LOOK Lavastone Steakhouse's epic social media meltdown

Social media is an important medium to comment and engage with your customers – we all know this.But sometimes, we struggle to find the balance. When do you respond to a rant? When do you defend yourself? When do you apologise?Well, one F&B outlet, Lavastone Steakhouse, took a rather bold approach to responding to criticism on social media. It decided to get somewhat aggressive and investigative on its consumer “feedback” - probing and prodding vehemently.Take a look at what happened:Unfortunately, its aggressive response tactic led to further outrage from customers and the eatery losing the number of stars on its feedback review scale. Since then, the F&B outlet has released a statement where it clarified that due to the recent publicity around the matter, it’s review rate dropped:“As we can all see, most 1-start reviews are created in order to bring "justice" to the rating (ironically) and because of our response to other bad reviews. HOWEVER, they do not reflect any value or constructive views about the food and service we serve at our place. Therefore, those reviews are simply for sensational purposes only that has created huge followers and great 'publicity'.”Lavastone then went ahead to clarify that its response to reviews which slammed the company were simply to clarify with the customers about what happened during their visit.“Perhaps the language used may not be accurate, too straight forward or not to your liking, but there's definitely no offence intended as mentioned. If there is any offence taken, we sincerely apologise […] We continue to look forward to SINCERE and TRUE reviews,” it said.Read the full statement here:While bold can sometimes be beautiful, in this instance, a fine line was crossed.In an earlier conversation with Marketing,Lorna Lennon, managing director of boutique crisis consultancy Bailiwick said that when on social media, brands need "clear house rules on" acceptable content and conduct."Then, moderate. House rules should also cover discriminatory content. If discriminatory content is posted, the brand can pull the commentary because the user is not respecting its house rules,” said Lennon.Meanwhile, Don Anderson, regional managing director of We are Social also advises that in most cases, it’s better to take the conversation offline and decide on a ‘win-back’ strategy with the individual - rather than have an open for all conversation online.