If you want to add new customers and keep your loyal customers returning to your business, it is vital to have a good reputation. Would you utilize a business for their service if a trusted source told you about a negative experience they had? You most likely would not, and your business is no different.
Prior to online reviews’ popularity, most consumers would judge a company based on trusted advice from friends, family, and piers. While this still holds true, these same consumers also read online reviews before making buying decisions. Nielsen’s current Global Trust in Advertising study has shown that “sixty-six percent of global consumers said that they trust and utilize online reviews when making decisions about buying.” With this information in mind, there are multiple ways to preserve your business’ current reputation and grow it to attract new clients.
Online Reviews: Opportunity Potential
Most business owners tend to think that having a few decent reviews on third-party platforms such as Google and Yelp are good enough to carry their business. This is a mistake. A business cannot have too many reviews. Consumers want to see detailed reviews of a business spread across many websites and applications.
The problem with third-party platforms is that they have nothing to gain with your company’s success. Allowing them to host most of your business’ reputation without managing the reviews is a significant oversight.
Truthfulness is Critical
It is imperative to know that reviews about your business are genuine and legitimate. When you have a good handle on a product, post, and engagement, ask your customers to leave specific reviews to generate positive, recent reviews.
The desire to create fake reviews is tempting, but the consequences for these fake reviews being revealed are detrimental. While positive reviews are always a plus, current reviews hold more weight when it comes to search engine optimizing.
Current Reviews & SEO Ranking
The more current reviews your company has, the greater ranking it will see for search engine optimizing. This by itself is an adequate reason to want customers to make reviews about your company often.
As stated before, sixty-six percent of global consumers look to reviews to aid in deciding whether or not to buy a product or service. This is why more current reviews hold more weight to possible clientele.
People want to know what kind of experience your customers had with your business recently. A review posted within the last few days will be a more substantial determining factor than a review that was published a few years ago.
Business Reviews & Quantitative Data
A plethora of positive experiences is most reassuring to plausible customers. A handful of five-star reviews tell consumers that sometimes you do your job well. Twenty or thirty five-star reviews in a row prove to customers that you always do your job well.
When it comes to credibility, numerous positive reviews put the most security in a potential customer as they see that many customers have had beyond satisfactory experiences with your business.
Quality Reviews Build Credibility
Aside from a product or service, reviews are a big part of selling credibility. When a consumer purchases after reading positive reviews from multiple platforms, they tend to worry less about that purchase.
Imagine purchasing a product or service from a company that has no reviews. You have no idea how real-life clients feel about that product or service; you have nothing to refer to. If you purchase from a company with bad reviews, you will automatically assume you will have a negative experience.
If you only read bad reviews about a company, but the company is actively trying to reconcile, it will also affect how credible you deem a company. It sounds strange, but bad reviews build credibility, too. By promptly responding to a bad review within twenty-four hours and asking the customer what you can do to right a wrong, potential customers see how you genuinely care.
By letting negative reviews go without a response, consumers think you do not care about that customer. By properly replying to negative reviews, you can still build a good business reputation.
Analyze it All
It is crucial to acknowledge each and every review, good or bad. By reading through every review, you will learn what your customers like and dislike about your company. By looking at a mass-number of reviews, you will be able to trace back the trends that appear regularly. This makes it easier to keep providing the positives and correct any negatives.
Moreover, this proves to customers your business is like a strong predator that overcomes change and not a weak prey that dies due to the inability to evolve. People like to be heard and understood; it’s part of being human. Listening to your customer’s principles and responding to their thoughts makes them feel like more than just a supporter but a crucial part of your company.
When customers feel like they are family to a company, this builds brand loyalty and boosts reputation.
Thought Leadership
Thoughts create words; words develop actions. The idea of using hashtags and trendy words to reach a larger demographic is enticing. However, when the hip-new-lingo or hashtag’s ancestry does not support your company’s vision, it may do more harm than good.
What you say can and will be used against you: What your company says creates a reputation just as much as a customer review does. When your words are relevant and relatable, you build a reputation by guiding the way your customers think.
When your positive words lead customers, they tend to follow with positive action, such as purchasing a product or service from your company. Take control of your online reputation; lead consumers by providing positive thoughts!
Reviews in General
Whether one realizes it or not, we use reviews in our daily lives to make decisions more often than we think. Your reputation as a business is imperative.
At the end of the day, your reputation will be the deciding factor in whether a potential customer chooses you or the competition. This is why requesting customers to constantly post positive reviews matters.
Likewise, by responding to reviews, good and bad, builds a relationship with consumers. When consumers see you frequently engage customers, they are shown that you have a healthy presence and honestly care about the product or service you are providing people.
Overview
Creating the ability for customers to review your company and product is simply not enough. For a business to survive during the internet-age, one needs to be monitoring reviews from all platforms, first or third party.
Furthermore, you cannot leave reviews unanswered, good or bad. You need to respond to reviews to show the world that you are actively trying to build relationships with consumers and value what they have to say. By doing so, you establish an authentic presence that will make customers feel compelled to leave reviews without being instructed to do so.
When your business’ customers continually post reviews, you will acquire more current reviews every day, causing your search engine optimizing rank to increase. Now is the time to take the next step and own the future by engaging every review that gets posted about your business.
