Five Minute Marketing: How to Get More Online Reviews
Trust. It’s one of the top factors to getting people to buy your product or service. The bigger the investment, the more trust you have to earn in order to gain new customers. Besides word-of-mouth, one of the best ways to earn trust online is through reviews. Google, Facebook, and Yelp are some of the top platforms that allow customers to review your services, but there are a million more, and many industry-specific sites. I’m certain that your customers have looked at your online reviews at some point, and if there are crickets there…well, it may have ruined a sale or two.
So what is the best way to get online reviews - especially the good ones? It takes a little bit of strategy and a little bit of time, but increasing the trust factor among potential customers is so worth the investment. Here’s what you need to do:
1) Determine the top two platforms for your reviews.
As I mentioned, there are countless review sites, but you’re likely not going to have a ton of reviews on every single platform. With that in mind, determine the two sites you most want reviews (I would highly recommend that Google is one of those choices!) so you can send customers there to talk about their great experience.
2) Create a system to ask for reviews.
For some, this will mean making sure you have customers’ email addresses so you can contact them after the transaction. For most, it will mean creating a standard template to ask for reviews so you don’t have to reinvent the wheel every time. Either way, you need to have a system in place so you can contact your customers to ask for online reviews because to be honest, if you don’t ask, it likely won’t happen!
3) Encourage reviews at every step of the process.
Put it on your website. Record a video about it. Write a blog talking about the importance of reviews. Whatever you do, keep in mind that many people won’t think to write a review after their interactions, so emphasizing how important it is will make your top fans and happy customers thrilled to tell the world about their experience after the fact.
4) Respond to all reviews, both positive and negative.
What do customers like to see as much as a positive review? Answer: an actively engaged business owner who is highly responsive. That might be a simple ‘thank you!’ to good reviews, but the key is how you respond to negative reviews. Never leave negative comments back, even if that customer was completely in the wrong! Apologize for anything you may have done wrong, and assure that person you plan to do better in the future. Even though that individual may never buy from you again, potential customers who see that you truly want to create a good experience for everyone will be impressed by your responsiveness and assured that the negative experience was an anomaly, and not a normal course of business for you. Obviously, if the review is just spam (and only if you’re 100% sure it is!), then report it to the powers-at-be to have it removed.
Online reviews lead to trust, trust leads to more customers, and having more customers leads to long-term growth. Spend a little time to increase your positive online presence, and I promise it will pay off for many years to come.
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