““People buy from people they trust and they trust people they like.”

— Garrison Wynn

Introduction

It's 6PM on a Friday. You've just completed a long week of work and you're feeling like ordering some food from a new restaurant in town.

You've been eating at the same five places for the last three months and you want to venture out a bit.

You've been thinking about Italian food ever since your coworker mentioned he and his wife tried a new Italian place in town and were stunned by the experience.

So what do you do?

Easy answer.

You pick up your trusty smart phone, open up Google, and search "Italian restaurant near me."

You know Google has the perfect answer, and it does. You see three locations pop up that all look pretty similar.

They all have pasta, pizza, wings, and bread. Go figure.

But you have to pick one. You're not going to order one item from each place, are you?

So, the narrowing process begins. You flip through each restaurant's images, menus, and reviews. You look at Yelp, Google, and anywhere you can to find information to help you make your decision.

Okay, option #1 -

You see only three reviews, with one customer saying they just got food poisoning last week. You figure they're probably exaggerating, but the thought of that has you concerned.

Okay, onto option #2 -

This one has good images, a decently priced menu, and 40 reviews, but you see a few complaints about their service and see it only 3.5 out of 5 stars. Decent, but not great.

Let's keep looking.

Then, there's one standing far above the rest. Option #3 -

It's got the most mouth-watering images. 4.7 out of 5 star reviews. And nothing but raving customers thanking them for their amazing food and service.

It's an obvious choice. If everyone's raving about the food, its got to be good, right?

You call the third one and place an order.

It's simple. You trusted them and they seem legitimate. So you buy from them.

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The search and decision making process

Pre-selection impacted what you saw

In the story we just went through, your journey from Italian food craver to extremely full, tired, and happy customer happened in the matter of a few minutes.

You didn't even have to think about it. It's second nature.

You knew Google would have the answer you were looking for.

And it turns out they do. They've made hundreds of billions of dollars doing this for that matter.

But what you probably don't realize is how much of the decision was already pre-determined before you even searched for it.

What I didn't mention in this story is the fourth option - a small, family-owned Italian joint in the corner of town who has world-class food.

But they have no website, no Google Business Profile, and no reviews.

Surely, Google wouldn't fail to mention the town's historic Italian spot right?

Sadly, they didn't even make the list of selections to choose from.

Even though they're loved by the community and serve plenty of customers, Google doesn't know that, so they chose not to show them when you came looking for their services.

Think about it, when was the last time you scrolled to the bottom of the Google results page to find a service you were looking for?

Probably never.

And are there some great companies down there? Certainly.

But Google can't listen in on your customer's conversations and feel for how well you are liked by the community.

At least I think they can't..

This is the worst-case scenario that a lot of businesses do not realize they are currently in.

Customers search for their services, but never find them. And how are they supposed to know?

The things is, customers are mostly choosing between a short-list of options Google has already determined to show them based on a few factors we'll discuss.

And there are many factors when it comes to ranking high on the Google results page, but reviews remain one of the top ways to improve your rank quickly.

Find me a business with over 500+ reviews on Google who ranks outside of the top five listings among their competitors.

It doesn't exist.

Social proof and validation

Beyond what you initially were shown by Google, you went even further - looking at images, menus, and reviews before making your final decision.

Not only did you only compare three restaurants, you compared each one against each other in depth to decide which was best.

Reviews act as social proof. If the group thinks it's good, then it probably is. If the group thinks it's bad, then hey, it probably is.

Google knows this too, which is why that little local place in the corner of town never made the ranks.

But beyond that, it became a competition for who had the most social proof between the three options.

You aren't going to go against the grain and take a risk on the lesser desired place, are you? Unless you're a charity or like giving the underdog a chance, why risk it?

This is what makes reviews, particularly on Google so powerful.

What was once only done one-to-one, like your customer telling their friends about your services, can be done in public and shared with thousands.

And that's what makes reviews so important. Your customers are helping you win businesses or ensuring you don't get any more.

If you do it right, your customers will publicly promote you from the rooftops. Do it wrong, and you'll end up being passed over by that competitor who's always taking your business.

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Google Reviews and their impact on local search

There are a few ways Google ranks local businesses. What we'll focus on today is reviews because it's the most impactful thing that you can control.

And we're going to focus on increasing that number. Quickly.

When a search for a product or service is made online, Google crawls the internet, takes in a variety of factors, then attempts to serve the user with listings that best fit what it believes they are looking for.

When attempting to rank local searches, Google claims it looks for three primary factors:

1. Relevance

2. Distance

3. Prominence (here's where reviews are)

According to Google, prominence is where reviews make the most impact:

"Prominence refers to how well known a business is. Some places are more prominent in the offline world, and search results try to reflect this in local ranking. For example, famous museums, landmark hotels, or well-known store brands are also likely to be prominent in local search results.

Prominence is also based on information that Google has about a business, from across the web, like links, articles, and directories. Google review count and review score factor into local search ranking. More reviews and positive ratings can improve your business' local ranking. "

So let's get to it.

In this article, I'll be discussing how to quickly and efficiently increase the reviews for your local business so you can rank higher, get more inquiries, and land more new business.

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Ways to Increase Your Google Reviews Quickly

So I've convinced you that reviews are important. Now you've decided you'll try to increase them. Now you just ask every customer if they'd leave you a review each time you make a sale right?

YES!

But there are more efficient methods to add to your efforts.

Before we dive into the tactics, here's a pro tip: Create a QR code with a direct link to your Google Reviews page so customers can scan and be sent there directly.

This takes out the manual effort required to find your page, click on reviews, and submit one. People will just need to type their review in.

That's it.

You can use Canva or free QR code generators like https://www.qr-code-generator.com/.

Request reviews from your previous customers

Before you jump ahead and put up signs throughout your business and train each associate to ask, the fastest way to increase your reviews is to simply ask previously happy customers.

If you've maintained a database of customers (emails or phone numbers), you can simply ask if they'd like to leave a review.

To make this ask even more compelling, you can give them a reason why you're doing this. I've found a simple "contest" or "challenge" is more than a good enough reason to get people to participate.

A simple email or text your previous customers something like:

Hey {NAME},

Hope you are doing well.

Here at {COMPANY NAME}, we're doing something a little crazy right now.

We just kicked off a challenge to increase our reviews to over 100 on our Google Page and we need your help to do it!

If you have received quality service from us in the past, could you go ahead and give us a positive review using this link? {INSERT GOOGLE REVIEW LINK}.

We greatly appreciate the support of our customers and we hope to see you soon.

{COMPANY NAME}

In a matter of days, you'll see you reviews skyrocket.

I had a client generate 30 Google reviews in a week just using this script. You can see more on my website at chewningdigital.com/testimonials.

Ask each future customer after each sale

This may seem obvious, but you'd be surprised at how many businesses just overlook this.

You know the old saying "you'll never know unless you ask?" Yep. That really applies here.

All you need to do is ask each seemingly satisfied customer if they'd be so kind to leave you a review on Google if they think you deserve it. If you make it easy with a QR code or link, people will be more than happy to give you a review.

The mistake is waiting too long to a point where the heightened sense of happiness and satisfaction wears off.

Just ask!

P.S - make this part of whatever follow-up sequence, email, call, or procedure you have. It's just 1-2 sentences and shows you care about what your customers think.

Add prominent signage inside of your business

If you have a store location where customers visit you, make sure you have signage that has a QR code where customers can quickly leave a review.

If you're willing to plaster a bunch of promotional flyers up, you should have no issue asking customers if they'd support you in your endeavors to serve more people like them

Don't over-do it, just add a sign or two near the location where a purchase occurs, like a front-desk or checkout station.

If you ask upon purchase, all they have to do is scan the QR code and add a few words in.

Easy!

You'll slowly build reviews this way. It won't be over night, but people like to support businesses they believe in, and are probably standing there on their phone anyway.

Automate the process with software

While manual effort is a quick and easy way to ask for more reviews, you're better off setting up a system that asks for reviews without you or an associate even having to ask for one.

There are multiple ways to achieve this, but what you want to happen is to automatically fire an email or text message to the customer after a purchase event with a review request.

This can be done through software that can create a trigger event once an action has taken place, like a purchase made or an invoice paid.

This can be sent from your POS system if you're in retail or your CRM system if you have one setup. If you have a small crew and an email software, you can probably figure this one out.

I help my clients do this and can customize the trigger event depending on their sales process. You may need someone to help you set this up, but once it's done, you'll never need to manually ask for a review again.

Filter out negative reviews

If you're an upstanding business, you'll likely have few negative reviews, but they do happen to everyone.

A good trick I recently learned was this:

When sending a review request to your customers, setup a separate landing page that is used to filter out negative reviews. This page will ask the customer to "leave a review", but it will not be the actual Google Reviews page.

Instead, this page is owned by you on your own website. On the page, add text that asks for the customer to rate you 1-5 stars.

Setup a page redirect so that anyone who rates you four or five stars is automatically sent to your Google reviews page. And for those who select three stars or below are given the chance to add their comments directly on the page.

Only people who select four or five are redirected, while anyone who selects 3 or below stay on the page and never make it to your Google reviews page.

You'll now have a place where angry customers can talk negatively about you without if ever making it public. Make sure to take these seriously, as they may go direct to Google later on.

With this gated page, you'll be able to receive all negative reviews directly and only encourage positive reviews to be posted on your Google Reviews page.

Genius!

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Congratulations, you now know how to increase your Google reviews and start ranking higher on the local search results.

If you employ these strategies, you'll certainly be generating more business when people search for services like yours.

Increase your reviews! (And more)

If you'd like any help or advice on the strategies and tactics I've covered, head over to chewningdigital.com and learn more about my services. I help local businesses increase their sales through better marketing, including SEO and local search as discussed in this article.

Zack Chewning

B2B Marketing Manager | Consultant | Strategist

zackchewning.com | chewningdigital.com