How to get more online reviews for your business

Online reviews are something all modern-day business ventures should strive to acquire, particularly positive ones.

The reality is, the more reviews you have the more noticeable and trustworthy you’ll be in the eyes on an online customer.

This is why amassing a large amount of online reviews is a great way to get into the mind of potential customers and start making more sales within your business.

Although, many business owners have often wondered how they could improve their online review rating, so we’re here to tell you exactly how to do just that.

How important are online reviews to your business?

The importance of customer reviews cannot be under estimated for shoppers and customers. 90% of consumers will read online reviews before visiting a business and making a purchase. With this in mind a whopping 88% of consumers trust online reviews as much as they trust personal recommendations.

These reviews can be the difference between a company with a strong reputation and a company that’s avoided by consumers. In a Google search, if your company has had much interaction, potential customers will likely notice your overall review score. This rating gives them an immediate indication of your business’ quality. This is why it’s now more important than ever to collect as many positive online reviews as possible.

You were likely already aware that reviews can help to develop your business, but knowing how to collect them is more complicated. This article aims to help you learn just why you need them and exactly how you go about getting them.

How to start gathering reviews for your business

The simplest way to gather reviews is to ask for them. This method sounds basic, which it is, but it’s also effective. You don’t have to go around shouting Google my business, but asking for customer feedback can often prompt people to give it.

If you’re a small business that only deals with a limited clientele, send out an email asking them to leave some feedback online. Try to send out slightly different messages in order to give it some personality, or the client may dismiss it as automated spam.

According to Campaign Monitor, emails are opened up to 27% more often if the subject line is personalised. This means even making the commitment to differentiate emails can earn that much-needed customer feedback.

Offering customers an incentive can be another positive way of developing online feedback. Not many people will turn down a freebie, making incentives an often successful method of business-to-customer negotiation. The incentive you decide to offer will be unique to your business, but an online voucher often carries a high level of persuasion.

You must however, be careful not to purchase online reviews in any way. Instead choose to try and build them naturally rather than throwing important funds away for the sake of a quickened development.

Asking for reviews from every customer you ever interact with may seem a bit like overkill, but that isn’t necessarily the case. A commenter on The Financial Times’ website writes, “I agree there are a lot of requests to review now after receiving even minor services. It may be slightly annoying at times, but the opposite approach is zero data collection on the quality of service. I’d prefer to ignore the request rather than never be asked”.

Positive reviews will improve your online reputation

Even if your business has already managed to gain a decent amount of online customer reviews, it doesn’t mean your work is done. Though, we fully appreciate the fact that it is indeed helpful to gain plenty of online reviews, regardless of the rating attached to it. You should however note that for the very best results, you’ll need to boost that Trust Pilot review score up to at least a 4 out of 5.

By gaining customer reviews through your company website itself, or through the use of online review services, such as the likes of Trust Pilot and Yelp, you’re putting your venture on the map. You’re getting it on the radar of your customer base, and more importantly than that, a potentially new, more extensive amount of customers. Gaining new customers is often the secret to success when it comes to the world of business, especially within sales-heavy industries and sectors, so don’t be afraid of trying to branch things out.

If a customer sees a product with 1000 online reviews and compares it to a product with 50 reviews, they’ll always be more trusting of the more heavily-reviewed one. This is because they can clearly see that more people have tried and tested the product and therefore it is more reliable in the mind of the customer. There is a key deciding factor to know of here though, and that is that if you have a product with a thousand reviews, which average a rating of 2 out of 5, but the competing product with only 50 reviews has a rating of 4.5 out of 5, you’ll still almost certainly lose out to them.

Why do my products’ customer review ratings matter?

There are a myriad of reasons why achieving a high rating score matters when it comes to customers deciding on whether they should purchase your goods or not. For instance, a poor review score reflects poor product quality, meaning it will likely lead to an unfulfilling purchase experience for the consumer. The better your customers experience of shopping with your business is, the better quality of review they’ll be more inclined to give you.

Customers like reading reviews before they commit to making a purchase from any business they’re a little unsure of. If your business venture is new to a customer then they will likely be quite wary of shopping with you, before first seeing some primary evidence from shoppers across the internet; they want to be reassured that they’re making a good decision.

According to Fan & Fuel, 94% of online customers read reviews before making any purchasing decisions. For product-specific information, Spiegel Research Centre (2017) shows that 95% of shoppers read reviews before making a purchase.

BrightLocal studies indicate that 97% of consumers use reviews to search for local services. Specifically, 60% of consumers read reviews for restaurants and cafes, 40% for B&B’s, and 33% for medical services.

Small Business Trends shows 83% of job seekers use reviews to support their decisions on which companies to apply to. And 84% of patients use online reviews to evaluate physicians before checking in.

Free micro-marketing

Customer reviews can act as a form of marketing. While reviews can be hard to acquire at first, when the ball starts rolling and you begin to get a larger portion of them, they can turn into valuable assets for your company.

Reviews maintain their effect long after initially being posted. The knock-on effect of a positive online review is that you’ll reap the rewards for an extended amount of time. Other potential clients will notice it for years to come after first going live, meaning the hard-earned positivity is going nowhere once you’ve gained it.

This form of micro-marketing is actually the greatest kind as customers believe it comes from the best possible source: other customers. Hosting Tribunal claims marketing teams are missing the mark with their current ignorant view of online customer-published reviews. They say, “Online reviews are obviously persuasive – yet marketers haven’t necessarily come to appreciate that. With the increase use of mobile devices in 2020, the power of local search will continue to grow and so will the impact of user reviews”.

How do you ask for a 5-star rating?

The simplest way to ask for a 5-star rating is to ask for them. This method sounds basic, which it is, but it’s also effective. You don’t have to go around shouting Google my business, but asking for customer feedback can often prompt people to give it.

If you’re a small business that only deals with a limited clientele, send out an email asking them to leave some feedback online. Try to send out slightly different messages in order to give it some personality, or the client may dismiss it as automated spam.

According to Campaign Monitor, emails are opened up to 27% more often if the subject line is personalised. This means even making the commitment to differentiate emails can earn that much-needed customer feedback.

Offering customers an incentive can be another positive way of developing online feedback. Not many people will turn down a freebie, making incentives an often successful method of business-to-customer negotiation. The incentive you decide to offer will be unique to your business, but an online voucher often carries a high level of persuasion.

You must however, be careful not to purchase online reviews in any way. Instead choose to try and build them naturally rather than throwing important funds away for the sake of a quickened development.

How do I get a Google 5-star link?

To get a Google My Business review 5-star link you will need an iPhone to complete this task. To generate a pre-populated URL for Google My Business review pre-filled with 5 stars isn’t easy, but it’s definitely worth it. This is how you get a 5-star review from your customers:

• Create a Google My Business Page for your company.
• Get your iPhone
• You will need Google Chrome for this task, so download and install it from iTunes store if you don’t have it.
• Use the incognito mode in Chrome and open a new incognito tab. The private mode ensures that you aren’t logged in when creating your Google My Business direct review. This means that your accounts will not be part of the link that you send to customers.
• Go to Google.com or your country’s version i.e. Google.ca in Canada.
• Now look for your business name as it is displayed on Google My Business Listings. You can change your search if your business doesn’t appear at first by including the registered phone number, address, city or state – do this until you locate your business.
• Scroll down until you find the Review and Rate tab and tap on the 5^th star on the right. By selecting the 5^th star, your URL will have a 5-star rating by default.
• You will be presented with a review screen. Don’t be alarmed that it asks you to log in. This part is the most crucial so instead of logging in, scroll up to the address bar.
• Once you get there (should be straightforward), press and hold the address bar until you get the “select all” option. Click it and then select “copy” to copy the URL.

The people that actually write the reviews

UK Domain have gathered a series of statistics on the importance of customer reviews. They state that, “95% of people aged 18-34 read reviews before buying from a business”. This is an extremely high number for a younger age group that clearly believe in the importance of reputation. It’s also younger people that are likely to buy a product/service online, making them many businesses target audience.

It was also found by UK Domain that, “80% of 18-34 year-olds have written online reviews, compared to just 41% of consumers over 55”. This means younger generations need to be doubly impressed by your product online, as they not only take note of the feedback it has received, but most likely add to it as well.

This information allows you to narrow down exactly who you should be chasing positive customer reviews from. If you can build upon the customer trust you’ve already established, you’ll ultimately start appearing higher up in search engines, allowing people to locate your business with more ease.

Don’t be afraid to ask different audience age groups for feedback though. If your business is directly aimed towards an older market, then keep that target in mind. Don’t change your product plan just because you think it’ll reach a larger audience. That tactic could easily backfire.

Best ways to improve my business’ online review scores?

There are many different ways of gaining positive customer reviews in an online environment or improving upon your current customer review score. Doing so will lead your business onto a more successful path and in the future you will likely be able to achieve higher rates of growth than you have previously because of this.

The first and absolutely most effective way of getting your customers to leave a positive review of your business or the products it sells/services it offers, is to be reliable, offer high-quality goods and make shopping with you highly convenient for your consumers. Basically, if you were to write the dream hypothetical review of your business from the point of view of one of your customers, what would you include in the review? Whatever it is, make that the reality of your business venture. If you’d like them to say that your business is reliable, make your business reliable; it really is that simple.

Gaining those all-important 5 star ratings will come as a direct result of high customer satisfaction levels. Therefore, you should make it a priority to offer your customers the best experience possible whenever they shop with your business. Even if you own a physical retail store or high street shop, if you improve on your customer service skills, your audience will have a better time with you and be more inclined to say good things about it across review sites, social media platforms and more. This will improve your business’ online reputation and boost you up the rankings of any search engine results.

The negative aspect

Everyone can receive negative feedback in life, and it can be tough to take. In this instance it may be in the form of a bad review. Instead of letting negative comments get you down, actively respond to them and decide whether or not you believe the criticism to be valid. This will not only develop your communication skills with unsatisfied clients, but may also help you to fix a part of your business that wasn’t working quite as you right.

With this said, believe in your business and try to make it a positive experience for consumers. Many customers consult reviews before even visiting your business online. According to Igniyte “94% of people say an online review has convinced them to avoid a business”.

Another plus side (if we can say that) to negative reviews is that at least it shows people are engaging with your content. If members of the public care enough about your product to leave a negative response about it, it probably means that you’ve found a target audience. You now just need to learn how to deliver what they expect from you, which their critiques may help with. 

To summarise 

All in all, making your business a more customer-friendly experience will result in your online review scores skyrocketing. Whatever product or service you offer to your customers, or whatever industry your business venture operates within, you will become a more respectable and trusted provider of goods if you can manage to amass a healthy amount of positive reviews.

So start encouraging people to spread the word about your business, but make sure the right things are being said to the people that go searching for information about your venture. Start trading your old negative reviews for positive ones today and then continue this upward trend in business reputation management.