We all know reviews and testimonials are important, and that they can help attract and convert prospects into clients. In fact, nearly all consumers, 97%, use reviews when evaluating a local business.
But, there are a multitude of reasons why getting reviews specifically on Google are better for your business than nearly any other kind of review or testimonial.
In today's digital world, it is extremely important for businesses to build their own online reputation, which will ultimately help them attract a wide range of customers.
If you aren't actively managing your own online reputation, consumers will form opinions of your business for you. You'll be putting your brand at risk of being positioned as irrelevant and unreliable.
customers are willing to spend up to 31% more on a business with excellent reviews
In this post, we'll take a look at the importance of building local reviews for your contractor business as well as how to get more.
Top 4 Reasons Why Local Reviews Are Vital For Growing Your Business
Listed below are the points we’ll be taking a look at:
Leave An Outstanding First Impression
Build Your Own Reputation
Achieve Higher Organic Rankings
Good Reviews Drive More Profitable Sales
Leave An Outstanding First Impression
We all know first impressions matter. As stated by Seth Godin, “People won’t prefer doing business with you, unless they know you, trust you and like you.”
The reality is, most of your potential customers will not be familiar with your business. In fact, the first time they get exposed to your brand might be in the Google search results when they see your Google My Business profile.
What's the first thing they're going to look at in Google local listings? You guessed it, your reviews. Reviews help your potential customers understand the quality of your products or services and your past customers’ experiences with your contractor business.
That’s the first step to building trust...or losing an opportunity.
Build Your Own Reputation
As we reviewed above, it's vital for businesses to build their own reputation. Your reviews are a reflection of your online reputation.
Take action, ask for the reviews proactively. Don't wait for a bad review to roll in before you start asking for them. According to the latest consumer study on local reviews by BrightLocal, 68% of consumers will leave a review if asked.
But don't stop there, make sure you take the time to respond to reviews as well. And not just the bad ones. It's important to respond to all reviews, even if it's just a simple thank you. 89% of people say they read company responses as well.
Not to mention, you customer went out of their way to write you a review on Google, the least you could do to show your appreciation is respond, that's just good manners.
Achieve Higher Organic Rankings
Google takes into consideration the local reviews in order to consider the local organic rankings’ placement. In fact, they prioritize their reviews when making this determination and deprioritize reviews from other sources.
It’s no secret that Google focused on delivering its users with the best possible experience and relevant results.
And if you don’t focus on building your local reviews, then you will be costing your business a better local organic ranking. That’s because the local reviews are bold indicators of whether your past customers were happy with your products and services.
This helps Google figure out whether your business deserves to be ranked at the top of the search engine results.
It’s one of the many factors Google takes into consideration to determine your rankings. According to a survey, people looking forward to getting in touch with a local business prefer businesses that have 40+ local reviews.
Good Reviews Drive More Profitable Sales
In marketing speak we call this social proof.
No, we're not talking about social media. In fact, the term social proof was actually coined back in 1984, well before social media or the internet as we know it even existed.
Social proof is the concept that describes a psychological and social phenomenon wherein people tend to copy the actions of others in certain scenarios. In fact, 91% of 18-34 year-olds trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations.
Moreover, according to one study by Harvard Business School, a one-star increase in rating can lead to a 5-9% increase in revenue.
Finally, not only will great reviews drive your transactions and overall revenue up, but one study from Invesp found customers are willing to spend up to 31% more on a business with excellent reviews.
How To Build Local Reviews For Your Contractor Business?
Here’s a list of tips that you can apply today to start building local reviews for your contractor business:
Ask Your Past Customers To Leave Their Feedback
Create A Review Email Campaign
Add The Review Link To Your Website
Respond To Your Customers’ Reviews, Even The Negative Ones
Ask Your Past Customers To Leave Their Feedback
There's no harm in asking your past customers to leave their feedback on your Google local listings. You likely have a large list of clients who would be happy to leave you an online review. So what are you waiting for, just ask them for a review.
However, be sure to do it with tact, don't ask them repeatedly and avoid suggesting a rating. Better yet, with the help of marketing automation tools, you can automate review generation like we do for our clients.
Create A Review Email Campaign
It’s one of the most effective ways of getting a higher volume of local reviews.
All you need to do is be clear and to the point.
Your email might look something like this.
Subject Line: Tell us how we did!
Email Body: Dear Customer Name, Our company is committed to providing the best experience and service possible to all of our customers! Please take 5 minutes to share some feedback on your most recent experience with us so we can know what we did really well and what you would like to see in the future! All the best, Owner Name
And that’s how simple it really is.
Add A Review Link
Make it easy to leave reviews by providing a direct link to the Google My Business review section of your profile. You can use this link on multiple marketing assets, including, but not limited to your:
Website
Invoices
Email campaigns
Email signature
Thank you notes
The review link can be a traditional direct link to the section or you can easily create a QR code that can be scanned with any modern day smartphone.
Respond To All Of Your Customers’ Feedback, Even The Negative Ones
While we all try to avoid it, sometimes a customer leaves a negative review. One of the biggest mistakes that businesses do is not responding to these reviews or putting the blame on the reviewers themselves.
And that's the mistake you should always avoid. It doesn't matter if your customers leave positive or negative feedback, you should always respond to each one them. If the feedback's positive, you can be specific and grateful in the responses.
However, if it’s negative, you should acknowledge it and respond politely and promptly, letting the reviewer know that you are taking certain steps to resolve the issue and such kind of mistake won’t ever take place again.
Your potential customers will respect this and will love getting in touch with your business.
Conclusion
Local reviews can help your local business attract a wide range of potential customers. According to Podium, 93% of consumers say online reviews impact their purchasing decisions. The good new for our clients is we automate the review process for them so they build their reviews on autopilot.
Get started with reviews TODAY!
If you're looking to grow your contractor business, take the first step today, and learn how we can help with our all-in-one contractor marketing platform.