No matter how good your business is not everyone will see the appeal of your product or service. Sometimes this will lead to bad reviews in the press or online. This was recently discussed on the UK Business Forums when Claire asked about dealing with bad press.

Her business is The Crystal Chick and they encrust items such as mobile phone fascias (Motorola, Nokia, LG, Samsung), ipod cases, bling mp3 earphones, bluetooth headsets, PC laptop mouse, and lighter’s. For example:

However in reviews such as the one by Wired her business is critisied:

The Crystal Chick has taken a perfectly good, lightweight and unobtrusive Bluetooth headset and ruined it.

So she asked “Is there anything I can do about people writing articles on their websites putting my products down?” My answer was to suggest that she attempts to turn these negative reviews into a positive, the fact that various people (myself included) don’t like the products may well make them more appealing to her target market.

This made me think of the excellent advice Guy Kawasaki gives in his book The Art Of The Start:

Polarise people. When you create a product or service that some people love, don’t be surprised when others hate you. Your goal is to catalyze passion – pro or anti. Don’t be offended if people take issue with what you’ve done; the only result that should offend (and scare) you is lack of interest.

The most talked about recent example of this is Nestlé with the Yorkie Bar and their ‘Not For Girls’ campaign:

Which was massively successful and certainly did polarise people. You can read more about the Yorkie campaign here, or see what Nestlé themselves have to say.

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