Glassdoor is an employment review website that boasts more than 55 million reviews and attracts over 64 million unique monthly visitors. With Glassdoor having such an enormous impact, it's a priority for employers to monitor their reviews on the platform.

Bad reviews on Glassdoor can make job-seekers reconsider applying — and even make consumers think twice about supporting your brand. However, the platform doesn't allow employers to delete bad reviews. That means your company needs an effective strategy for dealing with negative feedback.

This guide explains how to respond to a negative Glassdoor review in four simple steps. It includes screenshots of real responses, plus negative review response templates your business can easily customize.

It also discusses some common reasons why employers receive poor reviews on Glassdoor and other review sites and answers your FAQs about Glassdoor review management. 

Top 13 reasons employees leave negative Glassdoor reviews

In 2023, ThriveMap used AI to analyze "hundreds of negative Glassdoor reviews for frontline roles such as those in hospitality, customer service, and fast-food, to understand what exactly fuels dissatisfaction" among current or former employees and applicants. 

According to the analysis, which you can read more about on LinkedIn, here were five of the top most common reasons behind negative reviews on Glassdoor:

1. The interview process is too long, too slow, or otherwise over-complicated
2.  The follow up is slow: It takes too long for the company to follow up or provide feedback after an interview
3. The application process requires candidates to submit too many forms or other documents (such as "extensive CVs, lengthy assessments, and detailed cover letters")
4. There are miscommunications around job roles (such as "interview questions that seem out of sync with the entry-level nature of the position")
5. The employer asks irrelevant interview questions or asks questions that seem "commonplace and predictable" 

In addition to the reasons listed above, here are some other pain points that can lead to a negative Glassdoor review from an employee, previous employee, or interviewee:

• Lack of employee benefits
• Employee complaints about raises, salaries, or compensation
• Micromanagement
• Lack of communication from management
• Hostile work environment
• Lack of diversity or inclusiveness
• No opportunities, or limited opportunities, for professional development  
• Concerns about workplace safety 

How to respond to negative reviews on Glassdoor in 4 steps

Ignoring bad reviews allows reviewers to control the narrative around your business. By responding to negative reviews and addressing the issues mentioned, you can provide job seekers with a more accurate picture of your company's values and the work environment you strive to create.

The key is to respond professionally, promptly, and courteously in a way that follows best practices. Each response should:

1. Thank the reviewer
2. Be personalized
3. Describe how you're addressing concerns
4. Encourage the reviewer to continue the conversation offline

Let's go over each step and look at examples of how to apply them.  

Step 1: Thank the reviewer for their feedback 

It's hard to feel grateful when your company receives a negative review, but it's essential to thank reviewers for their comments and ratings. In fact, Glassdoor recommends thanking reviewers as part of each review response: 

Here are some examples of ways to thank your reviewers:

Review reesponse examples:

• "Thank you for taking the time to share your detailed comments with us."
• "Thanks for leaving a rating and review for [ Company Name ]."
• "Thanks for taking a few moments to provide us with feedback about your experience [ working at, interviewing with, etc. ] [ Company Name ]." 

Step 2: Personalize your review response with details

Job searchers are more likely to engage with businesses that listen to and care about their employees' feedback. It's best practice to personalize your review responses and avoid using the same, copied-and-pasted block of text repeatedly.

For example, you can mention your company name and location and reference specific details from the original review. You should also use different wording in each response, like "our team members" vs. "our valued employees" or "exceptional" vs. "outstanding," to ensure that each response is unique.

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Response Examples:

• "Here at [ Company Name ] in [ Company Location ], we take pride in providing [ competitive benefits, cutting-edge training programs, professional development opportunities, etc. ] to our team members."
• "We appreciate your detailed comments about [ reference a detail from the review, such as site safety or shift scheduling ]." 

Step 3: Describe what your business is doing to address concerns

Job seekers checking your Glassdoor account won't be encouraged to apply if all they see are negative reviews with no meaningful action being taken by your business.

When you show that you're taking steps to resolve an issue, it demonstrates to employees and applicants that you genuinely care about their experience, which helps your organization retain and attract talent. 

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Response Examples:

• "Please be assured that this issue is being addressed by our new training program."
• "We will share your comments with our [ team leaders, management team, senior management, etc. ] for an in-depth review."
• "Your comments regarding [ detail from the review ] will be shared with our senior management team so that we can work to improve our performance in this area."
• "We value your feedback highly and are always open to learning how we can deliver a better [ employee, employment, interview, application, etc. ] experience." 

Step 4: Encourage the reviewer to follow up privately

While you might disagree with the reviewer's comments or rating, it's important to maintain a respectful attitude and avoid becoming argumentative or threatening legal action. Instead, try to move the conversation offline so the issue can be resolved privately.

Invite the reviewer to contact your HR department if they need further assistance or support, and reassure them that their feedback is always welcome and valued. 

Response Examples:

• "Please don't hesitate to contact [ your HR professional, our Human Resources department, our corporate office, etc. ] if there's any additional feedback you'd like to share."
• "We encourage you to reach out directly to [ HR, Human Resources, our HR team, etc.] so that we can learn more about your experience at [ Company Name ]."  

Can you remove negative Glassdoor reviews?

In most cases, the answer is no: as an employer, you cannot delete a bad rating or review from your company's Glassdoor profile. You also can't pay Glassdoor to take down the review for you. Only the person who posted the review can remove or edit their comments (which Glassdoor refers to as "contributions").

Here's how Glassdoor explains it:

"We do not allow anyone to pay us to remove reviews simply because it's the right thing to do. It's important for our business that we don't. If we gave clients control over what reviews to display, we'd lose credibility, and job seekers would stop using Glassdoor to research employers and apply for jobs."

That said, reviews must obey the platform's Community Guidelines—and if they break the rules, you can report them for removal. 

Therefore, it's useful to know what types of content are prohibited. 

Here are some examples of Glassdoor's rules for reviews:

• No "aggressive" or "offensive" reviews
• No insults or "hateful content"
• No sharing of confidential information (like the names of employees other than company presidents or C-suite executives)
• No slurs, hate speech, discrimination, or stereotyping
• No profanity or obscenity
• No spam or irrelevant content
• No impersonation of others
• No links are allowed, and most types of images are prohibited
• All reviewers "must currently work for or have worked for the company within the last 5 years"  

How to respond to online employee reviews easily

Responding to Glassdoor reviews gives you the opportunity to improve your reputation, educate reviewers about your business, and attract top talent to your organization. 

ResponseScribe enables you to reap the benefits of responding to reviews without sacrificing time and effort writing your own review responses. 

ResponseScribe is an easy-to-use, cloud-based review response service that handles all of your writing, editing, and publishing tasks. This frees up bandwidth your team can use to tackle other initiatives while ensuring consistency and professionalism across all of your messaging. 

We respond to positive and negative employee reviews on:

• Glassdoor
• ZipRecruiter
• CareerBliss
• Vault
• Fairygodboss
• Rate My Employer
• Kununu
• Indeed
• 50+ other review sites 

Your business can choose an AI-powered, human-powered, or hybrid content strategy and cancel or upgrade plans at any time. Review every response before it goes live, or embrace the efficiency of full automation—your team can be as involved or hands-off as you like.

With over 10 years of experience responding to millions of reviews for brands like Burger King, Denny’s, and Kia, you can feel confident that your reputation is in capable hands. 

Attract job seekers and boost your company’s reputation with an AI-powered Glassdoor review response service 

When employers respond to negative reviews on their company's Glassdoor profile, it sends a signal to current and future employees that you genuinely care about their experience. With an efficient response strategy, retaining employees and attracting top talent is easier than ever before.

Grow your company, manage your reputation, and earn more positive reviews with an AI-powered review response service trusted by over 10,000 brands.

Start your free trial of ResponseScribe today, and discover a simpler approach to Glassdoor review management.