Can You Sue Goodle to Take a Review Down
When you're building a business, y'all want to do everything you lot can to provide stellar products and/or services to your customers. When you operate at a loftier standard, y'all'll proceeds a reputation equally a business concern that people tin trust and rely on—and that reputation will continually drive new customers your way.
Online reviews play a huge role in building that reputation. When potential customers research your business and read glowing, five-star reviews, they're going to want to attain out and practise business with you lot. But if they read a bad review (even if it's biased, unfair or completely untrue), it'southward going to do the opposite—and send those customers straight to your competitors.
As a business owner, you want to do everything yous can to effectively deal with negative reviews so they don't ruin your business' reputation and proceed customers from working with you.
But what do y'all do when you get an unfair or untrue annotate? How do you handle the situation? And tin you (or should y'all) take it as far as suing for defamation?
Contents
- Who Tin can You lot Sue Over a Bad Review?
- Can You Sue Review Sites Directly?
- What Tin can You Exercise?
- What Not to Practise
- Deal With Bad Reviews Effectively
Who Tin can Y'all Sue Over a Bad Review?
To be honest, the answer is: It depends.
For the most office, reviews are covered under the First Subpoena, which protects complimentary speech communication. Additionally, 34 U.South. states accept passed Anti-SLAPP (strategic lawsuits against public participation) laws. Anti-SLAPP is intended to prevent people or businesses from silencing or censoring their critics by intimidating them with the threat of a lawsuit.
Thank you to these protections, if a customer is unhappy with your products or services, or the experiences they've had with your business organisation, they have the correct to say then—whether that exist in person, over the phone, or online.
In that location are, however, exceptions. If a client posts a review that is factually inaccurate or contains accusations well-nigh your business that are untrue, y'all may have grounds to sue the online reviewer for defamation.
The best way to distinguish between the two? Any review that contains a client's opinions or factual data about your business would be covered nether complimentary speech. Some examples of content that would be covered under the Start Amendment include:
- "That business concern charges an arm and a leg!"
- "I wasn't happy with the level of service I received."
- "The customer service representative was rude."
On the other mitt, whatsoever review that contains blatant factual inaccuracies that harm your business could exist grounds for a defamation lawsuit. Some examples of content that might let you to sue (bold the content is untrue) include:
- "This company does not take a license to provide their services."
- "I of the workers stole an expensive watch while painting my dwelling house."
- "This company charged me for services that they never delivered—and have refused to return my money."
Before y'all fifty-fifty consider suing, make sure you distinguish whether the annotate would even qualify as defamation—or if information technology would exist protected under the Start Subpoena.
Can You lot Sue Review Sites Straight?
There are sure scenarios where you would be able to sue a reviewer over a bad review (namely if it independent factual inaccuracies that harmed your concern).
But what near the site where the review is hosted? Can you go above the customer and sue the review site directly?
Every bit it turns out, you can't.
Under the U.Due south. Communications Decency Human action, websites cannot be held liable for publishing any content written by a third party—and that includes review sites similar Yelp, Google Reviews, Healthgrades, and Angie's Listing.
And then if the review site doesn't change or alter the content or pregnant of the original annotate? They're protected from whatever potential libel or defamation suits, which ways you lot can't sue them.
What Can You Do?
If you happen to come up across a negative comment most your business, what should you do? Is filing a defamation lawsuit a feasible pick?
The truth is, information technology takes a significant corporeality of time, money and energy to rent a lawyer and bring a suit to courtroom in order to go a bad review removed from a review site. Only, if the annotate is extremely harmful to your business organization (and you can bear witness it to be false), it may be worth that time, coin and energy. If non, there are other, more than applied means to deal with a bad review.
Some strategies you can use to finer deal with a negative review online include:
- Asking the website to remove the online review. If someone has posted a annotate that'southward both negative and factually inaccurate, you can request that the website remove it past making your case that the information in the review is false. Simply keep in mind that they're under no obligation to remove the review.
- Post a thoughtful, gracious response. Arguably the best style to deal with a negative review? Posting a thoughtful, gracious response. Address any bug brought upwards in the review, share how your company is working to ensure it doesn't happen over again and offer a solution to the customer. For instance, if they had a negative client service, y'all might apologize and offering them a disbelieve code for a future purchase.
- Generate more positive online reviews. One of the best ways to combat negative reviews? With plenty of skilful reviews. Strive to offer the best products and/or services to your customers, make sure they're satisfied and then ask them to post a review.
If you ultimately decide to move forward with a lawsuit, it's important to consult a lawyer immediately. And particularly before you invest too much time, money or free energy into the process. They can give you deeper insights on your legal options, the viability of your instance and whether you might exist able to successfully sue for damages.
What Not to Do
At that place are likewise a few things you lot definitely DON'T want to do when you find a negative review for your business organisation, including:
- React immediately: Reading negative comments sting. So when you read one, your human knee-jerk reaction may be to answer in the moment (e.thousand., by posting a comment defending yourself). Simply if you respond immediately, you lot may react poorly (e.g., lashing out because you experience aroused or insulted). Instead, give yourself time to cool off before you write a measured response.
- Ignore the content: While it can exist hard to read negative or critical things nigh yourself or your business, if at that place's truth to the negative review, information technology tin be a growth opportunity. Don't immediately ignore the content of a review simply because it's negative. Instead, sit down with it. Run across if in that location's any truth to what the review says and develop a plan to address the issue moving forward.
- Retaliate: If a comment is either insulting or spreading lies about your business, y'all may desire to retaliate against the reviewer. But information technology's incredibly important not to retaliate online because that retaliation can come back to haunt you—peculiarly if yous plan to file a defamation suit.
Here's a real-life example:
A contractor filed a $700,000 lawsuit against a homeowner who claimed on Yelp and Angie'south List that he damaged her townhouse, billed her for work he never completed and stole her jewelry. Originally, the courtroom awarded the contractor a victory and ordered the homeowner to take down the annotate about theft.
Merely before going to trial, the contractor posted his own negative comments in response, claiming that since the homeowner never paid, she really stole from him.
Ultimately, the jury adamant that while the homeowner defamed the contractor, the contractor's subsequently negative remarks also defamed her—so no damages were awarded. Essentially, the contractor'south online retaliation may accept cost him a $700,000 settlement.
Deal With Bad Reviews Effectively
No 1 likes to encounter bad reviews for their business—especially if they're malicious, harmful or untrue. But now that you know the about constructive means to deal with them, you'll know how to navigate the situation next fourth dimension you come up across a negative comment—whether that's by managing it on your ain or consulting a lawyer to move forwards with a defamation conform.
This post was updated in Baronial, 2020.
Source: https://www.freshbooks.com/blog/can-you-sue-over-a-bad-review
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