Online Review Campaigns are Just as Important as Marketing

Online reviews need to be an essential component of your marketing efforts. Reviews are showing up everywhere. When you come up in a local search Google, Yahoo, and Bing are now showing or giving links to reviews. They are on Facebook, Yelp, Google+ and more. If you don’t have reviews, you may be losing business to the competition. They can even help with your paid search campaign by providing prospects information on how excellent your service and products are.

In order to understand your business performance, you need feedback from customers. In the past,this may have been done with follow up phone calls. Now it can all be completed online. Your marketing strategy needs to include ways to generate online reviews that can show up in a local search for your products or services.

Get More Online Reviews with These Tips

• Ask for them! Send your customers a thank you email after their order or visit to your business. Let them know that you value their feedback and give a link to your review page on Google+, Facebook, Yelp, Angie’s List or your website.

• Run a promotion. You can run a contest or promotion on Facebook and ask people to give you a review. Anyone that submits a review can be given a small token of appreciation like 10% off their next visit or purchase.

• In person requests. If you see most of your customers face to face, you can also ask them to give you a review immediately after their visit. If they don’t use a computer, ask them to fill out a comment card with permission for you to post the review on one of your online profiles.

• Post a request on your website. Use a call to action button so people can go to the review page with one click.

Once you have started to get more online reviews it is important to regularly monitor them. You are bound to get one or two negative reviews. Don’t take it personally but do respond immediately and on a public forum. You want the author to understand that you are willing to listen to their concerns and address the problem. Consumers will respect your willingness to try where ignoring them only confirms the initial complaint. The majority of businesses do not spend time monitoring and responding so this basic exercise will give you a strategic advantage. Plus you need to remember that reviews are showing up in local search results along with a star rating. You don’t want to give prospects a negative impression right off the bat.

The majority of businesses, 61 percent, believe that if you advertise with a website you will receive preferential treatment when it comes to customer reviews. This hasn’t been proven, but if you are running a paid search campaign on Google, listed in their local directories to come up on a local search, and using social media, there is no reason to leave online reviews out of your marketing strategy. Reviews can help you to gain more customers and prompt them to select your company in the decision making process. Start today.

If you need guidance, Local SEO Sites can help and has prepared a white paper on how to get and improve your online reviews. Ask us for a copy!