What should I do if someone writes a negative review about my business?
You can never please everyone 100% of the time, no matter how hard you try. Negative reviews are an unfortunate — but entirely normal — part of doing business.
While it’s important to look for patterns in your reviews (e.g., people keep mentioning that the noodle too little or that a particular employee is not polite), you should not read too much into any one review. Most Novnis users are looking for a consensus among all of the reviews they read rather than accepting the revelation of any one review, so you should do the same.
Of course, you can always contact the reviewer or post a public response, but be forewarned that responding to criticism with criticism of your own will almost always work against you.
What should I do if someone writes a review about my business that isn’t true?
We do not arbitrate disputes, so your best bet is to contact the reviewer or post a public response in order to clear up any misunderstandings. If it is clear on the face of the review that it violates our Content Guidelines (e.g., the reviewer admittedly describes a second-hand experience or uses an inappropriate language), you can flag the review to bring it to our attention.
Should I ask my customers to write reviews for me on Novnis?
No, you should not ask your customers to post reviews on Novnis.
For one thing, most businesses tend to ask their happiest customers to write reviews, not the unhappy ones. These self-selected reviews tell only part of the story, and we don’t think that’s fair to consumers. We would much rather hear from members of the Novnis community who are inspired to talk about their experiences without a business owner’s encouragement.
As a result, you shouldn’t be surprised if our software fails to recommend the reviews that you’ve asked your customers to write. Your best bet to get high quality and unbiased reviews about your business is to provide a memorable and amazing customer experience – it has nothing to do with asking your customers to post on Novnis.
Why are so many of the positive reviews for my business not getting recommended?
Here are some possible explanations:
Some of these reviews may have been written by people we don’t know much about, so they aren’t ranking high with our automated recommendation software. This is entirely normal, and it affects all businesses on the site and all types of reviews, whether positive or negative.
Some of these reviews may fit a pattern that is different from what we typically see. Our automated software is trained to detect these anomalies, and even though there may be a good explanation, the software sometimes errs on the side of caution.
Our users write more positive reviews in the first place, so you would expect to see a higher proportion of them being both recommended… and not!
How did my business information end up on Novnis?
We obtained basic business information from third party data providers who gather this type of information from public records and other sources. We also get business information from our users, who are helpful enough to correct the info we have, or let us know about a new spot that just opened down the street. Please feel free to let us know if our information is out of date!
Can I have my business listing information removed from Novnis?
Customers have the right to talk about what they like (and don’t like) about a food they ate, a dentist they went to, or an auto mechanic they visited. We don’t remove business listings, so your best bet is to engage with your customers and critics alike, and hear what they have to say.
Will Novnis remove or reorder bad reviews if a business pays for advertising?
No. You cannot pay us to remove or reorder your bad reviews — it’s just that simple. It’s worth pointing out some additional checks and balances that we build into the system: among other things, our sales team does not have the administrative privileges that might allow them to remove a bad review for an advertiser; similarly, the folks who do have those privileges don’t have anything to do with sales and aren’t compensated on the basis of sales performance.