Online reviews have become an increasingly important part of the buying process for many products and services. Before purchasing, customers will look online to find honest opinions from other people who have used the product and will take all this information into consideration.
Having a good number of Google reviews can give your business a serious boost, as it provides social proof and credibility. Further to this, there is evidence that Google takes reviews into account as a ranking factor, which determines how well your product pages rank.
So how do you go about improving your Google Reviews?
There are a number of key steps you can take to encourage your customers to leave reviews:
- Ask them – As simple as it sounds, an important step towards getting more reviews is to ask your customers. This is something you can include on the confirmation page at the point of sale, or in the email receipt.
- Follow up – You often have to show persistence to make a sale in the first place, and the same goes for getting reviews. While you might not get a review straight away, it is worth sending a follow-up note one the customer has had the chance to use the product or service for a period of time.
- Make it really easy – Asking too much of your customers, or any obstacles that stand in their way will seriously hamper your chance of getting a review. Make it as simple as possible for people to leave a review. Give them a link to the review page, and educate them as to exactly how to navigate the page.
- Be personable – Creating a brand that people can relate to and like makes them far more likely to leave positive reviews. Being personable, and interacting with your customers through social media channels will make lead to your customers actively championing your products.
Turning around a negative review
It goes without saying that to get positive reviews, you need customers to have a positive experience with your product or service. This might not be possible 100% of the time, and occasionally you will get feedback from your customers that aren’t in line with what you were expecting.
Rather than seeing this as a negative, you can use these reviews as an excellent source of research. Even if you don’t necessarily agree with what the customer has said if they perceive that their experience wasn’t up to scratch you should take their points on board.
Listen to what they’ve said, and look at how you can make improvements to avoid other customers feeling this way in the future.
Start improving your reviews today
Improving reviews needs to be a concerted effort and something that you focus on over a sustained period of time. It is also not something that is easily tackled in isolation and benefits from inclusion in a broader digital business development strategy.
At AsOne we have experience managing this effort on behalf of our clients, dramatically improving the number of positive reviews they receive, and subsequently boosting their top line growth.
For more information on how we could support your business through this journey, don’t hesitate to get in touch.
