Every week, I read Google reviews.
It's part of my job.
I work in marketing, and one of my responsibilities is keeping up with what people are saying about their experiences across the internet.
Some reviews are five stars with no explanation.
Others are paragraphs long.
Some people share how welcomed they felt. Others talk about an interaction that left them disappointed. Occasionally, someone leaves a review that has very little to do with anything at all.
It's an interesting thing to read every week.
Hundreds of people can walk into the same building, participate in the same experience, hear the same message, and leave with entirely different impressions.
One person remembers how someone greeted them at the door.
Another remembers that nobody did.
One person walks away feeling like they found somewhere they belong.
Another walks away feeling invisible.
And both experiences can be true.
I think about that a lot.
We spend so much time thinking about how we want things to be experienced.
In marketing, we carefully choose words, images, colors, and messages. We think about what we want someone to feel when they encounter something we've created.
But eventually, whatever we've made leaves our hands.
People experience it through their own expectations, histories, moods, and circumstances.
And we don't get to control what they take away.
I've started to think that's one of the more humbling things about creating anything.
Our intentions don't always determine someone else's experience.
We can mean well and still miss something.
We can work incredibly hard on something that someone barely notices.
And sometimes, the smallest detail, the thing nobody planned or thought much about, becomes the part someone remembers most.
I see that in these reviews.
People rarely describe the strategy behind an experience.
They describe how it made them feel.
They remember a conversation. A gesture. Someone taking the time to help. Or the absence of those things.
And it makes me wonder how often we overlook the details that matter most because we're focused on the bigger picture.
I've also learned that listening isn't always comfortable.
It's easy to appreciate the positive reviews. They affirm the work people have put in.
The negative ones require something different.
Sometimes criticism is fair. Sometimes it's missing context. Sometimes it's difficult to know what actually happened.
But I don't think listening means agreeing with everything someone says.
It means being willing to consider that there might be something worth understanding.
That's a distinction I'm still learning.
Because whether we're building a brand, creating something, leading people, or just moving through our everyday lives, we're constantly leaving impressions on people.
Most of them we'll never hear about.
Every now and then, someone decides to tell us.
And I think that's worth paying attention to.
Not because every opinion should change what we do.
But because there's a difference between wanting to be understood and being willing to understand someone else.
Every week, I open another collection of reviews.
Some are encouraging. Some are disappointing. Some make me laugh.
But every so often, one makes me stop and think about something I hadn't considered before.
And maybe that's the part of the job I value most.
Not knowing what people think.
Or just being reminded that there's always something I haven't noticed.
