We’re going to show you how to get Google reviews for your business, but first, tell me this:
What’s the first thing you do when…
- You’re looking for a place to eat in a new city while you’re on vacay with your boo?
- Your kitchen sink is clogged beyond your fixing and you’re looking for a plumber?
- You’re trying to decide which photographer to hire for your wedding?
- You’re doing research on the best car seat to keep your babe safe?
You search for and read reviews, right? Or, you ask trusted friends who they’ve hired/used/bought from before. That’s what we do, too.
Any time I’m interested in a product or service or restaurant or massage therapist or ___________ (fill in the blank), I like to see what other people are saying about them. Reviews create a reputation for a business, whether the business owner pursues this intentionally or their customers take charge and write and post reviews on their own.
I’m sure you know this by now, but we like to do things intentionally around here. We coach our clients to do the same. We encourage you to do the same, too. 😉
And, good reviews are vital if you want all the amazing work you’ve done with and for your clients or customers to grow into a beautiful bonus: Free marketing for your business!
Here’s the thing, at the end of the day, nothing you can say to a potential client or customer (who’s just met you!) will be as believable as what someone else has said about you! And…
- What it’s like to work with you
- How you do business
- How you helped them
- How you made their life better
- How you over-delivered like cray because you value your clients big time
Cool, you get all this! You’d love to have more fabulous reviews for your business floating around on the internet (and maybe even try your hand at video testimonials, too!). But…
Why Google vs. Yelp, Facebook, etc.?
We’re definitely not anti-collecting reviews on other sites. I mean, for our photography business, we have 33 five-star Yelp reviews because our clients are amazing. But, 16 of them are hidden! We like our reviews to be served front and center, thank you very much 🙂
If you’re in the wedding industry, you might want to collect reviews on Wedding Wire or The Knot, if you’re using those sites to build a better brand presence for your business. Cool! We recommend asking clients or customers to copy and paste the same copy to Google, too.
Facebook reviews are sweet, too! Again, no discrimination here. But, at the end of the day, when you’re looking for something, what do you do…
GOOGLE IT!
Google isn’t going anywhere. Google is super reputable. Google doesn’t hide reviews the same way Yelp does. That’s why we now focus on getting Google reviews for our business. (We have 10 five-star Google reviews, so far! Again our clients are amazing! YAY!)
How to get Google reviews for your business
Getting google reviews for your business is pretty simple. But, we’re guessing what you’re after is five-star reviews, yeah? I mean, a gazillion three-star reviews won’t do that fabulous free marketing for you. So, first thing’s first…
Take care of your people! Give your clients or customers every reason to tell the world how fabulous you are! Go above and beyond and then some! Make them feel cared for! Make them feel like a million bucks! Make them feel like they’re getting way more than they bargained for! We’ll talk more about client experience another day, but know that incredible client experience is the ticket to getting five-star Google reviews for your business.
Once you wrap up your contract, services and have finished working with your clients or customers, send them a final email wrapping things up and letting them know you’d so appreciate it if they took a couple minutes to write you a Google review.
Give them the exact link that takes them to a page where they can post their review. If you’d like a review in more than one place, ask them if they wouldn’t mind copying and pasting that same review on whatever sites you want them to leave it. Again, give them direct links! You don’t want this to feel like a chore; make this easy peasy for them.
How to get the link where clients or customers can write you a Google review
- Register your business on Google
- Google will send you a postcard with a code that verifies you’re the business owner
- After you verify you’re the business owner (this might take a few days to register with Google)…
- Create a custom link for clients or customers to write reviews
- If you’re still having trouble and you have a Google My Business account, call 1-844-491-9665 for support 🙂
Do you already collect Google (or, Facebook, Yelp, etc.) reviews for your business? We’d love to hear how this has increased your brand presence! We’d love to hear if this is helping you book more clients! Let us know in the comments below!