It was described by participants as a “train wreck,” a “car wreck” and likened to watching a slasher film. No matter how you describe it, the incident was ugly and an example of how not to do things.
On November 8th, a reader who goes by the name L.B. Taylor posted a review for the book “Electra Galaxy’s Mr. Interstellar Feller” by Candace Sams. I wouldn’t categorize this particular review as “scathing,” but Ms. Taylor did point out quite plainly she didn’t like the work and gave the book a 1-star rating. She ended her review by writing, “Save your money, you’ve been warned.”
21 days later, another Amazon member who goes by the name “Niteflyr One” (whom I shall refer to as “Niteflyr”) commented on this review. (Please note: many of the comments in the thread have been deleted by the writers or Amazon, so what follows is my description of the events as I recall from my reading.) In this comment, Niteflyr called into question the reviewer’s intelligence and opined that Amazon should only let professional reviewers post comments about books because authors could lose their jobs over bad ratings. She also referred to Ms. Taylor as a “hit and run reviewer” and blamed her for not understanding the book.
Ms. Taylor responded with a well-put, well thought out response in which she pointed out that she’d never read any of the author’s works previous to this one, that she had no personal issue with the author, and that she just plain didn’t like the book and could not recommend it to others.
To this Niteflyr responded, again calling Ms. Taylor’s intelligence into question and accusing her of being part of a conspiracy to discredit authors via Amazon’s reviews.
Ms. Taylor responded again, defending “amateur” reviewers.
At this point, another commenter “outed” Niteflyr as the author of the book, Candace Sams. This is also the starting point of a diatribe of back and forth comments between Niteflyr and a slew of others with Niteflyr basically accusing the readers of being part of a conspiracy launched by Ms. Taylor (who had since bowed out of the discussion) on another blog. It appeared from the comments that Niteflyr was actually Ms. Sams, though it was never plainly admitted. Some of the comments made by Niteflyr:
- told the posters that she hoped none of them would purchase her books
- blamed her editors repeatedly for the quality of the book
- accused those who posted of being gestapo-like in their tactics
- questioned the intelligence of those who posted
- claimed the negative publicity was helping the sales of the book on Amazon
- claimed some people from her publisher were telling her to keep going (though she also claimed the main editor of her works didn’t have her phone number and never called her)
- “… I don’t want you reading my book. Please don’t. Burn a copy if you can find one …”
- constantly baited Ms. Taylor to return to the “discussion”
Many people, alerted by tweets and blog posts, stopped by to view the scene. Many of them jumped in to add their opinions. By the time I sat down to write this post, most of Niteflyr’s comments were deleted either by the author or by Amazon. This was probably for the best, though large quotes from Niteflyr’s comments are included in others’ comments and can probably be found on other blogs or on Google.
I don’t know for sure if Niteflyr is actually Candace Sams. Though this idea was purported by one or two posters and run with by subsequent ones, I am not totally convinced. Because of this there are two possible ways to examine this mess: 1. as if Niteflyr is Ms. Sams and 2. as if Niteflyr is not Ms. Sams.
If Niteflyr is Ms. Sams
This is a PR and socmed nightmare scenario. While it is important to respond to comments in social media spaces, the “how” of those responses is critical. In this instance, it’s pretty obvious that Niteflyr’s response to Ms. Taylor’s criticism is inappropriate. Instead of chiding the reader for not understanding the nuances of the story and calling her intelligence into question, a better response might have been worded more like: ” Thank you for your comments. I’m sorry you didn’t like this particular book. I understand not every story will appeal to every reader. I invite you to read one of my other works which will, perhaps, be more to your liking.” That type of response could have opened up a dialog between author and readers and resulted in some constructive ideas instead of what actually did occur.
Many people posted comments throughout this thread asking, sometimes begging, Niteflyr to stop, take a deep breath and calm down. Perhaps this finally happened and that is why many of Niteflyr’s comments were deleted a few days later. Unfortunately, the damage is done.
If Niteflyr is not Ms. Sams
Although somewhat different, this is still a PR and socmed nightmare. While it’s wonderful that a fan of a brand (or author, in this case) might be willing to step up and defend, this is certainly not the way to do it. It’s also possible that Niteflyr is someone who is completely removed from the situation who just likes to “start fires and watch them burn.” If either of these cases is true, then the situation should have been handled differently.
If I were the author or publisher in this case, I would have posted something in the midst of the conversation letting the readers know that Niteflyr was not the author nor anyone officially authorized to post on behalf of the author. I would then have contacted Amazon to let them know what was going on and ask their assistance to prevent any further postings by this person. I’m not sure how Amazon handles this type of situation, but I’m sure it’s against their site policy to cause such a ruckus – especially under false pretenses.
There are three lessons we can draw from this situation:
- Be careful how you respond on line. Your comments will be seen by anyone who cares to stop by. The conversation can be immediately spread like wild fire around the world via Twitter, Facebook, and other social media means. The golden rule applies: Treat others as you’d like to be treated.
- If you are a public “brand” it is critical you take steps to monitor your on line reputation. At the very least you should set up a Google alert or two looking for your name and some key words surrounding your work. There are a number of great tools out there which will automate this process quite nicely. You need to respond quickly should someone start trashing your brand in a public space.
- To go along with #2, you need to have a plan. What will you do if someone starts ruining your on line reputation? How will you handle it? A complex decision tree isn’t quite what is needed, but you should have a basic outline as to how to handle different types of situations. This way you won’t have to worry and fret as the events unfold, you can put your plan into action.
How would you handle a situation like this? If you have dealt with something like this, how did you handle it? What kind of advice would you offer? Please feel free to share in the comments.
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