Pro-Tips To Get Google My Business Page Reviews

Don’t let reviews scare you, instead use them to your advantage!

Each Google My Business page review is an excellent opportunity for your business. They are more than just a customer’s thoughts about your product, service or brand. Reviews on Google My Business not only increase your Google rank, but they can also have a significant impact on people’s purchasing decisions.

Can you remember the last time you booked a hotel or bought a $20 home appliance without checking the reviews?

I can’t.

Well, I’m not the only one who seeks information about the good or bad of a business.

Consider this: Nearly ,95% of shoppers read online reviews before making a purchase. What’s more? 93% of local consumers use reviews to determine if a local business is good or bad.

With Google, consumers have become more informed and empowered than ever before. They can discover a plethora of information about a business with just a few clicks.

Thus in today’s competitive world, you’ll need more genuine business reviews. However, remember, Google customer reviews just don’t happen by themselves; you will have to make efforts and request people who've already made purchases from your business for their valuable feedback!

To help your business get more reviews on Google My Business in a way that enables you to grow sales, here are 5 Google My Business page reviews tips!

How to Get Reviews on Google My Business Page in 5 Simple Steps

Here’s how to ensure you provide an extraordinary customer experience, and, thus, get as many genuine reviews on Google My Business as possible.

Step 1: Understand Google Business’s don’ts

Google My Business has stringent guidelines covering what is and isn’t allowed to get Google My Business page reviews. One misstep and your GMB account could be suspended or closed permanently.

So what are the Google My Business don'ts? What is it that violates Google’s Review Policy?

• Try not to review your own business - If you are thinking of getting your business reviewed by your happy employees, then you’re are doing it the wrong way. Never take shortcuts – it’s a conflict of interest, and the risk isn’t worth the reward.

• Don't do review gatekeeping - Businesses should steer clear of the practice of using a third-party platform to filter out negative reviews -- Review Gatekeeping -- as it violates Google’s Review Policy.

  I understand that negative reviews can leave businesses shaking in their winter boots. However, they are not that bad! You may want to consider this -- According to Reevoo Study, 68 % of individuals trust a company's reviews more when they see bad reviews blended with the good ones.

  The same Reevoo study also found that 18 % of people became loyal repeat customers after receiving a brand's response to their negative feedback.

  Thus instead of gatekeeping the negative reviews, you should consider responding to them!

• Don't review competitors - This is a no brainer. If you are thinking of reviewing your competitors with some negative intention regarding their business, drop this thought immediately! This is considered black-hat SEO and can get you stuck in an unfortunate situation.

  What Google My Business is honestly endeavoring to eliminate through these guidelines is the systematic abuse of the review system that frequently occurs, particularly for things that have extreme interest.

Step 2: Ask for the Google Customer Reviews directly

Here’s a tip that you may have neglected.

Request your customers to leave your business a Google review. It is simple, and it works!

To back this point, I've listed an impressive stat reported by LSA,

68% of consumers left local businesses reviews when they were requested to
A few ways using which you can ask your customers for reviews are:

E-mails
Social media
CTA on website
Thank you pages

This is the bare minimum, and it can make getting Google Reviews for your business a smooth process. But the most significant challenge lies in making it easier for your customers to leave you Google My Business page reviews.

So how to do that? Read on to find out!

Step 3: Make it easy for your customers to leave reviews on Google My Business

This might sound like a no-brainer yet it's astonishing how a vast number of businesses fail to make it easy for a customer to leave a review. Keep in mind, the reason why many people are not able to leave their reviews is that they have no idea how to do it.

Educate your customers on how to leave their valuable feedback on GMB -- Either incorporate a link on your website or consider creating a blog post on your site with instructions on how to leave a Google review.

Here’s an example from an Eye Care Clinic.

Clicking on this link, brings customers directly to the review form on another platform, like Google My Business.

If you don’t do this, your customer would have to follow an elongated path which they would likely not want to pursue.

They will have to go to your Google My Business page. Look for your business. Discover a link to leave a review. And afterward, write the review.

Step 4: Respond to all reviews immediately.

The secret of success in responding to all reviews on time lies in consistency, thus try and devote at least half an hour a day to respond to all Google customer reviews paying little heed to whether the reviews are positive or negative. Doing this encourages your future customers to engage with your brand and leave reviews!

Think about a situation where a client of yours, chooses to leave a review, telling other potential clients of how their experience with your business was. Would you respond to them or just hang tight for them to leave?

Naturally, you would respond, and you would respond as soon as possible!

The Positive Review: Responding to the positive reviews should be your priority. After all, these customers took time out of their day to give you positive feedback online. Show that you are thankful to them for leaving their review about your business on Google My Business. A straightforward "thank you" can encourage them to make a recurrent purchase.

The Negative Review: Take this as an opportunity to grow. Thank the customer for setting aside the time to give feedback and move the conversation off the platform - offer them an answer for their concern! Tell them that you are always prepared to address their issues and make their experience stunning.

You can start responding to your Google My Business page reviews today by logging in to your Google Business User Account.

Step 5: Add a CTA to your E-mail

Think about the number of emails you send each month to your customers. Adding a CTA like -- “Have feedback? Leave us a review on Google” -- in your email can generate a decent amount of reviews on its own.

Now that you've known how to get positive reviews on Google, it's even more essential for you to pursue best practices to manage them.

How to manage your Google My Business Page Reviews?

If you own a business operating from several locations across the globe, soliciting and managing reviews can become very time-consuming. This is where you may want to incorporate a Social Media Management Tool like Statusbrew that can help expedite the process of managing Google Reviews for multiple locations.

Statusbrew is an effective and user-friendly reputation management solution which empowers companies to monitor their reputation, prevent PR crisis, improve customer relations, and measure results/ track performance with the built-in analytics features for their Google My Business account.

Found it interesting? We'd love to have you try Statusbrew for managing your Google My Business account. Just head on to www.statusbrew.com and select the plan of your choice to start a 14-day trial.

While you have no control over what your customers say about your business online, you can have an influence over getting and managing your Google My Business reviews by following the tips we’ve outlined.

Let us know in the comments below how you feel about them.