The goal of many small businesses is to get more positive reviews on Google. Let’s face it. When it comes to online reputation, Google is one of the major players in the online review space. Google reviews are often seen as more credible and have higher authority because of Google’s reputation as a company and search engine tool. With the importance of search engine optimization, Google also brings the majority of traffic to the websites of small businesses.
It’s essential to recognize the power of positive reviews and how to navigate managing them. Otherwise, it could compromise your entire online reputation. Here are six useful tips:
Importance of Positive Google Reviews
Google reviews are essential because people rely on Google for business searches over any other platform. They also use Google as a source to find reviews. Positive reviews can help boost traffic to your business and website. Since Google is the primary source of searches, having positive reviews and a solid online reputation will help your visibility when people search for you.
Set Up a Google My Business Profile
The first thing is to set up your Google My Business profile and make sure anyone managing reviews has access. This will allow you to collect information on Google Maps and Search or respond to the reviews. If you have any reviews, bad or good, you want to be responding immediately.
How to Get More Positive Google Reviews
Train your employees to provide the best customer service possible is a great start to getting more positive reviews. However, negative reviews are bound to come in for any small business. You may not be able to control if someone had a positive or negative experience, but your reaction to these reviews is important as a business owner. Your response to a negative or positive Google review will impact how future potential customers look at you.
Always respond to any reviews you have. Potential customers are often viewing reviews and the company’s responses. Taking too long to respond or not responding well can negatively impact how people view your business and can cause you to lose customers.
Always respond politely and promptly.
Create a Link for Google Reviews
Make it easier to access and market your Google reviews by creating a link. That way, you have a quick place to direct customers. You can also use this for an email campaign, in your email signature, or on social media. There are lots of creative uses for this link to encourage customers to leave positive reviews.
If you need some help with creative marketing strategies, check out our previous blog post, which covered the online reputation for marketing.
Ask For Reviews
Merely asking for reviews can help immensely with receiving positive Google reviews. Also, ask specifically for your customer to use reviews. You’ll never know until you ask, but studies prove the importance of receiving verified reviews.
According to a study done by Spiegel Research Center, people are more likely to leave higher star ratings when they are verified. Anonymous reviewers tend to leave lower ratings and are more motivated to leave reviews, meaning it’s important to ask customers to leave reviews whenever you can. Try to ask for reviews if you know your customers or feel confident that they had a positive experience.
Purchase a Reputation Software
Managing Google reviews can be a challenge, but it is necessary for your business. If you don’t have the bandwidth, consider using an online reputation software such as ReviewInc.
With ReviewInc’s reputation management software, our team will respond immediately to your reviews, as well as other platforms, to help keep your customers happy while protecting your online reputation. You can manage all your positive and negative reviews on over 600 review sites with ReviewInc.
To learn more about ReviewInc, request a demo here.
