Reviews play an important role in today’s world. There are sites dedicated for users to browse and book services based on reviews. Most users won’t even look at a business that has no reviews, which means that getting reviews for your business is essential.
This blog post isn’t meant to sell you on why reviews are essential but rather to show you how you can get them automatically. If you’re ready to get more reviews for your business, let’s begin.
Turn on the feedback feature to gain internal reviews
The feedback feature will allow you to capture reviews when users log in inside their accounts. Why does this work? It works because users visit their dashboard often due to many different reasons. If they want to tip someone, they will log in. If they’re going to cancel a future appointment or reschedule it, they also have to log in. During that time, an opportunity presents itself for you to start the review process, and it works well because the user is already giving you their attention.
Often times business owners reach out via phone or email to get a review. This rarely works because the customer is usually busy or simply brushes it off, typically says they will do it later but forgets. What works is a combination of our review system and also a phone call follow-up. If you noticed that you hadn’t received a review via the system, you could always follow up by calling the customer and getting feedback. It’s important to note not to be pushy. Otherwise, you will annoy the customer, and they may never return.
Turn on the feedback feature to get external reviews
Above, you learned how you could gain internal reviews. Later in this post, I will show you how those reviews help your business. Now, you’ll want to learn how to push reviews on your external platforms such as Yelp or Google.
You already know it’s much easier to get the review from a user that’s already giving you their attention. If they gave you a rating, you could activate a 2nd pop-up (shown in the image above) to show up based on your chosen criteria. For example, if they gave you a 5-star rating, another pop-up will show up, asking the user to copy and paste that review on an external platform of their choice. They can copy the review, click the link that will take them to your profile, and copy that rating there. It’s an easy way for customers to give you reviews externally and an effective strategy to gain positive reviews.
To learn more about the strategy, you can visit this link: https://help.bookingkoala.com/help/automatic-reviews-explained
Why are internal reviews helpful to your business?
Internal reviews help avoid negative external reviews. Most of the time, a business receives a negative review because the customer wants action to be taken from the company. Unless a user had a disastrous experience, they typically wouldn’t write negative reviews across all of your platforms. The majority will give you a negative review under one platform giving you a chance to fix the issue.
Our system will send an email and/or text to the user to rate their service after completing it. When they decide to leave the review, they will be taken to their dashboard to leave the review. If it’s a good experience, you can show them the 2nd pop-up, pushing them to an external profile. But if it’s a negative review, that review will only be displayed inside BookingKoala.
The strategy is helpful because once a user gives a rating on an external profile, the only way to change that review is for the customer to do so. More often than not, they won’t, even if the customer says they will because they either forget or don’t feel like it. Internally, you can call them after fixing the issue, asking them something simple ‘Have we done everything to fix the situation?’. If they say yes, you can ask them, ‘If you were to rate your experience again, what would you rate us out of 5 stars?’ Then after they give you feedback, you can easily change the internal review right then and there.
What else can you use internal reviews for?
You can use them to display them across your website:
It helps showcase you’re a good company because all these reviews are 100% authentic from all of your completed jobs. You can also show reviews when customers are booking:
This helps increase conversions during a booking. For example, when a customer is directly on your booking form, you can showcase providers with excellent reviews. If you allow the customer to read them, they can also do so, which will help them decide which provider they’d like to book with.
You can also use them to prioritize who gets jobs first. For example, you can tell the system to give jobs only to top providers rated four stars and above, ensuring your company provides top-notch service in your area.
If you’re convinced that reviews are necessary for your business, you can try this feature free for 14 days. Click here to sign up for a free trial of BookingKoala, and don’t forget to join our Facebook and Reddit groups.