The Ultimate Guide For Encouraging Customer Reviews On Google

1. Improve Your Online Reputation. Online reviews can significantly impact a business's reputation. Positive reviews can improve a business's image, attract more customers, and increase revenue. Conversely, negative reviews can harm a business's reputation and deter potential customers.

2. Increase Search Engine Visibility. Reviews can also impact a business's search engine visibility. Google uses review data to determine a business's relevance and authority, which can affect its search engine ranking.

3. Understand Customer Sentiment. Reading customer reviews can provide valuable insights into customers' opinions, preferences, and pain points. This information can help business owners make informed decisions about their products, services, and overall customer experience.

4. Improve Customer Engagement. Encouraging customers to leave reviews can also help improve customer engagement. When customers feel heard and valued, they are more likely to return and recommend the business to others.

The most important strategy for encouraging positive Google reviews is, of course, to provide excellent customer service! If your customers have a positive experience with your business, they are more likely to leave a positive review. Assuming you already provide an excellent customer experience, here are some of the things you can do additionally to encourage your customers to leave you positive reviews on Google.

• Ask!

Many customers are willing to leave a review if you simply ask! You can ask for reviews in person, on your website, or in a follow-up email after the customer's experience with your business. We've found that personally asking works best.

• Make It Easy

You can make it easy for customers to leave a review by providing a direct link to your Google My Business page, or a direct link to simply leave you a Google review. You can include this link in your email signature, on your website, and in your follow-up emails to your customers. 

• Incentivize Reviews

You can offer customers a small incentive, such as a discount or free product, for leaving a review. However, be careful not to offer incentives which are too large, or that could be seen as paying for reviews. 

• Respond to Reviews

Responding to reviews, both positive and negative, shows that you value your customers' feedback and are committed to improving your business. This can encourage more customers to leave reviews and can also help build customer loyalty.

• Use Signage

You can display signs in your business or on your website that encourage customers to leave a review. Make sure the sign includes a direct link to your Google My Business page or a review page.

You might find it useful to follow a script to ask your customers for reviews, especially if you're using the follow-up email method. Here's an example:

Hello, (Customer Name)!      

We are so happy that we were able to exceed your expectations. 

Would you be willing to write an online review about your experience with (Your Business Name)? We'd really appreciate if you'd be willing to share your feedback with us.

To leave us a review, please click (link to your review site). It would be a great help.

Thanks,      

(Your Business Name)"

There are many types of scripts you can use for this, but the important thing is to ask, and to make it easy for your customers to respond positively.

Start by grabbing your custom review link from Google. If you have a Google My Business Account, this is very easy:

On your computer, sign in to your Google My Business account, click “Home” on the left menu, and click the “Get More Reviews” card. A window will pop up with your listing’s short URL. Simply click it to automatically copy, or you can choose to share it on a specific platform. On your smartphone, open the Google My Business app, tap “Customers,” then “Reviews,” then tap “Share” on the top right.

If you don't have a Google My Business Account, you can grab your Google Review link by finding your business listing on Google (if you're not sure how to do this, simply Google your business!) and find the following link:

Once you have this link, you can use an online link shortener such as bit.ly to make the link a little more snack-sized for your customers.

One of the first places your customers are going to look for a place to write a review is your website. You have several options for linking them to your Google Reviews page. You can use a Google Widget so customers can easily see what others are saying about your business. This can encourage them to click on "Leave a Review" right from your website. Google widgets are included out of the box in many content management systems (CMS), or you can grab one from this Google review widget site.

Another great option is to include a Google review button in the footer of your website. That way, you have it on every page. If you want to get REALLY creative, you could create an entire page dedicated to Google Reviews. This could include both a call-to-action to write a review, as well as a place to showcase existing reviews.

Sometimes, a quick little video on "How to Leave a Google Review" is all it will take for your customers to see how easy it is. Create or provide a little 60-second walkthrough for your customers with instructions on leaving a Google Review, which may encourage them to take the leap.

When offering incentives to customers to leave you Google reviews, it's important to avoid incentives which could be perceived as buying / paying for reviews, or anything which might attract fake reviews. It's also crucial to be transparent about the incentive and make it clear that it's not contingent on a positive review.

An appropriate incentive to offer could be a small discount or coupon for their next purchase. For example, you could offer customers a 10% discount on their next purchase, or a coupon for a free product or service.

Another approach is to hold a contest that customers can enter by leaving a Google review. For example, you could offer a prize such as a gift card or a free product to a randomly selected reviewer. This can be a fun and engaging way to incentivize reviews without appearing to be paying for them.

Remember, while incentives can be effective, they should never be the sole reason for customers to leave a review. The primary incentive for customers to leave a review should be their satisfaction with your business and their desire to share their positive experience with others.

One of the easiest ways to create effective in-store or other signage is to create a QR code using an online QR code generator. Simply embed your Google Review link into the QR code. Then, have it printed on your signage, along with guidance: "Are you satisfied with our customer service? Scan here to leave us a review!" Make sure that the QR code is prominent. This way, customers can leave you reviews directly from their phones!

While there's lots of ways to generate QR codes from URLs, the QR Code Generator from Beaconstac gives you different visual options for your QR code that you can easily generate and download as a PNG.

Asking for reviews in person or on your website is a great start, but you can also provide a business card with a QR code or shortlink that takes your customer straight to your review page so that they can leave a review with ease.

You should also target social media. It is very easy to post a quick invitation to your customers on your social media platforms. Maybe include a snippet or your latest positive review and invite them to do the same so that other customers can experience the same great service that they received.