Becoming a Star: How to Get Good Reviews and Boost Your Rating Online
Did you know that according to a 2018 BrightLocal Survey, 85% of consumers trust reviews as much as personal recommendations? This tells you that focusing on creating a good experience for your customers and ensuring they write about it afterward will grow your business exponentially.
However, it can be difficult to figure out just how to get those good reviews consistently. Read on for our top tips that you can add to your workflow today!
1. Create a Positive Customer Experience
The first thing you need to start with is to ensure your customers are having a positive customer experience that they’ll want to write about. The best way to do this is through direct feedback from your current customers.
After they’ve purchased your product or service, reach out to your customers and ask them open-ended questions about the quality of your service. Moreover, if they had any complaints, this is a great way to smooth over that relationship and build trust again.
Here are a few questions you could ask:
- How easy was it to navigate our website?
- Is our pricing clear? How can we improve our pricing page?
- Why did you choose us as your service provider?
- What would you say to someone who asked about us?
- If you were unhappy with us, what can we do to get you back?
- What is the primary benefit that you received?
Asking specific, open-ended questions will give you a clear, overall view of the impression you’re making on your customers. There may be easy, quick improvements that you can make that you may not have considered before.
Depending on the size of your business, you may need to incentivize your customers in order to receive feedback. Consider creating automated emails that can be sent after a week of product delivery or service. Even a separate domain to create a landing page could be beneficial in its professionalism and ease of access.
2. Ask for Reviews
The easiest and simplest way to get more reviews is to ask for them! Even if your customers had an incredible experience, they may not remember or think of leaving a review.
Consider asking for a review as the final part of your customer interaction. After your product has been delivered or service has been rendered, simply ask them to leave a review or send out automated emails.
Provide links to your Google Business page, Facebook, Yelp, and etc. to make it easy. Remember that it’s best to avoid incentivizing for good reviews – this is a shady business practice that’s illegal in many areas. However, you can offer incentives if you’re simply asking for honest reviews.
3. Consider Your Language
The language you use when asking for a review is also important. Be transparent with your customers and educate them about the value of your review. This can be as simple as letting them know that honest reviews like theirs help potential customers make informed decisions.
If you have a few loyal customers that stand out, sending them a personal versus automated email will go a long way. Let them know that as one of your important customers, their review is
3. Don’t Fear Negative Reviews
Eventually, you’re going to get a negative review – every kind and size of the business has to deal with this. While you can’t control whether or not you get a negative review, you can control your response to it.
Remember to stay professional and positive. Empathize with the customer’s complaint and offer a solution. Quick responses to negative reviews will actually have a positive effect on how your business appears to potential customers.
It lets them know that you value your client’s experience and that you’ll be quick to address their needs.
4. Utilize Positive Customer Reviews
You can use positive customer reviews in a variety of areas to give potential customers instant social proof that your business is worth their money. For instance, create graphics of recent positive customer reviews and add them to any website pages that describe your pricing. This may be all the incentive a hesitant buyer will need to head to checkout.
Graphics of positive customer reviews are also great to use on social media sites, like Facebook or Instagram.
5. Create a Campaign
You probably have a lot of happy customers that you haven’t asked for reviews. If this is the case, the most time-effective way is to run an email or social media campaign. Incentivize them with a deadline along with a discount on their next purchase or service.
Social media campaigns can be especially effective because you’re catching customers while they’re simply browsing the Internet during their leisure time. With enough incentive and an easy way to submit their reviews through a link – such as in your Instagram bio or the post itself on Facebook – you’ll quickly get caught up on the reviews you need.
6. Talk to Your Customers
Let’s not forget the old-fashioned way of asking for reviews simply by talking with your customers face-to-face or on your phone. Genuinely ask them for feedback on what you can do to make your service or product better.
If they’re happy with their experience, ask them right there and then for a review. If they say yes, there’s a large chance that they’ll want to be true to their word.
If you frequently have face-to-face interactions with your customers, consider putting the link to your review pages on the back of your business card. This will help keep it fresh in your customers’ minds.
Receiving Good Reviews: Just Get Started
You may feel tempted to craft the perfect landing page, email automation, or business card before you start asking customers for reviews. However, the most important thing to do is focus on one method and monitor your results. This is a far more efficient way of getting good reviews fast compared to waiting for perfection!
Ready to improve your customers’ experiences through professional website design? Take a look at the services we can provide for you today!