© Copyright 2011–2021 BizEase Support Solutions · A Division of Fastype VA Services, Inc · Privacy Policy · All Rights Reserved