The Advantages of Using Top Rated Local® for Consumers

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

Share this article!