Business Owner's Guide (FAQ)

As a business owner or manager, what is the The New Hanoian and what can it do for me?

For businesses in Hanoi, The New Hanoian website has multiple purposes. At the simplest level, getting your business on The New Hanoian ensures that the community of Hanoi has a chance to find you. With photos, contact information, a short description, and a map to your location, you business will have taken its first step out of the shadows. For those who whish to make a concerted effort to reach a greater customer base, we have a range of advanced features to put you in touch with the potential customers you value most. Finally, The New Hanoian is also your opportunity to find out what your existing customers think of their experiences with you. The public reviews contributed by our community of users offer a broad overview of what's effective or ineffective at your place and others around Hanoi.

How can I get my business on The New Hanoian? Do I need to pay?

For basic inclusion on The New Hanoian, there is no payment needed whatsoever. Any business or organization that may be of interest to the community in Hanoi may be included. Contact information, photos, a description, and its location in the city are welcome additions to our database. These can be entered in one of two ways:

1. An interested business can contact us and set up a meeting so that we can collect the necessary information. This may involve some delay as we find a free day to get out to your location.
2. The most immediate way to get it done is to enter it yourself! Any registered user (including a business owner) can enter a favorite spot of theirs not yet on the site. The entry will be posted immediately with an "unverified" status. This indicates that while it is included on the site, it will not receive full standing until our staff are able to visit the business and evaluate the entry

What do I do if the information on my business's page is incorrect?

If any of the basic contact information or the position on the map is incorrect, please send us the corrections by email. If you feel that the description or the photos do not properly depict your establishment, explain to us the nature of your objection, and we will make the necessary corrections or meet with you to discuss them in greater detail.

Can I advertise on The New Hanoian?

Yes and No. Fundamentally, The New Hanoian is a community-based information resource with user-generated content. We are not a web magazine, a blog, or a guide book. We may offer many of the same appeals as these other publications, but we do so in a much different manner. What we do is provide a framework that helps the Hanoi community locate your business and decide if it suits their needs. Fellow users who have preceded them provide the detailed insights that allow them to make decisions with greater confidence than any magazine ad could. While we do not sell any banner ads or preferential treatment on the site, we do offer some sophisticated ways of increasing the likelihood that New Hanoian interested in your services will locate you. If you would like to meet with us and discuss how we may be able to most effectively represent your business on our site and bring it to the attention of new customers, please contact our sales department: sales@newhanoian.com. We have a variety of ways to help you become a more active part of the Hanoi community without hammering your potential customers with ugly forms of advertising that everyone is tired of seeing.

Now that my business is on the site and getting reviewed on a regular basis, what's the best way for us to use this to our advantage?

Those first reviews appearing on your page can be a nerve-wracking time, be they positive or negative comments. The most important thing is to remain calm and clear-headed about the whole process. When you're feeling a bit tense about user impressions that are out there for anyone to read, keep a few simple things in mind:

• Don't overreact to any single review! Of course every customer's experience is important to you, but when considering the impact of a review on your potential customers' feelings about your place, take a deep breath. Our users are smart people. They understand that not everybody is impressed with the same things. They expect differences of opinion and are more interested in the information the reviews provide. One user's two star review will read like a five star review to somebody else.
• Don't argue with users who have reviewed your business! One of the most devastating things a business owner or manager can do is lose his or her temper in a "counter-review". It only makes you look defensive and immature. It will not help your image. It is, in fact, more damaging than any negative review could be. Show some class.
• Make ample use of our private messaging system! The New Hanoian has its own internal messaging system that allows users of the site to communicate with one another. This is a potentially powerful tool for any business owner in Hanoi. First, you need to sign up for a user account that clearly states you are the owner/manager of your business. Then, use that account to interact with the users who have reviewed your business. Thank those who had kind words to say, and find out more from those who were disappointed. Just be sure to keep your tone professional. Again, take a deep breath. Lashing out at a reviewer, even on our private messaging system, will do more harm than good. Treat them with respect and they may give your business a second chance.
• Now that you have an account, feel free to review your own business... so long as you clearly state your relationship to the business. You too are a part of the The New Hanoian community. Your opinion matters. If you make it clear who you are, readers will respect that and take what you say into account. Try to be sneaky about it, and the consequences can be disastrous.
• Do not secretly review your own business in a way that does not make it clear who you are! Do not ask family or friends to do so either! Any of these people are welcome to review it, so long as they clearly state their relationships to the business. I know it may seem clever to try to give yourself a glowing review, but it backfires time and again. Our users are sharp and tend to take this sort of review abuse personally. If they think you are trying to deceive the community, they may ruthlessly critique you for things that would have only been minor issues before. Credibility is a major asset in Hanoi. Don't blow it like this.
• Make great use of the reviews, both the ones on your business page and on those of others'. With a little perspective, it will become apparent just what a wealth of insight is available to you (as a business owner) on these pages. The unfiltered expectations and experiences of a wide range of consumers sit before you.

I understand how it could be very bad for me to secretly review myself on here, but is there anything in place to prevent somebody from abusing this review system?

Anytime there is a system in place to reward merit, there will be those who look for a shortcut around the effort it takes to succeed. However, we have gone to great lengths to put a system in place that automatically marginalizes abusive elements in our community. Users of our site have the ability to label a review they feel is particularly good or bad. With a simple click of a button, a user's overall importance to our rating system can go up or down. If enough of the community thinks a user's reviews are of little or no value (frequently the case with someone trying to write fake reviews), then that user's effect on a business's rating can erode all the way to nothing. A user's overall importance to the community is also affected by other things, such as the volume and variety of reviewing they do. So, in the end, a dozen fake reviews may be worth less than the honest opinion of one of The New Hanoian community's truly respected members. And, if you want to try to fake respect, go right ahead. See where it gets you.