In terms of cost-efficiency – dollars spent per new customer – it wouldn’t surprise us if building positive Google reviews was the hands down winning marketing tactic. There’s no two ways about it, those free five star reviews can make an enormous impact on where potential customers ultimately decide to take their trade.
But, to be honest, it’s a bit of a red herring to describe five star review as free. They’re usually the result of being an extremely well run business operation based on months and years of hard work. They’re usually the fruit of slick and super-friendly customer service.
And even then, the vast majority of customers you ask for reviews from will probably never get round to it. Even so if you’re not devoting a solid chunk of hours to getting and responding to them every month you’re definitely missing an opportunity. Positive Google reviews are not only going to make potential customers more inclined to give you a try, they’re also going to make potential customers more likely to see you – Google’s SEO algorithm factors them into its calculations and this is reflected in search results and on maps.
But I know you’re not here just to hear about how positive reviews are helpful for your business. After all you already know that! You’re here to find out how negative reviews can help your business. It's pretty simple; if you can turn an unhappy customer into a happy one you’ve done well and it's not as hard as you may think. By acknowledging negative reviews and responding to them, you let customers feel they are being listened to and their opinions are important. Not only this but other potential customers will read your replies and feel more positive towards you. After all looking at a negative review and seeing that a business is going to try to rectify a customer's complaint looks pretty good in my opinion. Much better than a business who either ignores all negative reviews or replies nastily.
With that in mind we’ve come up with the fundamentals of responding to all types of reviews below; so have a look and start setting aside some time to reply to your customers reviews!
