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How to Get Customer Reviews Online: The Ultimate Guide

Are online customer reviews trustworthy?

A quick and simple answer is yes. In general, you can trust reviews online. For one, a lot of platforms have been successful in their efforts to crack down on fake and unverified reviews. They no longer let anonymous reviewers post on their sites.

Online reviews provide consumers with detailed feedback from their point of view. This provides readers with a perspective other than that of the business. The business is likewise not always capable of providing such feedback.

It is important, however, for users to exercise due diligence when browsing online reviews. It is a good idea to read numerous reviews of the same product. This can help you appreciate and understand the product through a wide variety of customer experiences. 

When reading reviews, you also need to be selective on what to believe and which ones to take with a grain of salt. For example, if you come across a review that seems too exceptional to be true, then it probably is something to be skeptical about.

Can you buy online reviews?

Now, you may be asking, “Can I hire can hire some people to write favorable but fake reviews for my company?” Yes, it is possible. You can find people who may be willing to do that for a fee. However, you have to understand that this scenario is high-risk, but it can potentially yield only a low reward. 

You can hire people to write fake reviews for you. However, it may only harm your business in the long run.

The truth is, you need to spend time on your business's online reputation management. You may think that bought reviews may be a great shortcut to success. While it may seem to work at first, it may, and it often does come back to haunt and severely hurt your business in the long run.

Once you get caught, and you will get caught, you will not only lose the trust and confidence of your customers. You will also receive a good spanking from popular search engines like Google. Your website may be banned, and they may strip off your business listing. Thus, you need to have good Google listing management.

To sum everything up, buying fake online reviews is altogether a dishonest practice. It is not worth the risk it entails. It is a good idea to stick to using accepted practices in managing Google reviews.

What is review-gating, and why is it bad?

Review-gating happens when a business learns that its customers had both negative and positive experiences. Then only those who had positive experiences are asked to leave an online review. This is not an honest practice. Customers with a negative experience are discouraged from giving feedback. 

It is important that all customers – whether with good or bad experiences about your products or services – are given an equal chance to provide feedback. Your online reviews must depict the true state of your customers’ experience. 

While rave reviews are good for your business, a few negative ones can help you determine the areas you need to improve on. A few negative comments might do a bit of damage to your business. But, dishonesty will result in a lot more damage. Thus, you can use the negative online reviews to fix the problem and not hide it. It is only a matter of proper review management.

How to encourage more online reviews

By now, you should already be aware of the importance of online reviews. However, you may still be struggling with gathering them. You can manually request reviews from every customer you serve. However, this can be tedious. Also, it will only drain your resources and put unnecessary strain on your hardworking staff. 

Worse, even after exerting the effort, you may still fail to get a high response rate. So, what are you going to do?

Following are some valuable tips on how to make your review gathering process easier, as well as information on how to get more responses. 

Automate your review requests.

When collecting reviews, one important thing to remember is to keep striking when you’re on a roll. The longer wait time you spend asking for customer feedback, the less chance they are going to give it.

By automating your review gathering process, you can send review requests on time and without giving extra work to your staff. 

Make the system as easy and straightforward as possible.

All things considered, your customers are doing you a big favor by leaving an online review. Note that they are sparing some time out of their busy day just to help build the reputation of your business. You must return the favor by making the process of leaving a review as straightforward and easy as possible.

Make sure to include the link in your review request. This way, your customers would only have to click to respond and nothing else. 

Respond to all reviews you receive.

Make it a habit to respond to all reviews you gather – even negative feedback – and not only the rave reviews. According to Google, responding to reviews can make your customers feel heard and appreciated. This encourages your future clients to also leave reviews.

Thank the customer each time they leave a positive review. However, when you get a negative review, find out what the problem is. Then work with the customer in finding the appropriate solution.

Conclusion

Whether good or bad, an online review from an actual customer can help your business. While good reviews provide an affirmation that you are doing an excellent job of serving your customers, negative reviews, when given constructively, can help you identify the areas where you need to make some improvements. 

Contact us for more information and to learn how we can help your business.

Image of the author - Adam Bennett

Written By: Adam Bennett |  Monday, June 28, 2021

Adam is the president and founder of Cube Creative Design and specializes in private school marketing. Since starting the business in 2005, he has created individual relationships with clients in Western North Carolina and across the United States. He places great value on the needs, expectations, and goals of the client.