Tag: Reviews

Tips for Creating Content More Consistently

Posted on by Robyn Rivera

Consistent content creation is an important part of the online reputation management puzzle

There are many things that go into an effective online reputation strategy. You’ll need to claim your listings and keep them updated, consistently check in on review sites for new reviews, and respond to your reviews on a regular basis — just to name a few of them.

However, reputation management isn’t just about exercising some level of control over what people are saying about your brand online; it’s also about controlling the results people find when they look up your brand online.

When someone googles your business online, are they inundated with negative reviews and bad press, or do they find your website, social media profiles, press releases, and more?

Ensuring that, when people google your business, they find what you want them to is all about SEO (search engine optimization), and when it comes to SEO, there’s almost nothing more important than creating content consistently.

Google recognizes businesses that provide their customers with content that’s original, high-quality, and valuable on a regular basis, but creating content consistently isn’t always easy. What do you write about every day? How do you come up with fresh, new ideas?

5 tips for creating content more consistently

#1. Share your own unique knowledge

As a local business owner, chances are, you have a lot of knowledge to share. Whether you’re a chiropractor, a plumber, or an arborist, you know a thing or two that the rest of us don’t, and that kind of knowledge makes the perfect content to put on your website and to share on social media.

When Google ranks sites, it’s not looking for who can regurgitate the same information the most over and over and over again; it’s looking for content that’s original and authentic. And, as an industry expert, you’re in the best place to provide that kind of content.

How do you figure out what kind of knowledge to share? Pull examples from your day-to-day. If you’re an arborist, and a lot of your clients have been asking how often they should get their trees pruned or why it’s important to get them pruned, share that information in a blog or on social media!

#2. Save ideas for future content as you find them

If you wait until you’re ready to sit down and start blogging to think of a topic to write about, it’s going to make the whole process a lot longer and a lot harder than it has to be. You’ll be a lot better off (and you’ll be able to produce content a lot more consistently) if you have a few ideas socked away for future topics.

Oftentimes, when you’re doing research or on a job, you’ll come up with a great idea for a blog or a social media post. Whatever you do, don’t make the mistake of believing that you’ll remember it later. As a business owner, you have a lot going on, and the reality is that you’re probably not going to remember it.

Instead, take a minute to jot down any ideas you have in the moment, and keep them saved somewhere you can reference them later on. This way, you’ll always have something to write about.

#3. Let feedback guide you

There are all kinds of content that you could be creating for your audience, but not all of it will be effective or helpful for your brand. Luckily, you can use feedback on the content you’ve created so far to guide you when it comes to the type of content you’ll be producing in the future.

There are many places you could go to get feedback into the type of content you’re creating. One way to go about this is by using social analytics to find out which of your social media posts get the most engagement and clicks. On your website, you can keep track of how your content is ranking. It’s also a good idea to pay attention to feedback in any comments.

Another way to go about gathering feedback about your content is to simply ask for it. When you talk with your clients, it doesn’t hurt to ask them what they would like to learn or about any questions they may have that your content could answer.

#4. Outsource some of your content

No matter how much knowledge and experience you have, and how many sources of fresh topics you have at your disposal, keeping up on consistently producing content can be a lot of work. It can also get old quickly and easily become something that gets put on the backburner when your schedule starts to fill up.

But, there’s no rule that says that you have to produce all of your own content. In fact, if you are able to outsource some of your content to others, it will stay more fresh and interesting for your audience.

One great resource for content might be other businesses that you partner with. Ask them to publish content on your blogs in exchange for publishing content on theirs. This is also a great way to earn backlinks to your site, which will help with your organic rankings.

#5. Remember that there are many different types of content

Traditionally, when most people think of creating content, they think of publishing new blogs on their website or giving followers tips on social media. However, it’s important to remember that content creation goes far beyond text, and whether you’re sharing a video tutorial, an infographic, or even photos of your team volunteering or celebrating at your annual company party — it all counts as creating content.

If you limit yourself to text-based content, it’s going to feel like consistent content creation is an uphill battle. But, when you open yourself up to all kinds of content, it will help you tap into your own creativity and make it easy for you to consistently produce new content.

Consistently creating content is an important part of SEO, which is an important part of building and maintaining a strong online reputation for your business. And, the good news is that there are lots of things you can do to make creating content on a regular basis easier and less time-consuming.

Originally published on 1/31/20

Why Your Local Business Needs a Website

Posted on by Robyn Rivera

Does your local business really need a website?

It used to be that the only way for your business to be online was to have a website, but all of that has changed. These days, there are lots of ways to have an online presence, from social media to review sites and directories. However, regardless of whether or not you’re on Facebook or Google My Business, you need a website. It’s simply non-negotiable when it comes to the future success of your business.

Here at Top Rated Local®, we have an awards program that recognizes the businesses with the best reputations in each state across a variety of industries. While auditing our award winners, I’ve been struck more than once by just how many contenders still don’t have websites, and they’re not alone.

Did you know that fewer than two-thirds of all small businesses have a website? The reasons for this may vary, with some businesses believing that they’re too small to need a website, some business owners citing the cost of building a website and some believing that a website is irrelevant for their industry, among other things. But, the fact of the matter is that, no matter what size your business is, what industry you’re in, how many clients you have or how many word-of-mouth referrals your clients give you, having a website isn’t optional for your local business or, for that matter, your business’s online reputation.

5 reasons why a website is a must for your local business

#1. To build an online presence

The first and most essential reason to build a website for your business is that it’s the first step toward establishing its online presence. Don’t get me wrong, if you have a Facebook page and a Google My Business listing, you’ve got an online presence, but without a website, it’s missing its main hub.

Think of your business’s presence on review sites, social media and directories as the introduction to your business online. Often, these are the places where people can find your business online, but they’re not their final destination. In most cases, when someone finds you on one of these sites, and they’re interested in the possibility of working with you, they’ll go to your website to learn more about who you are, what you do and if you have what it takes to meet their needs.

#2. To establish credibility online

When someone finds your business on a directory or a review site, the next logical step in determining whether or not they want to work with you usually consists of visiting your website. As a result, if you don’t have a website, it can turn visitors off, and many of them will move on to the next business on the list.

Although there are still a large number of small businesses that don’t have a website, consumers still expect that you have one, and if you don’t, it can lead to questions about the credibility of your business. In fact, a majority of people won’t trust a business without a website.

Think about it from a consumer’s perspective. First, they find your business on a directory — let’s say Google My Business. They then spend a few minutes reading your reviews, and you seem like a decent company to work with. Now, they’re at the stage where they want to learn more about your business, but there’s no website to visit. Without a website, they’re left wondering if you can meet their needs or if your business is even legitimate. Finally, they decide to move on to the next listing.

#3. To gain more control over your online presence

There’s a lot that goes on online that’s totally out of your control as a business owner. You can claim your business listings, write your own business description and respond to your customers’ reviews, but you have no control over what those reviews say. On social media, too, you can start the conversation, but you can’t control it. You have some measure of control over your online presence across the web, but your website is the one and only place where you’re totally in control.

On your website, you decide which testimonials to highlight, which images to use, how to describe your business, etc. It’s the one place where you get to fully decide what kind of impression you make on your visitors and what they come away with.

#4. To inform consumers about what you have to offer

Too many businesses make the mistake of believing that having a Facebook page or a Google My Business listing is the only thing they need to do online. And, while these sites are great for helping people find your business online, they don’t tell people a whole lot about your business or what you have to offer.

Let’s say someone is looking for a specific service, like the dry foam method of carpet cleaning. They know enough to know that they don’t want a typical carpet cleaner, but there’s no “dry foam” category of carpet cleaning on Yelp. So, when they find a carpet cleaner that looks like they have decent reviews, they go to their website to ensure that they offer what they need.

Directories and listing sites often allow businesses to write their own descriptions, but it’s not always easy or possible to give consumers the information they need to confidently choose their business in a few sentences. Your website is the perfect place to go into more detail about what you offer and how you can help.

#5. To get your name out there

Staying competitive online means making your business as visible as possible online. That means, regardless of whether someone is searching Google, Facebook or Top Rated Local for a local business, your business needs a presence.

Having a website is just one more avenue for people to find your business online, and what’s more is that there are a lot of things you can do on your website that you can’t on your Facebook page or Google My Business listing that will help it rank higher in the organic search results, and for lots more keywords.

Online reputation management is important for every business to think about, but your presence online will never be as strong as it could be unless you have a website. If you’re interested in building your own local business site, the Marketing 360® Websites app can help.

With an intuitive drag-and-drop editor and a library of beautiful design templates to choose from, Marketing 360 Websites makes it easy to build your own website, no matter how much design experience you have. Get started! 

Originally published on 2/7/20

Your Guide to Showcasing Customer Reviews

Posted on by Robyn Rivera

Reviews are a very powerful thing for your business’ online reputation, as well as for its overall success. But have you ever wondered if there’s a way to get even more out of your reviews?

Showcase your reviews to get the most out of them!

Even if you never do anything but let your reviews sit on Google, Yelp, Facebook and any other review site they were published on, they’ll do your business a lot of good. Reviews help with everything from SEO (search engine optimization) to credibility and trustworthiness, but that’s not all they can do!

With a little know-how, you can make every five-star review you get go a lot further!

A note about showcasing reviews:

A negative review can be a powerful thing, and for reasons that are both psychological and — believe it or not — physiological — people are naturally more drawn to negative reviews and have a tendency to give them a lot more weight than positive reviews. This fact alone makes taking the time to showcase your positive reviews is well worth it.

Seven Ways to Showcase Outstanding Customer Reviews

#1. Publish reviews on your website

Your website is a great place to publish reviews you want to highlight or are especially proud of. And when you do, you may even enjoy a subsequent boost in sales, as reviews help to establish trust and give buyers more confidence.

At Top Rated Local, we’ve seen a lot of businesses publish reviews on the front page of their website, which is a great way to get attention with them, but they also work beautifully on testimonial pages, as well as relevant product pages and pages for any specific services mentioned in the reviews.

You could also utilize a positive review to give credence to what you say on your ‘About Us’ page. For example, every business says they’re the best, but when you publish a customer review also backing up your claim, your customers don’t have to take your word for it!

#2. Share reviews on social media

If a customer has left you a five-star review on your social media page, especially if it was well-written and tells a story that tugs at the heartstrings or otherwise stirs up emotion, sharing it on social media is a great way to ensure that it gets noticed.

Posting on social media is something you should be doing on a regular basis. Luckily, posting a review every now and then will give you a break from constantly having to come up with new content to publish on your social media pages, and it gives you the opportunity to thank your client for taking the time to share their experience in a public way, as well as to brag on your business without having to be the one to brag.

#3. Utilize reviews in print ads

Online reviews don’t have to be used strictly online! They are a great way to make any print advertising you do more trustworthy and comfortable. Regardless of whether you’re putting reviews in newspaper ads, magazine ads or even in direct mailers, they’ll go a long way toward making your business look good.

When it comes to adding reviews to print ads, direct mail may be your most impactful option. Surprisingly enough, in the digital age, direct mail is still an incredibly effective way to get your business’ name out there, and a lot of consumers have come to know and trust direct mail, even if they don’t love it. Because direct mail already enjoys so much trust, you can make a direct mail campaign even more effective by incorporating your online reviews in your mailers, postcards and other marketing items.

#4. Display reviews in your store/office

Some reviews are so perfect that they are worth framing — literally.

If you’ve received a real show-stopper of a review, and you’d love to spread the word about it high and low, one cute and effective way to utilize it is by printing it out in a nice font, framing it and hanging it in your store or office.

Having a great review hanging in your store or office is an effective way to remind yourself of the standard of service you want to set and reach each and every day. It also shows anyone who comes into your business what kind of service you strive to offer.

#5. Publish reviews in your monthly newsletter

Sending out a monthly newsletter is a great way to keep your customers informed about what’s going on in your business, including any promotions or sales that are coming up, any big projects you’ve recently completed, what you can help them with, etc. These newsletters are also the perfect place to share reviews that your especially proud of.

Part of your monthly newsletter should include updates on what your business has been up to for the last month, and if you’ve received a five-star review in that time, there’s no better way to showcase it than in your newsletter. Sharing reviews in a newsletter is powerful because you can give it context and add more information to help your readers get more out of it.

#6. Write about great reviews on your blog

If you know anything about SEO (search engine optimization), it’s probably that content is king — which it is. Adding fresh, unique content to your website on a regular basis is the number one most effective thing you can do to improve and maintain your website’s organic ranking on search engines. But adding all of that content on a regular basis can get old, and it’s not always easy to think of new topics to write about. Luckily, reviews help you break the mold!

You could promote your reviews on your blog in a couple of different ways:

  • Tell the story of a great experience with one customer, highlighting that specific review. If the customer is willing, you could also ask them about doing a case study with them or interviewing them further about their experience.
  • If you’re writing a blog based on a specific product or service, you could pull a list of several reviews that you think give valuable information on the product or service.

#7. Display reviews on the shelf

Product reviews are powerful things, but you don’t have to limit using them to online marketing and promotion! If a particular product in your brick and mortar store has a stand-out, five-star review online, you can utilize it in your in-store marketing efforts to great effect.

Displaying outstanding product reviews on shelf displays is a superb way to bring attention to products. Plus, it lets your reviewer explain the benefits of purchasing the product, which not only gives you a break but also makes for more credible and convincing claims. Having a review on display will also help to establish more trust in the product and could lead to an increase in sales!

Make the most of your online reputation

Building and managing your online reputation can be challenging, but when you have the right tools in front of you — as well as the knowledge of how best to use those tools — there’s nothing stopping you from building the kind of online reputation for your business that you want. Marketing 360®’s reputation management software is here to help. Learn more and see plans and pricing.

Originally published on 10/21/19

Simplifying SEO for Local Businesses

Posted on by Robyn Rivera

Local SEO isn’t as complicated as you may think

Being visible online isn’t something any local should take lightly in this day and age, and there are two basic ways to ensure that your website is visible online — paid ads and organic results. Paid search ads are a great way to get your name out there when you’re just starting out, but when you’ve dominated the organic search results, you’ll save money with each and every lead that you get.

SEO (search engine optimization) is all about increasing both the quality and the quantity of the organic traffic that your website gets from search engines. And it’s something that every local business should think about. After all, a business that learns how to dominate local search results through SEO not only saves money on paid search ads but also benefits from better, more qualified traffic to their website.

As important as SEO is, it’s often an overlooked piece of the online reputation management puzzle for many business owners. That’s because SEO can seem like an overly complicated thing, and while it’s true that it takes time and hard work, it’s actually a lot more simple than you probably think.

The basics of SEO for local businesses

Keyword research

Keywords are what people type into Google, Bing or other search engines to find the topic they’re searching for. Identifying the appropriate keywords to optimize your website for is done through keyword research, and it’s the first — and arguably the most important — aspect of your entire SEO strategy. The bottom line is that you need to be able to identify which terms you want your website to rank for, and once you do, you’ll be able to base the entire rest of your SEO strategy off of it.

The keywords you choose will have a direct impact on both the quantity of the traffic your website gets and the quality of that traffic. Choosing broader, more general keywords will mean more competition, and choosing irrelevant keywords will hurt your ranking and diminish the quality of your organic leads.

Learn all about how to find the best keywords for your business.

Content

If you’ve talked to many people who work in digital marketing, there’s a common saying about SEO you’ve probably heard — “content is king.” Everything in SEO has to do with content, and it’s one of the easiest and also one of the most challenging aspects of SEO for local business owners.

The good news is that SEO won’t require you to have a whole lot of technical knowledge or marketing savvy, but the bad news is that it requires you to create original, high-quality content on your website, social platforms and beyond on a regular basis. That can be daunting for business owners who may not exactly think of themselves as writers or already have an over-flowing schedule to contend with.

Luckily, Google doesn’t expect every business owner to be Hemingway, but they do expect them to create content that adds value. And for the benefit of your website’s SEO, that content should be built around your keyword research. Keep in mind that it’s more important to use keywords naturally than it is to force them into your content as many times as possible.

As a business owner, you have a lot of knowledge about your industry that the average consumer does not, and a great strategy is to use that knowledge to create content for your website. Tips, how-to articles and client testimonials are the perfect things to put in your blog.

It’s important to know that content isn’t just text. There are many different types of content that should be added to your website, and when optimized correctly, videos and photos can be valuable commodities when it comes to organic rankings.

Not many businesses think of them this way, but reviews are actually another type of content that can help a business rank higher organically in the SERP, and the best part about reviews is that you don’t have to write them yourself! Google also weighs what other people say about your business more heavily than what you say about yourself, and reviews can be a major benefit for your SEO.

In addition to adding content to your website consistently, posting on social media should be a regular part of your SEO strategy. Excerpts from blogs on your site, tips and tricks, photos of your team and client testimonials are just a few examples of the kind of content that works well on social media.

Links

The other major aspect of SEO is link building. Link acquisition can be challenging, and it will take a solid investment of time and hard work to achieve it. One of the most straightforward ways to acquire it is to email website owners directly, and ask if they would allow you to publish a guest post on their blog.

Contacting website owners directly is just one aspect of earning links; you also need to have link-worthy pages on your website to link to. What makes a page linkable? Here are a few questions to ask yourself in order to determine linkability:

  • Is the content useful? – Link-worthy pages are informative and useful. How-to guides, advice and concept explanations are just a few examples of the kind of pages that are linkable.
  • Is the content original? – In order for a page to be link-worthy, it can’t have the same information that’s available everywhere else. Use your industry expertise by taking a new perspective on something, or share original data or research to create link-worthy content.
  • Is the content entertaining? – There are a lot of ways to make an impact with your content, but the best way is by creating content that entertains. Humorous content, as well as interactive content, like quizzes or games, can be very entertaining and link-worthy.

In general, the most linkable pages appeal to a wider audience, which means that they probably won’t be your highest-ranking pages. But as long as your content is strong enough, you’ll earn links to those pages anyway through your manual efforts to reach out to site owners. And when you do, those links will add credibility and authority to your website and your brand.

SEO often gets a bad reputation for being overly complicated, but it really doesn’t have to be. Neglecting SEO can hurt your business’ visibility and online reputation, so it really isn’t something you should overlook.

The Marketing 360® Content app can help you monitor your organic performance, including keyword rankings, traffic and more. Work with a dedicated Content Marketing Specialist to reach your organic goals. See plans and pricing.

Originally published on 1/14/20

Build Ready-to-Go Forms for Anything

Posted on by Robyn Rivera

Whether a local business is collecting customer feedback or information, accepting a payment or growing your monthly newsletter, website forms are the perfect tool.

Having the right website forms builder on your side can make it easy to create the forms you need. The Marketing 360® Forms app has everything you need.

How Marketing 360® Forms can help you reach your goals and grow your business

Save time with ready-to-go forms, or create your own

Unsure of where to get started when it comes to making forms for your small business website? Not to worry, the Marketing 360 Forms app offers a library of ready-to-go forms for your industry, saving you time and hassle.

Alternatively, if you want something specific, it’s easy to create your own website forms from scratch. And, it only takes a few minutes.

Gather data and get leads

Website forms are the perfect tool for collecting data from leads and customers. Whether the form is an application, an onboarding form or an estimate request, it’s the perfect way to gather key information.

When someone fills out a form on your website, their information is stored right in the CRM app, where you can access and organize it.

Give customers the option to book online

A lot of consumers these days prefer to schedule their own appointments online, as opposed to calling you to schedule an appointment over the phone. With the Marketing 360 Forms app — backed by the Scheduling app — you can give them that option.

With the Forms and Scheduling apps, you’ll spend more time serving your customers and less time on the phone booking appointments.

Make sales without a shopping cart

You don’t necessarily need an e-commerce website or even a shopping cart to start making sales on your small business website. The Forms app makes it easy to accept payments, donations and more quickly and easily.

Payment forms are backed by the Marketing 360 Payments app, where you can store and analyze payment information, manage your invoices and more.

Collect feedback from your customers

For many small business owners, it can be difficult to get a clear view of your customer service from where you’re at. That makes it hard to tell what’s working and what’s not.

Gathering customer feedback is the best way to identify and address issues within your business that may be holding you back. And, with Marketing 360 Forms, you can collect customer feedback right on your website.

Get more applications

Are you looking to fill open positions in your small business? You’re not alone. Businesses of all sizes and in many different industries are facing a shortage of employees. But, you can increase the number of applicants you get by making it as easy as possible to apply.

With Marketing 360 Forms, you can create custom job application forms that your candidates can fill out from your website. Applicant data is stored in the CRM so that you can follow up.

Grow your newsletter subscriptions

Want to stay top of mind with your customers and leads? A monthly newsletter is a fantastic way to do just that. But a successful newsletter requires a healthy subscriber list.

Marketing 360 Forms gives you an easy way to grow your newsletter subscriptions. In just a couple of steps, your website visitors can sign up for your newsletters, and you’ll have the information you need to create automated email marketing campaigns.

Simplify with full platform integration

Marketing 360 Forms is an all-in-one tool that makes creating your own website forms quick and easy. But, the very best part is that each and every form you build integrates seamlessly with the rest of the Marketing 360 platform.

Create forms to book appointments online and manage appointments with Scheduling, organize customer data in the CRM, build automated email journeys with Nurture, accept and manage payments with Payments and more.

Start creating forms for your website the easy way with Marketing 360 Forms. See our plans and pricing.

Build a Strong Reputation for Your Local Business

Posted on by Robyn Rivera

Every business needs a strong reputation, and having the right reputation management software on your side can go a long way toward building one. Here’s how.

Build a strong reputation for your local business with Marketing 360® Reputation

Request reviews

Reviews are the bedrock of your online reputation, and every small business needs them. But, the downside is that people don’t often write reviews without being prompted — that is, unless they are upset about their experience.

Because people who are unhappy are more likely to write reviews, it can leave you with a skewed reputation without any kind of management on your part. Since most people are happy to write reviews when asked, requesting reviews from all of your customers means a more accurate reflection of your business.

The Marketing 360 Reputation app makes it easy to request reviews. Because it’s integrated with the rest of the marketing platform, you can easily automate review requests through email and text.

Monitor reviews

Getting reviews is important, but it’s just one part of reputation management. People often expect a response to their reviews, especially negative reviews, and they expect you to respond quickly — within a day or two.

Your small business likely has a presence on lots of review sites, like Top Rated Local®, Yelp, Facebook, Google, etc. You need to know when someone posts a new review on any of these sites so that you can monitor your reputation and respond in a timely manner.

Keeping track of your reviews on multiple websites can be a challenge. But with Marketing 360’s reputation management software, you can monitor your reviews on all of the most popular review sites — all from one place.

Build trust with a reviews widget

Trust plays a huge role in the average consumer’s purchasing decisions online. There’s a lot of competition out there, and people want to know that they’re buying a high-quality product or working with a trustworthy business.

Your reviews and online reputation play a big part in building that trust with new and potential customers, and by embedding a reviews widget on your website, you can harness the power of a strong reputation on your website itself.

With the Top Rated Local widget, visitors can check out your reviews from across the web, see your overall ratings and even write reviews — all without having to leave your website.

Gain more control

A small business’s online reputation is incredibly important, but it can be a tough piece of the marketing puzzle because it’s centered around what other people say about your business, which is largely out of your control.

Sure, you can do your part to build a strong reputation by providing great customer service, requesting, responding to and monitoring reviews, keeping your business information up to date, etc., but there’s a lot that’s still out of your control.

Marketing 360 Reputation and Top Rated Local give you more control by allowing you to challenge potentially fake reviews, make some reviews private, make comments on reviews and more.

Streamline your marketing

Reputation management is not an island and shouldn’t be treated as one. It’s a key part of your overall marketing strategy, and it needs to be integrated with the other parts of your strategy, like social media management, local listings management and more.

One of the biggest benefits of building your reputation with the Marketing 360 reputation management app is that it’s built into an all-in-one marketing platform that has everything you need to grow your business, plus a marketing team that can help you maximize your efforts.

With Reputation, not only will you have everything you need to build a strong reputation, but you’ll also have access to a CRM where you can manage your contacts, a social media scheduling tool to keep you active on social media, an easy-to-use website builder and so much more.

Marketing 360 Reputation is the comprehensive reputation management software a small business needs to build a strong, impressive online reputation. Learn more and see plans and pricing.

The Advantages of Using Top Rated Local® for Consumers

Posted on by Robyn Rivera

Find a better way to look for local businesses near you with Top Rated Local®.

Top Rated Local® is not your typical review site

These days, when most consumers need a plumber or are looking for a great place to eat, they typically look online rather than asking for recommendations from friends or family. The last thing you want to do is to put your trust in the wrong business, and the only way to gain any kind of understanding of what working with a business is like is to read their online reviews. It’s for that reason that reviews can make or break a business’s success.

No one wants to hire a roofer, only to find out they like to scam their customers, or a home contractor that always shows up late or blows up the budget. You want to know that you’re hiring or frequenting a business that provides great service and ensures that you’ll get what you pay for, and reading reviews is one of the best ways to do that. However, not all review sites are created equal.

Here at Top Rated Local®, we’re proud to say that we’re not your typical review site. Built on five pillars of the customer experience — quality, value, timeliness, experience and satisfaction — Top Rated Local was built to provide a better, more effective solution to both consumers and businesses alike. It’s a place where consumers have access to a straightforward feedback system that gets to the bottom of their experience and helps them gain a better understanding of the overall customer experience.

5 advantages of using Top Rated Local — for consumers

#1. Gain an understanding of a business’s overall reputation

It’s not always easy to tell what kind of business you’re considering working with if you look at the reviews from just one website. There are a variety of different review sites, and a single business could have a wildly different reputation on each one. For example, the same business that has an “A” on Angie’s List might also have a one- or two-star review average on Yelp, so if you rely solely on either one, you won’t get a full picture of what working with the business is really like.

Top Rated Local provides consumers with an easier way to tell what kind of business they are potentially working with by aggregating its ratings across a variety of trusted review sites to calculate the overall Rating Score™ for the business. The number of reviews, the average star rating, how recent the reviews are and the number of review sources are all taken into consideration when calculating a business’s Rating Score.

With Top Rated Local Rating Scores, you no longer have to scour the internet in search of reviews from multiple platforms. Plus, Top Rated Local lists other review platforms, so if you’d prefer to read reviews instead of relying on a business’s Rating Score, every platform a business is listed on will be at your fingertips and easy to access.

#2. Top Rated Local isn’t pay-to-play

Did you know that a lot of the most popular review sites out there rank businesses higher based on the plan they purchase rather than their actual reviews? That’s right, if a company has money, they have to rely less on providing great service and a quality product, because a lot of review sites will rank businesses higher in their search results merely for spending money with them. These “pay-to-play” types of review sites aren’t helpful to either consumers or businesses.

Luckily, as we’ve mentioned, Top Rated Local isn’t your average review site, and it isn’t pay-to-play.

Not only does this ensure that the businesses that offer the best service get the biggest benefit — rather than the businesses with the largest bank accounts — but it also ensures that consumers have better, more accurate information to work with when they’re doing research on which company to choose.

#3. Get to the bottom of the issue with more valuable reviews

Reviews are wonderful, and oftentimes, reading reviews is the only way to get to know a business and what kind of service they provide before taking the leap and signing a contract. However, not every review is made equal, and a lot of times, reading reviews can actually confuse the issues rather than making it clearer.

The reason why reading reviews can muddy the waters is that they are often subjective and overly personal. Here are a couple of examples:

  • You went out to eat after your new fiance proposed to you, and you’re on top of the moon. Even though the food was late and a little cold, you’re so ecstatic about your future nuptials that you can’t see a single problem through your rose-colored glasses, and so you write a glowing five-star review.
  • You went out to eat on a crowded Saturday night, and you’re already feeling annoyed because there was an accident on your way there and you sat in traffic for 45 minutes. By the time you sit down, you’re more than a little hangry and nothing seems to be going your way. And even though the restaurant did everything in their power to meet your needs and make you happy, you’re not having it, and so you write a one-star review.

As you can see, our personal lives can easily bleed into the reviews we write, which is why Top Rated Local developed the five pillars of the customer experience — quality, value, timeliness, experience and satisfaction, giving consumers a better idea of what it’s really like to work with the business in question.

#4. Gain more confidence when making decisions online

Whether you’re purchasing the perfect ring for your special someone or scheduling an appointment for carpet cleaning, doing so online always comes with some level of risk. When you can’t be there in person to determine what kind of business you’re considering working with, you rely on people online to write reviews to guide you.

As we mentioned in our last point, reviews are incredibly subjective, and while they can certainly make you feel more confident when making purchasing decisions or decisions to hire a company, they can often end up leaving you more confused.

With Top Rated Local’s one-of-a-kind Rating Score and the five pillars of the customer experience, you’ll have the information you need to make decisions that are much more informed. When you use Top Rated Local to find the right local businesses for your needs, you can be more confident that you’re making the right decisions for your needs and your bank account.

#5. Write better, more effective reviews for the businesses you work with

Writing reviews is one of the best ways to support the local businesses you frequent — apart from financially supporting them by giving them your business of course. When you write reviews, you can also help other consumers make wise decisions about which companies to work with and which products to purchase. However, as we talked about in our previous point, there are some reviews that are more helpful than others.

If you want to write reviews that can help other consumers like you make the right decisions for their needs, let Top Rated Local guide you. Using the five pillars of the customer experience, you’ll rate the business based on specific criteria rather than just writing a few sentences in a comment. Of course, you’ll also be able to comment, but those pillars will help to guide you toward writing more effective, better reviews.

Would you like to learn more about how to write more effective reviews? You’re in luck because In a previous blog — How to Write Helpful Customer Reviews — we touched on a few tips to help you write reviews other consumers can really use and learn from.

Start experiencing the benefits of Top Rated Local for yourself!

When you haven’t had a chance to work with a business yet, and you don’t know anyone else who has, either, reading their reviews and learning about their online reputation are often your only course of action in determining what kind of business it is. There are a lot of variables that can make even reading online reviews murkier than you might think, and if you’re looking for a better option for making decisions online, look no further than Top Rated Local!

Whether you’re looking for an interior designer to help you bring life to your home or office, or you’re in need of restoration services to help you recover after a flood, turn to Top Rated Local to help you find the right company to work with for your needs. Start searching for local businesses near you with Top Rated Local today!

Originally published on 10/14/19

The Advantages of Using Top Rated Local® for Businesses

Posted on by Robyn Rivera

Find a better way to manage your business’s online reputation with Top Rated Local®.

Top Rated Local® is not your average review site

A business’s online reputation is everything these days. That’s because consumers regularly do research online when they’re looking for a specific product or service, and as Millennials and Generation Z start becoming a bigger and bigger slice of the consumer population, more and more people will rely on reviews when making purchasing decisions.

Reviews are a huge part of your business’s overall online reputation. Not only do they say a lot about your business, but they affect where your website ranks in search results. Reviews can make your website more visible, and that means that the success of your business relies heavily on your ability to generate reviews and manage them, and that’s where Top Rated Local comes in.

We’re proud to say that Top Rated Local is not your typical review site. Top Rated Local is built on the five pillars of the customer experience, and it was created to empower consumers and businesses alike by capturing a business’s overall experience in a way that’s unlike anything else you’ll find out there. And today, we’re going to go over the advantages of using Top Rated Local for both consumers and businesses.

Five advantages of using Top Rated Local for businesses

#1. Get a good idea of your business’s overall reputation

There are numerous review platforms out there, from Angie’s List and Yelp to Google and even Facebook. Having a profile — and actively monitoring it — on each of these platforms is essential to maintaining a strong overall online reputation, but it can be a lot of work to constantly check up on each one of these platforms to find out if you have a new review to respond to and to figure out where your business stands.

If only there was a way to get a good idea of your business’s overall reputation without having to check a dozen different websites. Luckily, with Top Rated Local, there is!

One of the biggest benefits of using Top Rated Local is that your Rating Score™ captures the overall customer experience — not just your ratings on Top Rated Local.

Your business’ Rating Score is determined by aggregating all of the reviews on verified review sites. From there, a proprietary algorithm analyzes your business’s overall rating based on the number of reviews you have, the number of verified sites your business is listed on, the average rating of your reviews and more.

#2. You don’t have to pay to play

A lot of review sites out there are free to get signed up on but offer paid plans in exchange for higher placement in their search results. So, for example, if a consumer is searching for a plumber on one of these sites, they aren’t necessarily getting results based on a company’s reviews or online reputation. Instead, they’re getting results based on how much a company is willing to pay.

Running a small business these days can be tough, and making a small business successful and profitable can be even more difficult. This can make it difficult for small businesses to compete with bigger, more profitable companies on these pay-to-play review sites.

Top Rated Local does offer a variety of different plans, starting with a free option, but signing up for a paid account does not mean that your business will show up at the top of the search results (though there are a number of incredible benefits).

The order in which businesses are presented in the search results on Top Rated Local is based on their Rating Score — not on how much money a business is spending with Top Rated Local. That gives small businesses an even playing field to compete in, and it ensures that consumers are getting suggestions based on a business’s reputation instead of how much money they are willing to spend.

#3. Get notified when you receive reviews

Responding to your reviews is absolutely essential to the success of your business, and that’s true regardless of whether the review in question is positive or negative. Responding to reviews demonstrates to both your existing customers and potential customers that, if they take the time to write a review for you, you care enough to take the time to respond to it and to address any concerns that they brought up. And when it comes to negative or one-star reviews, responding to your reviews will allow you to share your side of the story.

Even if you get occasional reviews that are fake or written by one of your competitors hoping to undermine your success, crafting a response can help to make things right. Unfortunately, it’s not easy to get a review deleted — even if you can prove that it’s fake — and responding is often your only course of action to let the world know that the review isn’t authentic.

In addition to making sure that you respond to every review, you should make it a point to do so promptly. In fact, most consumers expect you to respond within a reasonable timeframe — 72 to hours or so.

Plus, if you respond to a review fast enough, your chances of a customer changing a one-star review to a three- or four-star review are greatly increased. That’s right, responding quickly enough may even eliminate an unsightly one-star review that could hurt or diminish your business’s online reputation!

#4. Display the Top Rated Local trust badge on your website

These days, trust is everything, and it’s imperative to earn the trust of consumers if you want your business to be a success.

When someone comes across your business online, the only thing they have to help them determine how much to trust you is your word — and your business’s reviews! — and you need to give people a good reason to choose you rather than turning to the next business on the list.

When you sign up to become a Top Rated Local business, you’ll have the ability to display the Top Rated Local trust badge on your website and any other marketing assets you wish. When people see that Top Rated Local badge, it helps to build trust and gives them a reason to choose your business over your competition.

#5. Embed reviews on your website

As mentioned, establishing trust right away is a huge part of any business’s success in this day and age, and customer reviews are a huge part of that. Let’s face it, every window cleaner, plumber, home contractor and electrician out there claims to be the best at what they do. They all claim to have experience, value integrity and put their customers first, but the reality is that not all of these businesses can be the best, and not all of them can be trusted.

What a company says about itself is important, but it doesn’t compare to what a company’s customers say about it. When your customers go on and on about how great it is to work with your company, it says a lot and helps to give potential customers more confidence in working with you.

Displaying reviews on your website is a great way to add trust and give people a reason to work with you, and when you become a Top Rated Local business, displaying those reviews is easier than ever. With Top Rated Local, you can add a widget to your website that will display your reviews directly on your site. That means that consumers don’t have to go look for your Yelp or see what customers are saying on Facebook. All they have to do is go to your website, and they can see your reviews!

Enjoy the benefits of utilizing a different kind of review platform.

Reputation management should be a focus of every business, and that’s true regardless of what size your business is or what industry you work in. Luckily, with the help of Top Rated Local and Marketing 360®’s reputation management software, you’ll have everything you need to maintain your business.

Originally published 10/13/19

The Dos and Don’ts of Generating Reviews

Posted on by Robyn Rivera

There’s a right way and a wrong way to get reviews

Businesses need reviews in this day and age, and that’s true regardless of the industry they are in, how long they’ve been around or the level of service they provide. Unfortunately, though, most people still don’t write reviews on their own, even as up to 90% of consumers religiously read them when making purchasing decisions. However, the vast majority of consumers will write a review when asked.

Buying reviews is shady, can ruin your online reputation and could be potentially illegal, resulting in huge fines and even the risk that your business’s listing might be taken down completely.

When you take a few minutes to read the guidelines on major review sites, like Google and Yelp, you’ll quickly find that asking for reviews is definitely a grey area, and if you’re not careful, you could incur the same kinds of risks as you would by buying reviews. It’s for that reason that every single business owner understands the dos and don’ts of generating reviews.

The dos and don’ts of generating reviews

DO create and claim your business listings

There’s a reason why so many people don’t write reviews on their own, even if they were completely satisfied with their experience — it’s inconvenient! Life is busy for many of us, and the idea of taking time out of our busy schedules to write a thoughtful review can just seem too prohibitive. And when you’re asking the customer to sign up for an account or to create a profile on a review site in addition to writing a review, it makes the process even more time-consuming and inconvenient. That’s one of the reasons why it’s important to create and claim your business listings on multiple review sites.

In addition to making it easier for your customers to leave a review for you on their preferred site, claiming your creating and claiming your business listings will also help you to ensure that your information is accurate and up to date on every site your business is listed on. On most review sites, claiming your listing also gives you the ability to respond to reviewers on different platforms.

Are you ready to start creating and claiming your business listings? Start with Top Rated Local — it’s free!

DON’T pay for fake reviews

Getting reviews naturally can be difficult, and since most business owners understand how important those reviews can be, many of them have resorted to simply buying reviews. Buying reviews is certainly easier than trying to earn them naturally, but it’s a big no-no, and it can do a lot more damage to your business’s online reputation and overall well-being than you might think.

The risks that you take when buying reviews include losing the trust of your customers, getting fined by the FTC (Federal Trade Commission), getting your site taken out of the SERP (search engine results pages) altogether and missing out on valuable feedback that you could use to make your business better.

If you’d like to learn more about how buying reviews can be damaging for your business, check out our previous blog — Why Buying Reviews is a Bad Idea.

DO ensure that your customers know how important reviews are for your business

As we mentioned, asking for reviews is a grey area, and on some review sites, like Yelp, it’s more than a little frowned upon. However, asking for reviews is also the number one most effective way to actually get them, so where does that leave us?

There are ways to ask for reviews without actually asking for them. You don’t have to come right out and say, “Please write a five-star review for us on Google,” to get the point across that you’d like a review. A better way to do so is by making sure that your customers know how much you value their feedback and how important reviews are for your business’s future success.

DON’T bribe your customers in exchange for reviews

Incentivizing reviews is another easy way for businesses to generate more reviews, but much like outright asking for reviews, there’s a fine line between incentivizing reviews and bribing your customers to write reviews, which is certainly against the guidelines of many review sites. In fact, some review sites treat incentivizing reviews the same way they treat outright buying fake reviews, and you’ll risk the same kinds of penalties.

You should never offer your customers discounts, special offers or free products in exchange for five-star reviews. However, a less-shady way to accomplish the same goal is to enter clients who give you feedback — good or bad — into a drawing.

DO ask that your customers convert their feedback into reviews

Your customers give you feedback all of the time and in many different forms. Sometimes, they’ll tell you in person about their experience. Sometimes, your customers will email you about their experience. Sometimes, your customers will tell you about their experience over the phone. It’s important to note that, while this kind of offline feedback is a valuable tool for helping you make your business better, it doesn’t do much for your business’s online reputation.

When you get feedback offline, it doesn’t hurt for you to ask your customer to turn it into an online review, particularly if you’re not trying to pressure the customer into giving you a specific star rating or writing specific things about your business. Here’s an example of how to ask your customer to convert their feedback into an online review:

“Thank you so much for the valuable feedback! We value it so much and would really appreciate it if you could leave it for us online so that you could help other customers make the right decisions for their needs.”

DON’T write your own reviews

Like paying someone else to write reviews or bribing your customers to write them, writing your own reviews can seem like an innocent way to quickly generate reviews, but it’s definitely a black-hat tactic that is against the guidelines of every major review site. Writing your own reviews make your business vulnerable to the potential penalties — which, to recap, includes fees, the possibility that your listing could be taken down and the loss of trust with your audience.

Fake reviews are easier to spot than you might think, and if you aren’t planning to go to the trouble of creating a fake profile on Yelp or Google, it’ll be all too easy for your clients to determine that you — the business owner, CEO, manager, etc. — are writing those reviews, which will cause them to lose trust in your brand and possibly even ditch you for your competition.

DO make great customer service your number one priority

Encouraging your customers to write reviews is great, but as you can see, the line between what’s acceptable and what’s not can be blurred easily, particularly since review sites often have differing guidelines. However, there’s one surefire way to generate more reviews that every review site finds acceptable and that you never have to worry about breaking guidelines or rules — and that’s to make providing next-level customer service your number one priority.

Every time you interact with a customer, think about how they are seeing your business and how they might represent the interaction online. And while it’s true that most people won’t automatically write reviews on their own unless they are unhappy with their experience, that doesn’t mean that great service never encourages people to write reviews. In fact, here at Top Rated Local, we see reviews all of the time that start with something along the lines of:

“I never write reviews, but I got such great service that I knew that had to…”

DON’T make getting reviews a competition for your team

Your employees are the face of your company. As the owner, CEO or manager of your business, you’re often too busy with everything else to have face-to-face interactions with every single customer, but your team, on the other hand, does have those personal interactions with your clients. And because of that fact, it’s absolutely essential that your customers know why getting reviews is important.

This doesn’t mean that you should try to get more reviews by creating a competition among your team to get reviews. If a bonus or another reward is on the line, it might encourage your team to use black-hat tactics in order to generate more reviews, and they could end up getting your business in trouble.

Start generating reviews the right way with Top Rated Local today!

Navigating the ins and outs of the different guidelines on review sites can be tricky, and what’s acceptable on one review site may not be acceptable on another. However, there are a lot of dos and don’ts that aren’t negotiable, and we hope that this article has helped to clear them up just a little bit.

Generating reviews is an essential part of online reputation management, but it’s only one step in the process. With Marketing 360®’s reputation management software, you’ll have everything you need to be able to manage your business’ online reputation like a pro, including real-time notifications when you get reviews, the ability to reply to your reviews, a more frequently updated Rating Score™ that will give you a snapshot of your overall online reputation, a Top Rated Local badge of your own so that you can display reviews on your website and the ability to verify your reviews and eliminate fake reviews. And unlike many other review sites, businesses don’t “pay to play” on Top Rated Local.

With Marketing 360 Reputation, you can take your business’s online reputation into your own hands effectively and professionally. See our plans and pricing to get started.

Originally published 10/11/19

What Makes People Write Reviews

Posted on by Robyn Rivera

Understanding why people write reviews is the first step towards getting more reviews for your business.

People write reviews for all kinds of reasons

Every business needs reviews, and it’s not acceptable just to have one or two — you need as many as you can get. But, it’s also not enough to have hundreds of reviews if none of them are recent.

A five-star review holds a lot of weight, but that weight becomes diminished the older the review is. Many consumers don’t even look at the reviews that are more than a few months old, because they no longer see those reviews as relevant.

Your business’s online reputation can make or break your success both online and offline, and it depends on your ability to get multiple positive reviews on a regular basis.

In order to do that, you need to have a good understanding of why people leave reviews in the first place. When you understand people’s motivations for writing reviews, you can fine-tune your strategy for getting lots of reviews

Seven reasons people write reviews

#1. To help other consumers

A lot of people write reviews because they genuinely want to share their experiences with other consumers when making purchasing decisions.

Whether that experience is positive or negative, these reviewers want to be able to guide other people to make, what they see as, the right decisions.

You can generally spot these types of reviewers by looking for more detailed, story-driven reviews.

If someone really and truly is motivated by helping other people make better buying decisions, they’ll probably give the entire 411 about their experience — sometimes right down to the name of the person who helped them and the time of day they were helped.

#2. To have their opinions heard

These days, it’s not always easy to get noticed or feel heard. There are so many people out there with opinions, thoughts and feelings, and if social media is any indication, people want to express themselves!

It can be difficult to break through the noise under normal circumstances, and one of the best ways to ensure that people are actually heard is to speak directly to a business via reviews.

When someone writes a review, they’re not another anonymous person complaining to customer service, and they don’t have to rely on a tech or customer service rep to relay their message to management.

Reviews allow people to communicate directly to the business in a way that ensures that they will be listened to and can’t be ignored.

#3. To be a part of the group

People find camaraderie in all kinds of places. You see it in fandoms all over the internet.

If you’ve ever stepped foot in a midnight showing of a movie or at your local comic con, then you know what we mean.

People love to connect with other like-minded people, but that doesn’t stop with dressing up as their favorite superhero or writing fan fiction.

Reviews are a great way to make a connection with other people who share your likes and dislikes.

You see this most often in reviews for movies, television shows and books, but some businesses invoke the same kind of response in their customers, particularly businesses that have a strong brand or offer unique products or services.

#4. To vent about a bad experience

One of the most common reasons anyone writes a review is in response to what they perceive as a bad situation.

Maybe they had to wait longer than they expected. Maybe the person who helped them was late or didn’t provide them with the level of service that fit their expectations. Or, maybe they simply don’t accept that mistakes happen.

Whatever the situation, people are more likely to spread the word after a bad experience than a good one.

Perception is reality, and even if you’ve done everything in your power to provide the best possible customer service and meet all of their needs, sometimes, you just don’t live up to expectations.

Unfortunately, people are more likely to write a review when they’re upset than when they’re happy,

#5. To give feedback about products or services

Some people genuinely want to help businesses get better!

There’s no such thing as a perfect product or service, but businesses often don’t see the flaws in what they’re offering because they only see one side of the equation.

You can’t possibly know about every potential flaw or downside of your product or service unless you are the ones using it on a regular basis. That’s why insight from your customers is very valuable!

These kinds of reviews are incredible because they give you the ability to make changes to your products or services that can help you attract more future customers, make your current customers happier and keep them coming back for more.

#6. To say thank you for a job well done

Going above and beyond in order to provide the best possible service for your customers is a surefire way to get great reviews for your business.

Let’s face it, these days, customer service can be lackluster, and a lot of people are simply accustomed to service that’s less-than-ideal.

One of the best ways to actually make an impact on your customers is to provide the kind of service they can’t ignore and that they’ll want to shout about from the rooftops.

These kinds of reviews are some of the best any business can hope for.

When prospective customers read them, they’ll be able to tell exactly how hard you work to please your customers, and about how much your customers appreciate that hard work.

#7. Because they were asked to!

There are many reasons why people write reviews on their own, as we’ve discussed in the points so far, but unfortunately, the vast majority of people don’t write reviews by themselves, at least not at this point in time.

And, as I mentioned, people are more inclined to write a review without being prompted after a negative experience than a positive one.

More and more people are writing reviews on their own, but until the day comes when it becomes second nature to consumers, your best course of action is simply to ask!

Very few people will write a review unprompted, but when asked, 70% of consumers will write a review!

Asking for reviews is one of the easiest ways to ensure that you actually get them, and no, you don’t have to bribe people with discounts or gift cards.

All you have to do is let them know how much a review will mean to you and request that they write one for you.

Every business needs reviews!

Understanding what motivates people to leave reviews will help you gain more for your business, which will help you build the kind of online reputation you want.

However, gaining more reviews is just the first step in the process of building and maintaining a solid online reputation for your business. Learn how to build and manage your reputation like a pro with the Marketing 360® Reputation app. See our plans and pricing.

Originally published 9/21/19