Having reviews is a must for every business, but it’s not enough to simply have them — you also have to respond to them!
Responding to reviews is a must for every business.
Did you know that 84 percent of consumers place just as much trust in online reviews as they do word-of-mouth referrals from their friends or family? These days, reading online reviews is a very important part of the purchasing decision for consumers, but the simple fact that you have reviews is just the first step of an effective reputation management strategy. And if you’re hoping to take your strategy to the next level, it’s time to start responding to those reviews!
Whether your reviews are positive or negative, it’s important that you take the time to respond to each and every one of them. And believe it or not, taking the time to respond to a review is not a waste; it can be beneficial for your business in many different ways! In fact, you could be missing out if you don’t respond to your reviews. That’s why we’ve taken the time to put together this list of the top five reasons as to why you should make it a point to respond to each and every review:
Six Reasons to Start Responding to Your Reviews
#1. Show that you care.
A lot of business owners understand why it’s important to respond to negative reviews but completely fail to respond to positive reviews. This is a mistake, and to consumers, it looks like you only care enough about responding when your reputation is on the line. However, if your customer can take the time to write a review, you certainly can take the time to respond to it, and best of all, doing so will show that you care.
Responding to reviews, negative or positive, shows your customers that you care enough to respond regardless of the kind of review they leave you. Of course, how you respond to negative and positive reviews will be different, but regardless, leaving a meaningful, sincere reply will show the world just how thankful you are for your customers and for their efforts to leave you a review.
When you only respond to negative reviews, you’re merely managing your online reputation, but when you respond to every review — negative or positive — you’re utilizing your online reputation to market your business!
#2. Show off your customer service chops.
Responding to your reviews, particularly the negative ones, is a great way to show off your customer service skills. The fact of the matter is that most people are willing to accept that businesses are operated by humans who are capable of making mistakes. Therefore, when a mistake occurs, they’ll be a lot more willing to forgive that mistake than you might think. However, in order to earn that forgiveness, you need to be able to turn the bad review around with the right kind of response.
When you respond to reviewers who aren’t so happy with your service, it gives you a chance to turn the situation around and demonstrate to — not only the customer in question but to anyone else who may have been following the exchange online — the lengths you are willing to go to in order to turn a wrong into a right.
Taking the time to appease an upset customer demonstrates to the world how committed you are to pleasing your customers. Best of all, it could help you create a cheerleader for life. When a customer sees the lengths you are willing to go to win them back, they are often willing to shout it from the rooftops.
#3. Share your side of the story.
One of the challenging things about reviews is that you can’t control what people say about your business in them. Because reviews are so very public, this fact can make a lot of business owners incredibly nervous — and rightly so. However, what you can control is how you respond to those reviews, and even if the review in question was entirely inflammatory, responding is critical because it allows you to share your side of the story.
Let’s say, for example, that one of your competitors writes a fake, one-star review on Google or Facebook. There are steps you can take to get that fake review taken down (at least in some circumstances) but in most cases, most review platforms won’t immediately take down a fake review, and until they do, you need to be able to tell the truth about the interaction.
While you should never call out a fake review in your response, you can say something along the lines of, “We don’t have a record of working with you, but we’re sorry that your experience wasn’t up to our high standards of excellence. Because our records don’t indicate that we’ve ever worked with you before, we’d love to hear more about the situation so that we can take steps to make it right. Please email us or call us to discuss the matter further.”
#4. Earn a customer for life.
In a previous blog — What Makes People Write Reviews — we talked about what motivates people to write reviews. Among the many things that motivate people to write reviews, one of the most common is just that people want to be heard. However, people aren’t likely to feel heard if they’re in a one-sided conversation with themselves, which is essentially what a review with no response is.
Making your customers feel heard and valued will require a response that’s well-thought-out and demonstrates the fact that you’ve truly listened to your customer’s needs and thoughts. A simple, “Thanks for the review!”, won’t suffice. Instead, respond to the specifics in the review, and not just the negative ones.
For example, say you own a restaurant, and a reviewer raved about the lasagna and the fact that your waitstaff remembered the fact that they had a nut allergy from their previous dining experience with you. A personal, detailed response might go as follows:
“We’re so happy that you loved the lasagna! It’s our Chef’s grandmother’s family recipe, and it’s one of our most sought-after menu items. Needless to say, we’re proud of it, and we’re so excited that you loved it. And thank you so much for your kind words about Stephanie, your server on Saturday. Stephanie has been with us for a few months now, and the kind of personalized service she offers is what we strive to provide day in and day out.”
#5. Enhance your website’s SEO power.
Where does your business rank on Google for applicable keywords? Are you on page one? If not, your website could use a little SEO (search engine optimization) TLC. These days, if your business doesn’t show up on page one of Google, it may as well not exist at all. Let’s face it, most people aren’t even looking past the first few search results, let alone to the second page, so doing whatever it takes to help your business rank highly should be your top priority. Luckily, your reviews can help!
Reviews are a powerful SEO tool because Google puts more trust into what your customers are saying about you than what you’re saying about yourself. And when you take the time to respond to those reviews, it gives you a chance to boost your ranking fuel for the keywords that are most valuable to your business.
Let’s pretend that you’re a photographer hoping to rank for “best wedding photographer in Maryland.” The likelihood that your reviewer will use those exact words probably isn’t high, but you can utilize those keywords in your response. For example:
“Dear Katelyn, we had so much fun working with you to capture your special day, and we’re so excited that you love your pictures! We strive to be the best wedding photographer in Maryland each and every day, and we truly value your feedback and your business. Thank you so much for taking the time to write this review, and we hope that you’ll think of us when you need an experienced photographer for family portraits, baby portraits and more!”
#6. Enhance your business’ overall reputation.
Responding to reviews helps to enhance your business’ online reputation in so many different ways, but one of the most impactful is that it discourages competitors or disgruntled ex-employees from leaving fake reviews, and it also discourages people from utilizing review sites as a way to blow off steam about minor, inconsequential issues.
A review platform is an easy target for people who have malicious intent, and that’s especially true if the business owner doesn’t take the time to respond to reviews. If someone thinks that their review will go unchallenged, it could embolden them to make false or inflammatory claims about your business. However, if they don’t think that they’ll get away with it, the chance of them leaving that review will be greatly diminished.
Decreasing the number of trolls who feel emboldened to leave you fake reviews is just one of the ways that responding to reviews can improve your business’ overall online reputation. Demonstrating to your customers that you are willing to listen and respond to their feedback could also encourage more people to write reviews for your business.
Sign up for Top Rated Local to take your business’ online reputation into your own hands.
Responding to reviews is an easy way to take control of your online reputation and start managing it like a pro. However, you won’t be able to respond to your reviews until you start claiming your listings on every review platform.
Get started by claiming your business with Top Rated Local! We offer you a free, effective way to manage your business’ online reputation by giving you the power to respond to reviews, get real-time notifications when someone leaves you a review, have your Top Rated Local profile prioritized on Google, gain insight into your reputation across verified review platforms and so much more. And the best part is that all of this is free when you sign up for Top Rated Local!
