Total SEO Reviews - The Importance of Online Reviews for Business

Total SEO Reviews - By Simon Chapple

Why reviews are important for your business

As a business owner, it is important to ensure your clients leave reviews online, there are many review websites you can choose from and depending on your industry there is generally one suited to your specific area.

Having reviews online builds trust and confidence in your company, assuming most of the reviews you get are positive it will also help potential new customers with their decision to use your service or product.

In addition, having a regular flow of new reviews online will help your trust with search engines and will benefit your SEO.

It is also worth thinking about the format of reviews, as well as the standard written review it is worth considering asking for video reviews, these can be far more engaging than the standard format. Below is a video review from one of our clients as an example.

How to get more reviews online

If you don’t ask for reviews from your customers, you probably won’t get many.

The first thing to do is decide where you would like to have reviews about your business shown online. Look at the various different online platforms and review sites, some are free and some require payment, then make a decision as to where you would like to encourage reviews to be written.

Do bear in mind that some review sites will allow ‘stars’ to be shown in Google search results once you have a certain number of reviews, this can make a big difference to your click through rate and how much you stand out in the search results.

Here is an example of a company standing out in the search results because their ‘review stars’ are showing.

Stars Standing Out

There are a number of methods of asking for reviews, you can even automate the process. For example an online shop might automatically send a review request a couple of days after a product has been delivered.

Another method is asking a customer when dealing face to face and get them to leave a review then and there, maybe using an iPad.

Or, if your business is done by email, you could send a link to a location where a review can be left, or even have a link in your email signature.

Responding to online reviews

Once you start getting online reviews about your business it is important to respond to them, whether the reviews are positive or negative, a response from the business owner shows a high level of professionalism and a caring attitude to customers.

Responding to a positive review is fairly easy, however replying to a negative review is more of a challenge.

First of all, accept that you can’t please everyone and that nearly all business will get the odd bad review, our research shows that roughly 5% of online reviews received by a sample of UK businesses are negative (1 star out of 5).

Take time to consider your response, it may be worth contacting the customer to attempt to resolve any issues, this may result in them changing what they have written online, but don’t try and ‘pay off’ or ‘bribe’ someone into doing this, it could backfire and make matters worse.

If it becomes clear that the review is going to stay live online, you need to think about the best way to reply to it.

A good strategy is to address every point, explain what went wrong and what you have done as a business to ensure it never happens again, it is worth expressing empathy. In general replies from a business owner to negative reviews are read 10 times more than the review itself, so it can be used as a marketing opportunity to show how well you step up when things go wrong.

Why reviews really matter

Reviews really matter to businesses, in a digital world more and more consumers carry out due diligence online, they take time to research companies and learn about other peoples’ experiences.

A strong, positive review profile can make a big difference to your business, it can also be an excellent incentive for business owners, management and staff to do the best the can to impress your customers.

In the future we anticipate that reviews will play an even more important role in consumer buying decisions.

Simon Chapple, Director at Total SEO says “We deal with many small/medium sized businesses and more and more of them have woken up to the importance of online reviews and how they can be leveraged as a marketing tool if the business does a great job. We also speak to businesses who have experienced negative reviews and offer them advice about the best way to approach the situation to ensure a positive outcome.

In the future we expect reviews to play an even bigger part in the online footprint of a business, especially with ability to leave reviews on social media.

Business owners need to be on the ball, encourage reviews from customers and take the time to respond in the most professional and appropriate way.”

Contact Simon directly at simon.chapple@total-seo.co.uk

Total SEO & Marketing Limited are a digital marketing agency based in Aldershot, Hampshire. Specialising in SEO, PPC and Social Media Advertising Total SEO have been helping businesses for over a decade.

The team of 26 staff take pride in delivering the very highest levels of service and great results for their clients.

Read the numerous Total SEO reviews online to see what clients have to say.

Total SEO & Marketing Ltd
1-2 Alexandra Terrace
Alexandra Road
Aldershot
Hampshire
GU11 3HU

This release was published on openPR.