Customer reviews are critical to the successful ranking of Google My Business Listings and improving your Local SEO. How do you get more GMB reviews?

1 – Ask for GMB Reviews.

Send a postcard with a link to your Google My Business Listing and ask customers to leave you a review on Google, and mention that Google displays your star rating as part of the listing. You can include this postcard with every shipment or periodically, whichever is easier for you. You can also include this as part of your email campaign to your customers or attach a printout with customer receipts.

2 – Offer Excellent Customer Service.

Take the time to answer questions from customers. Review their feedback and make changes that customers are requesting. Be tentative to your customers’ needs as well as give a positive environment that leaves them wanting to write GMB reviews.

3 – Respond to Negative Reviews.

This is a difficult thing that no business owner wants to do, but it’s important. If a customer has a bad experience, apologize and try to resolve the issue in every way you can, from refunding money to offering free products or services to getting them on the phone for a personal apology. Google will show your response along with the negative review so be sure to write an extensive response and leave nothing out. This time and effort will be beneficial in righting the wrong and letting other online visitors know that your business cares about customer experiences.

4 – Ask Your Happy Customers for Reviews.

Well that’s a no-brainer, but you’d be surprised how often businesses don’t. Did your customer have a delightful experience? Use these opportunities to request GMB Reviews.

5 – Ask for GMB Reviews When Your Customers Enter Their Order Details on Your Website.

Include a message asking them if they would like to leave a review. You can send the review request email directly to the customer or have it sent through the form provider you use, such as SurveyMonkey or Typeform.

7 – Ask for Reviews When You Email Your Customers with Shipping Confirmation or Billing Information.

When your system emails out their reciept, shipping Cnformation, or order confirmation, ask them to leave you a review on Google My Business and include a link directly to your GMB Profile review page.

8 – Offer an Incentive.

Offer customers who leave a review on Google access to a special deal (i.e., free shipping) or offer them something of value (i.e. a discount of 10% or more) on their next purchase. These incentives can often elicit GMB reviews out of those who wouldn’t think of doing it otherwise. Who doesn’t love to save money?

9 – Work With Your Customers to Leave Reviews on Third-Party Websites Too.

Encouraging customers to leave reviews on other websites will only help your Local SEO efforts (i.e, Yelp, Facebook, etc.) 90% of customers read online reviews before making a purchase decision and the wider your review net, the better the return.

10 – Don’t Be Discouraged if You Don’t Get GMB Reviews Right Away.

It takes time and patience. Stay consistent with it because they will begin to trickle in the more you make the effort. For help with tracking your reviews, check out this article.

11 – The Secret to Success is to Have a Positive 5-star Rating Across All Social Media.

GMB reviews definitely hold their weight but you want to make sure you have reviews on all the platforms your customers are on. This means setting up a Facebook profile, Twitter profile, Pinterest, etc to best capture your market. Include links to each of your profiles on your website and GMB profile listing as well as your customer emails to encourage engagement, follows, etc. If you don’t have the reviews yet, use these tactics together to start getting more

12 – For more information about GMB Reviews,

Check out this article on Google My Business or this article on Wordstream.

We hope this was informative and helpful in getting your business more GMB reviews. Interested in Google My Business Optimization to increase your rankings locally?