As you know the best form of advertising or getting more number of customers turning to your business is through the word-of-mouth publicity. If you keep bragging about how good your services are people may not interested to listen to that and neither will they get converted to the potential leads or customers. But if your regular and satisfied customers talk about your company it will definitely have a great positive impact on the people.
Google+ Local page is one such place where you can ask your customers to post a testimonial, comment, feedback or just a review about your services and how they like them. There are many benefits associated with having more number of reviews on your Google+ Local page which we will discuss later. Let us first see how you can get your customers to write reviews for you.
Generate Reviews
The following are the fast, easy and sure ways to get the reviews from your customers:
1. Talk to your customers:
Your regular and satisfied customers are the best source to get started with for getting reviews. You can ask your customers to write positive reviews when they visit your outlets. If you give handouts to your customers which contain your Google+ Local page URL and directions on how to write reviews using Google+ it becomes easy for your customers and with little encouragement you can be sure that the customers will write good positive reviews for you.
You can get Phil Rozek’s Review Handouts PDF, You can print it and give to your customers that provide step wise instructions on how to leave a review on your Google+ Local profile.
2. Make use of kiosk:
If you have a small booth or a kiosk where your customers can check their mails or use computers while they wait for their appointment, then that can be used as a great opportunity to get reviews from your customers. You can prompt your customers to write a review for your Google+ Local page listing once they are done with their online surfing. A frequent customer will readily do this. For new customers you can ask them to write a review when they exit after experiencing your services.
Google allowing setting up on site review stations. still as Mike rightly said – DO NOT put all of your review eggs in one basket. Just make sure that you will not overdo it.
3. Use a QR code:
QR code is like a barcode and when scanned by a smart phone or other mobile devices will land you to a particular mobile landing page. You can direct your customers to your Google+ Local page with one click, by having this page in your QR code. You can add QR code to brochures, mails and business cards.
QR code is a part of mobile marketing strategy and it works. You may find many customers spending time on their mobile phones while they are in your waiting room and most of them will be using smart phones.
4. Shoot emails:
Generally all businesses nowadays have a database of their customers’ email address. Shoot out personalized emails to all your customers containing a link to your Google+ Local page, persuading them to write reviews for you.
You can get Phil Rozek’s Review Handouts PDF, You can email it to your customers that provide step wise instructions on how to leave a review on your Google+ Local profile.
5. Reach your customers through social media:
Social media sites like Facebook, Google+ and twitter provide you a platform to reach out to your customers. You can encourage your customers to write a review by posing a link to your Google+ Local page listing.
Benefits Of Reviews
These are the sure ways to get reviews from your customers. Now let us see how you can benefit by having more number of reviews:
1. Increases trust:
A recent study showed that customers trust recommendations. They even trust recommendations from the people they don’t know. You need to have at least 6 reviews to make a positive impact on the customer according to the study.
2. More number of click through rates:
Now Google moved to the 30 point system developed by Zagat. So now, in the place of stars, you’ll see a number rating in the format of “0 / 30” displayed in local search results.
With the new Zagat scoring system it takes 10 reviews before your score will be displayed. So If your business has more than 10 reviews it will stand out in the search results. Business with more reviews has a tendency to get more clicks even if it is further down the page in search results.
3. Improvement in search ranking:
Reviews have low to moderate impact on the ranking in the search results. According to result of Bizible’s Study of Local Ranking Factors study, that having five or more Google reviews was associated with a 1.85 improvement in rank. Your business popularity and trustworthiness can be decided through the reviews by the search engines.
4. More reviews leads to increased conversion rates:
Like I said before people are not interested in what you portray about your business, they tend to judge your business by what others have to say. So if you have more reviews there is a better chance that you will have more number of visitors converting into leads and customers.
These are just a few benefits listed here, out of other innumerable benefits that you will experience once you have significant amount of reviews on Google+ Local page.
You can have reviews written on many review sites like Google Places, Bing Local, Yahoo local, Yellow Pages, City Search, etc. You can also choose your industry niche review sites to get your customers to write for you.
Response and Monitor Reviews
Your work just doesn’t end by getting better and more number of reviews from your customers. You should also respond to the reviews written by the customers. It is not necessary that all reviews are positive there can be negative reviews as well as complaints. Be very polite and do not personalize the message when you respond to the negative feedback, you can share the positive improvements that you must have made based upon the reviews. This will further help in developing your business.
You also need to respond to the positive reviews and thank all the reviewers for taking time out to review your business.
So, it’s important to integrate your Google+ Local listing into your business reputation management strategy. Start by asking happy customers to leave you reviews on your Google+ Local page, and make sure you are monitoring reviews on the page so you can respond to any negative reviews or complaints that you receive there.
My name is Hiren Ponkia and I am Freelance SEO Consultant India with strong background in search engine marketing, both paid and organic SEO services. I have found my deepest passion to be around the world of SEO, Social Media Marketing, Internet Marketing and Web Development Standards.