When was the last time you hired a company or purchased a new product without reading the reviews first? It’s completely normal if you can’t remember. Online reviews have become one of the essential pillars for businesses today. None of us are willing to purchase a product or service without first checking the reviews and ratings. And this is not a claim – it is movers’ marketing fact that even you can’t deny. So, instead of asking yourself “why would I need reviews”, you should start asking yourself: “how do I get customers to leave reviews for the services my team offered them?”
Just how influential have online reviews become?
If you want to attract new customers, you have to include testimonials and ratings of your moving business. The more you have to offer, the better your conversion rate will fare with leads. Consider this for a moment – recent studies by BrightLocal show that over 86 percent of consumers aged 18-34 will read reviews for local businesses. 91 percent of those that read reviews will trust them as much as personal recommendations, while more than half won’t even look at companies with less than 4 stars. So, if you were skeptical about getting reviews for your business before, time to change your stance.
10 simple ways to get customers to leave reviews
Online reviews have become one of the basic means of promoting your business on a budget. And to help you realize just how simple it is, we are going to offer some guidelines. So, here are ten easy ways to earn reviews from clients:
1) Make sure to do your homework
If you want customers to leave reviews for your business, you first have to give them the opportunity to locate you. After all, your online presence plays as big as a role as any when it comes to getting reviews from others. And in order to achieve that, you first have to make sure that your company name appears in all the right places. Start from the biggest one – Google reviews. Claim your company name there by following the instructions. Once you take care of that, you should move on to the most popular websites:
- Yelp
- Bing
- Yahoo etc.
2) Simply the entire task for your customers
People today lead fast and chaotic lives. This means that we find it challenging and overall vexing to find the time to do tasks we are not obligated to do. So, if you want to get customers to leave reviews for your company, you need to make it as simple as possible for them to do so. One of the simplest ways to achieve this is through email marketing and open communication. People tend to respond well to email marketing campaigns and clear instructions.
3) Offer incentive to reviewers
Nothing quite like a reward to offer people the motivation they need to do something. In this case, if you are looking to get customers to leave reviews about your services, you need to find the proper gift for them. This gift usually comes in the form of:
- Coupons
- Gift cards
- Promotional material
- Customer loyalty points etc.
This doesn’t mean that you should be paying actual money for reviews. After all, authenticity matters most here, and you want those that used your services to review them with honesty and objectivity.
4) Send a follow-up email
Sending a follow-up or “Thank you for using our services” email can offer a great way to invite customers to leave reviews. In fact, e-commerce businesses find this to be effective in more than 25% of purchases. Plus, following up shows that you actually care about the opinion of your customers, rather than simply their money.
5) Be quick to ask
Momentum matters, but so does patience. So, you have to find just the right balance between providing the services/products and asking for feedback. After all, nobody likes to be forced to do something, especially not when that something is praising others. So, be careful to ask quick, but not too quick, and with respect.
6) Don’t be afraid to ask for help
There is nothing wrong in having other customers review your business by giving answers to other people. So, what you want to do is have a FAQ section on your website, where different people can leave questions that others can answer. This is a perfect way to bring together your past and potential customers.
7) Survey them
Never underestimate the influence and power surveys can have. As long as you keep it simple and to the point. This usually means having 3-5 simple questions, with a star or low-high ranking system. This is much more practical than leaving a blank box for people to fill out on the spot. Why? Because it will hassle them to do so.
8) Tell reviewers exactly what you want
If you are looking to get more details out of customers leaving reviews, you can always approach them with short questions. Have them review your products or services by answering questions such as:
- How did you enjoy the services provided to you?
- Did our company fulfill all your requirements and expectations?
9) Make it mobile first
You have to consider that more than half of your customer will feel inclined to leave reviews via mobile phone. This means that you have to make sure that the reviews customers get to leave are mobile responsive and easy to leave via mobile devices. This is the best way to get customers to leave reviews n matter where they are or what they might be doing.
10) Habitually thank every reviewer
Each and every review is unique, and thus equally important for your business and online presence. So, you need to make sure to respond to each review accordingly. By doing so, you not only send a positive message, but you are also able to handle any negative reviews that might come your way. So, take out a part of each day to handle this task – it will all be worth it in the end.
