6 Proven Methods to Get More Online Customer Reviews

Let’s take a look at why your online reputation is something to focus on in the first place. We’ll also cover how to improve it by gathering more positive online reviews, and how a strong collection of reviews can help boost your business growth and bring in more customers. 

Why prioritize your online reputation? 

There are multiple reasons why increasing the number of online reviews you have can boost your business growth. 

• People read reviews. Potential customers are looking at your reviews, whether you’re keeping up with them or not. Research shows that 96% of consumers at least occasionally read online reviews, and 74% use two or more websites to do so, according to BrightLocal.
• Increased discoverability. Having more reviews for your business helps make your business more easily discoverable and boosts your SEO. 
• Provide business insights. Your reviews hold valuable feedback from customers on what’s going well and what’s not, which you can use to improve your customer experience.
• They act as testimonials. Your reviews can be used as testimonials in sales collateral, in marketing materials, and on your website.

6 methods to get more online reviews

Once you’ve decided to prioritize your online reputation and online reviews, there are a few steps you can take to help you earn more reviews and ensure you’re offering a stellar customer experience at the same time.

1. Update your online review profiles

Before anything else, make sure your online review profiles are up to date. Update your Google Business Profile account, Yelp, Meta accounts, and any industry-specific sites as well. 

When updating these profiles, check and update information like:

• Business hours
• Business location
• Contact information
• Photos
• Branding
• Name

Once this is updated, you can confidently direct customers to leave reviews on an accurate and professional listing.

2. Make it easy for your customers to write reviews

Minimizing the effort for your customers to leave a review is one of the best things you can do to encourage them to take the time to do so. This means soliciting feedback regularly, either through organic methods or with a customer experience (CX) management platform. 

Be clear with your customers about how they can leave a review and what the expectations are. You can do this by adding a link to a review template in emails, on invoices, on-site if you’ve got a physical location of your business, and through your CX management platform. Be sure they know it can be short and sweet (or sour), and you appreciate the feedback either way.

3. Time your requests right

Timing is everything in business, even when it comes to asking for reviews. There are a few parameters to follow when requesting a review from a customer. You want the interaction to be fresh in their mind, but also not so recent that they haven’t had time to form an opinion. For example, you wouldn’t want to ask for a review of an online order right after an order confirmation; make the request after the customer has received the item. 

When timing your review requests:

• Wait 24 to 48 hours after an in-person service, and after the delivery of goods.
• For a delivered item, you can wait a week or two for the customer to have time to use the product before reviewing it.
• Resolve any issues before requesting a review, if possible.

4. Respond to reviews

Every once in a while, you’re going to get a negative review. The good news is, it doesn’t mean it has to be a negative customer experience. A negative review is an opportunity to reach out to the customer, get deeper insights into what went wrong, and rectify the situation if possible. This can turn around that specific customer's experience and improve the overall experience for future customers, too. 

Plus, potential customers prefer businesses that have a mix of reviews and ratings, because nobody is perfect. They also look for businesses that take the time to make their customers feel heard and actually respond to feedback, good or bad.

5. Automate your review requests

To make collecting more reviews easier for you and your team, you can automate the process. Whether that be through a tool like AskNicely that has a “Review Request” feature to turn feedback into reviews, or another platform like a review widget, automation can ease the process.

6. Incentivize customers (legally)

You can also ethically incentivize your customers to leave you reviews. Consider offering a discount on a future purchase or service for an honest review. Or offer your customers points, insider status, or a coupon. Whatever you choose, be sure to take the good with the bad and follow all guidelines set forth by the review platform, as well as the Federal Trade Commission’s rules on customer review practices. 

Managing your online reputation and reviews

Your online reviews have the power to boost or dash your online reputation, so it’s essential to pay attention to your reviews and actively participate in them. Responding to customers and users and taking their feedback seriously will only help build your business. If you want to take it a step further, you always have the option to use a customer experience management platform to help as well. That’s what the team at Outreach did when they started working with Asknicely.

“We got AskNicely because it could give us more direct access to customers to hear what we're doing well, which we want to do more of. But then, also, areas where customers are frustrated, we want to hear that, too, so that we can fix it,” said Jamie Stahler, VP of Marketing, Sales, and Partnerships at Outreach. 

Whatever you choose, remember that your customers want to be heard and considered, and doing so will help your business grow and thrive beyond your online reviews.