Your law practice generates clients and referrals on social media. Other attorneys speak highly of you on LinkedIn, and you rate a perfect five stars on Avvo.

And then someone writes a negative review. Whether it's on Google or a similar directory, there's a stain on your reputation. What can you, as managing partner or firm administrator, do about it?

The good news is that you saw it as soon as it was posted. Constant monitoring of your law firm's reputation is essential to a healthy online presence. For most social media, including Google reviews, a daily check suffices.

On Twitter, where updates happen in a matter of seconds, you must log in several times a day. Some large practices have people devoted to watching the account every moment during business hours and on weekends because people on that platform are accustomed to instantaneous responses.

When you see a negative review, do not become emotional. Rage against the person who posted or fear that the negative comment will go viral are not productive feelings. Read and re-read the review until you understand it, research the complaint and develop a planned response.

Here's what you must do:

Answer right away. Post a note in 24 to 48 hours. When people go public with complaints, they want to be heard—and quick. Your note can be as short as: “Thank you for bringing this to our attention. We take every client matter seriously and will work to resolve yours with haste.” Even if you can't do that immediately, show that you care by acknowledging the review. That leads to the second point …

Offer to make it right. A proposed solution can take many forms, each of which depends on the client's situation. A positive gesture can go a long way toward defusing the reviewer's feelings of anger or disappointment. To do that …

Take the conversation private. Lift a page from the communications playbook of major brands and ask the reviewer to discuss the matter with you via a provided email or telephone number, or via private message. That elevates the seriousness of your response while taking it out of the limelight. It's easier to work out a problem when others cannot comment online or share the conversation through a repost.

When responding, be authentic and conversational. Avoid writing like an attorney or a marketer, such as “We serve all clients with the same high quality for which our firm has long been known.” Write the same way you would speak to the person on the phone or in person.

Don't argue. You might be innocent from a legal standpoint, but in the court of public opinion you will be found guilty of indifference or worse. Statements such as, “I am sorry that you don't understand how the law works,” are condescending.

Be succinct. Your law practice's difficulties are not someone else's problems. Thus, don't make excuses. No one cares whether a paralegal forgot to check the court docket. Admit being wrong without details that make you look incompetent, such as losing track of a document for a few days. Acknowledge that you didn't perform at your best and move on.

Take the high road. The post may be rude, crude and false. Do not respond in kind. Act in a professional, polite manner for the sake of your colleagues and everyone who clicks on the zero-star and one-star ratings. Express sympathy: “I am sorry that you were not happy with the  outcome of your case.” The people reading your answer will see that you are not as bad as the review suggests. They may even think it's a fake review. If you do, too, you can …

Report suspicious posts, especially from someone you don't know. Google has a procedure for notifying it of a review that may be spam or designed to harm a business's reputation. So do Yelp and Avvo. Like you, they want honest critiques. However, they may decide that a post doesn't violate their terms and leave it up there, no matter how false the claim.

Is that it? No, you can do more even if you think that the reviewer is not worth the time, will be more combative when directly addressed, or might take a private conversation public with more disparaging remarks.

Turn the negative into a positive. The best outcome is that your legal practice not only makes the client happy, the person posts a follow-up review telling how pleased he or she is. That's one of the best posts because it shows that when your firm makes a mistake, it acknowledges and corrects it in such a way that the client says, “Wow!”

Most important is to have the proper online monitoring tools working for you. Google Alerts can be set up on the name of your firm and key attorneys as well as other social listening applications. Lexis Nexis is also effective. Make this a priority. Your reputation is your most important asset, and it must be protected.

Don Silver is COO of Boardroom Communications, a Florida PR and integrated marketing agency. He co-leads the firm's crisis communications and online reputation management practice group. Contact him at [email protected].