888-773-4768

BLOG

The importance of positive reviews and how they drive your company

You own a successful company. Your customers tell you they enjoy working with your company and that they would recommend you to their network. However, you’re not getting the traction you desire from your website. Have you considered your online review presence? What about your SEO presence? Is your company listed on the first page of online search results? Is your online review presence negative or minimal? These factors may be negatively impacting your business, and SEO might be one of your biggest areas for improvement in driving business.

According to a consumer review survey by SEO research company BrightLocal, 85 percent of consumers read online reviews and 90 percent claim that positive reviews influence their buying decisions. Online reviews matter, and in a world of web searching – especially for local companies – it can make a business stand out amongst its competitors.

Here are two ways online reviews improve your SEO.

  1. Reviews improve trustworthiness.

The more online reviews you have and the better representation you have online, the more likely customers will consider doing business with your company. It’s the power of social proof. People want reassurance that they are indeed making the best decision for their money. The more confidence you give prospects, the better chance they will choose you. A strong presence of online reviews influences your rankings in SEO.

  1. New reviews produce traffic.

Search engines want to see that your website is making new content, whether that’s through new landing pages, blog posts or customer reviews. They want to see that reviews are frequently added. A search on tripadvisor.com for best hotels in your area usually gives you the most recent and top-rated review for a specific hotel. The newer the positive review, the better it makes your customer feel about the recent activity of your business. This leads to your website getting more clicks, which in turn influences the consumers’ purchasing decisions.

Online reviews are important to the growth of your company and help generate a better return on SEO. ReviewMaxer is an online review management software application that helps companies manage customer reviews. ReviewMaxer monitors and collects your online reviews. Sign up today for a free demo or visit the ReviewMaxer blog for more tips.

 

Photo credit: Pablo

Written by: Justin Hamilton


- 0 comments
READ MORE

How to improve your brand and increase engagement

There's a very good reason that companies include testimonial pages on their websites. Did you know that research from YouGov has shown that 78 percent of Americans look at reviews before making a purchase, and 88 percent find reviews about as trustworthy as personal recommendations from their inner circle of friends and family? Those online reviews are powerful …which is why it's too bad that more businesses don't know how to use them properly.

The testimonial page is just one tool that should be in your online review toolbox. Let's talk about how to manage a broader, more effective review strategy by tapping into the social market.

Your industry and your reviews

While social channels are a popular breeding ground for reviews, it's a good idea to start by examining which channels you should focus on. Begin by asking yourself: Where do my potential customers go for reviews? Which channels will have the most impact when it comes to posting reviews? Relevancy is different for everyone, but here are a few points to keep in mind:

  • Yelp is a powerful retail/restaurant review tool, but interest is starting to fade due to overuse and concerns about spamming, poor reviews, etc. For now, Yelp is still necessary for many industries, but expect it to be supplanted in coming years.
  • Google business profiles and Facebook are still requirements for nearly every industry. These are high-profile channels that directly impact both customers and your SEO. When in doubt, focus efforts here because these channels tend to have the most impact, even in B2B fields.
  • Be specific. Many industries have specific sites to garner reviews – think of Zagat for restaurants or Vitals for health care. Search for review sites unique to your industry and target them.
  • Use metrics. Examine your traffic: Where does it come from? What ads have the best conversion rates? This should point to social sites where you need to focus efforts.

A call to action for reviews

Once you know which social media channels you need to pursue – what’s next? A good review strategy requires effective calls to action. There are several places to put these calls to action. A solution that works for many companies is creating a landing page specifically for reviews, using simple forms that allow customers to quickly file a review. After a transaction, emails and links can point customers toward these landing pages with a simple request for a positive review about their experiences. Brick-and-mortar transactions can do the same with a little message on the receipt or an add-on to receipt emails.

Another powerful tool, especially for targeting specific networks, is a set of share buttons to allow customers to instantly share their reviews or visit the business profile where they can provide star reviews and messages for a particular social media site.

You should also consider incentives, especially when it comes to larger clients. Offering deals and discounts in exchange for reviews is common in many business circles; so don't feel bad about including rewards.

Using reviews when you have them

Positive reviews are starting to roll in thanks to your well-placed calls to action. Now, what do you do with them? It's smart to separate them into four different categories:

  1. Testimonials to share through website and email.

These are longer, more detailed positive reviews that are great for sharing in the right formats.

  1. Short reviews to share on social media.

These reviews are shorter and have excellent blurbs, ideal for posting on social media with a link to the review and a note about happy customers.

  1. Reviews that deserve a response.

These are reviews that raise important questions or comments that you should answer.

  1. Reviews you can ignore.

These reviews are far from useless and they contribute to overall review scores, but there's nothing much you can do with them, so don't waste energy on them.

Creating conversation

Finally, let's talk a little about poor reviews. Studies have shown that 4 out of 5 consumers back off from purchase decisions if they run across a negative online review. Here's what to do in response: answer poor reviews when possible. It doesn't matter if the review is unfair or doesn't make sense, post a reply, comment or apology. You aren't doing this for the poor review itself (although any toxic customer that you can convert is a win); you are doing this for new customers who are checking out reviews. If they see you are explaining or at least answering the negative reviews, they will be much less likely to let those reviews affect them!

Obviously, a successful review strategy requires a significant investment of time and labor (and it's probably not something you want to leave to interns). If you currently don't have the time to spare, consider using review management software to manage customer feedback and encourage positive customer reviews. ReviewMaxer is an affordable way to effectively manage your company’s reviews and online reputation – and it is extremely easy to use. Sign up for a free demo to see how this cloud-based software can save you time and promote your company online.



Photo credit: 123RF Stock Photo

Written by: Nick Rojas


- 0 comments
READ MORE

The first steps you should take to begin generating reviews for your company

The legal field poses unique challenges when it comes to obtaining online reviews. The sensitive and personal nature of a law firm’s work makes it more difficult to get clients to speak out about their experiences. But if you look at generating reviews for your firm as both a numbers game and a long-term proposition – you’ll see that it’s more than worth the effort.

The value of a single review is enormous. Consider the conversion increase that even a single review provides your firm: A recent Bazaarvoice study showed that one positive online review could boost conversion by 10 percent. Every subsequent review boosts that rate even more.

With a long-term review acquisition strategy, it’s important to have patience and make sure you’re putting in a sound and consistent effort to gather reviews from your clients. Here’s how to get started.

  1. Find your major review-site listings across the web.

Once you’ve created your account and logged into your dashboard, automatically search and upload links for your business’s existing listings across the most important major review sites by clicking the Connect a Location button in Dashboard > Funnel > Links > Review Profile.

Although industry-specific sites play a huge role for law firms, your major review-site listings (on sites like Google+ and Facebook) do have a large impact on your company’s visibility and reputation on the internet. Even if you choose to hide these major review-site links on your landing page, it’s valuable to keep them in your list for monitoring.

  1. Find your industry-specific review-site listings across the web.

Industry-specific review sites are particularly important in the legal field and you shouldn’t overlook them. Consider creating or seeking out existing listings on the following review sites (we integrate with all of the sites mentioned):

As always, if there’s a review site you’d like to see integrated into our platform, feel free to get in touch.

  1. Determine which of the review sites are most important to your goals.

Take a moment to inventory and assess your listings across these major and minor sites to determine which links you’d like to display and highlight for your visitors. Highlight your top priority site by dragging its link into the blue box in Dashboard > Funnel > Links > Your Review Site Links.

  1. Ask clients directly for feedback.

As a law firm, you have the advantage of establishing strong, sustained, face-to-face relationships with your clients. This is why asking your satisfied clients to leave a review is still one of the most powerful and effective ways to acquire them. And by directing customers to your landing page, you ensure that those reviews go exactly where you want them to go.

Still, your clients are susceptible to all the same deterrents to leaving a review as customers across all industries, including simply forgetting to do so. That’s why it’s useful to send them off with a tangible reminder to visit your landing page.

Our printed invites are uniquely useful in a law office environment. Here are a few ideas for incorporating our printed invites into your workflow:

  • Include your URL on appointment cards or use our printed review invites as appointment cards.
  • Include invites with paperwork or in paperwork folders (some have pocket slots for business cards).
  • Leave invites in a business card holder at the front desk.
  • Include your URL or an invite card in client mailings.

Note that we offer the proofing and printing of these cards in-house and at cost, but you may want to experiment with creating similar invitations with your own printer or find additional ways to incorporate your landing page URL into your business literature.

If you keep an email list, you might also consider using our drip campaigns or your email software to send a review invitation to your customers via email. You’ll also find an embeddable email signature snippet in the Widgets section that you can use to drive interaction with your landing page right in your correspondence. And our embeddable landing-page widgets are great for your website (find these in Dashboard > Widgets).

  1. Optional: Monitor your reviews across sites and keep tabs on what people are saying about you.

It’s important to take a proactive approach to managing your online reputation. Our optional Review Monitoring add-on allows you to keep an eye on what people are saying about your business across the internet. You’ll receive email alerts whenever you receive a new review on any third-party site listing you’ve loaded into your account so that you can take quick action if needed.

  1. Adjust your campaign as needed.

Review acquisition is a long-term commitment and one worth doing authentically. You may find that the most important review sites for your business change over time. We encourage you to make adjustments as you go. You can re-order, hide, show, edit and delete your review site links at any time. (You can perform all these actions in Dashboard > Funnel > Links > Your Review Site Links.)

Watch this free demonstration today to see how ReviewMaxer software works.


- 0 comments
READ MORE

A step-by-step process for reaching out to your customers via email

Our automated email campaigns allow you to reach out to your recent customers over time to facilitate a steady stream of reviews. Follow the steps below to get the most out of your campaign.

1) Customize/set up your campaign.

Before accessing any campaign features, you must complete the initial campaign setup by filling out the fields in the Setup email invite campaigns window. Once you have completed this setup, you’ll have access to all campaign features.

By default, the first email to a recipient will be sent out immediately after a recipient becomes active (more on this below). The Deactivate recipients on click? setting will also be turned on. You can adjust both of these settings in the setup window.

Please note: Using a free email address – e.g., Gmail, Yahoo, AOL – in the From email field can cause your campaign emails to bounce.

Before sending out any emails, take some time to customize your email campaign. This will help convert more customers into reviewers. Consider personalizing the wording of the emails. The default language is serviceable for a wide range of businesses, but the more directly you speak to your customers, the more you stoke the sense of reciprocity that motivates them to complete a review for you. If you need some ideas, consider mining your existing reviews for other motivators to touch on in your email messaging. For example, highlighting yours as a local business that needs your customers’ support to compete with the Big Guys. People love to feel needed and many want to support your business.

To get started, go to Dashboard > Invites > Email. Click here to learn how to customize your emails.

2) Create a CSV and upload your recipients.

While you can upload recipients one by one (click the Add a recipient button), you can also upload a high volume of recipients at once by creating a CSV file.

Upload your CSV file by going to Dashboard > Invites > Recipients and clicking the Upload CSV button.

3) Activate your recipients.

When setting up an automated email drip campaign, contacts you upload (via CSV or one by one) will automatically be added to the Pending Recipients list, where they will stay until one of the following happens:

  • They’re automatically moved to the Active Recipients list. (You must toggle on the setting Auto-activate pending recipients daily?)
  • They’re manually moved to the Active Recipients list (after clicking Activate all pending recipients or toggling the check mark in their entry on/green).

Auto-activating recipients

This feature automatically moves a set number of recipients to your Active Recipients list every day (provided that there is enough room on the Active Recipients list – you are limited to 100 active recipients by default).

To turn on this feature, set Auto-activate pending recipients daily? to Yes. You can then set how many recipients per day you’d like to activate (the default is 10).

Once a recipient is active, they will begin receiving your email drip campaign. Active recipients eventually become Inactive Recipients. Inactive recipients have done one of the following:

  • Received all emails.
  • Unsubscribed.
  • Submitted a review directly to your landing page (i.e., not to any third-party site).
  • Submitted feedback via the contact form.
  • Opened or clicked through a campaign email (only if you’ve turned on either of these settings in Dashboard > Invites > Recipients > Activity).

Inactive recipients stay on the list for 180 days (unless you manually delete them or change the expiration date), after which they can be re-added as Active Recipients. The system will prevent you from re-uploading recipients on the inactive list, thus preventing you from sending your campaign to the same customer twice.

Photo credit: Pablo


- 0 comments
READ MORE

Use ReviewMaxer to make it easy for people to review your company

No matter what industry you’re in, product and service reviews are a vital part of gaining new business and knowing whether or not your company is retaining customers.

Make writing reviews easy with ReviewMaxer’s texting feature

With ReviewMaxer’s text messaging feature, you can invite your customers to a landing page through a text message. This landing page allows customers to write reviews of your company’s product or service. Customers can quickly engage in the review-writing process by simply clicking on the link in their text message. In order to receive a text, the customer must opt in and agree.

To get started, upload a CSV file with recipients’ names and phone numbers. Then, customize your message and send it to your list of recipients. Phone numbers in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom and Australia are currently available. The initial fee is $15 for the first 200 messages, then a 6-cent fee per message after that.

Why should I use a text message review service?

A text message goes directly to the customer’s mobile device. It presents the review link in a way that’s easily accessible. When you make it simple for customers to leave a review, they’re more likely to do it. ReviewMaxer’s texting feature simplifies the process – you aren’t relying on customers to go to your website and find the link on their own.

How do I get my customers to opt in?

Present the opt-in option to your customers when you’re selling your product or service to them. You can use a station with a computer or tablet to quickly collect the customer’s name, phone number and consent to receive text-message updates from your company.

How do I customize my message?

Company representatives can customize messages under the text message template. Text messages are standard 160 characters, so it’s important to keep messages short and direct to avoid sending two messages. You can also send a test text message to a direct phone number to ensure the text appears on the mobile device the way you intended.  

What happens if a customer replies to my message?

If a customer replies to your message, they’ll get an automated response with an option to opt out. The same message will also direct them to a main number where they can contact your business.  

Incentives and rewards

You want your customers to write reviews and you also want them to return for more business. By implementing a review rewards program, you can get both. If customers leave a review, perhaps you offer a 10-percent discount on their next purchase. If customers leave three reviews on different review sites, perhaps they’re rewarded with a free gift. You can easily adjust the rewards to what your company can handle in order to encourage more customers to review your products and services.

Social media reviews

Similar to using the ReviewMaxer texting feature, social media makes leaving reviews easy for customers. Many people might already be tweeting your company with reviews or tagging your company in Facebook posts. It’s important for your company to be active on social media. Responding to customers who leave reviews and sharing those reviews will create relationships with your customers.

Social media reviews are also beneficial to your company because they allow potential customers to easily check out your product or service, which can lead to more business.  

Facebook has made it especially easy for people to leave reviews under the “review” tab on its business pages. Customers can leave a rating out of five stars and leave comments underneath. To boost your online reputation, you need five-star reviews to attract new customers; you should also address problems noted in lower-star reviews that potential customers will see.

ReviewMaxer is a great tool for your business to collect and manage your customers’ online reviews. You can also post or stream positive reviews directly to your website and social media channels. Try our demo today to see how easily and efficiently you can protect and improve your online reputation.

Photo credit: Pablo

Written by: Jordan McCrary


- 0 comments
READ MORE

6 online review sites your company should target

Today’s consumers are becoming increasingly technologically savvy. From determining which product to buy to which restaurant to try, consumers are relying more on online customer reviews to help make their purchasing and dining decisions. In fact, according to a survey by Search Engine Land, 72 percent of consumers trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations. So which review sites should your company pay attention to?

  1. Google My Business.

When consumers search for a local company on Google, reviews posted about that company show up in the search results. The reviews and star ratings help consumers decide whether that particular store or restaurant is worthy of their business. In 2014, Google began using the Pigeon update, which is an algorithm that uses the location and distance ranking parameters to improve search results. Google takes all the information from a company’s site as well as its reviews to produce more content, which makes the business appear more reputable.

If you want your business to show up in search results, you need to optimize your site. Set up accounts with local directories and online review sites, particularly with Google My Business. Your sales and the visitors to your site will increase as people post more comments, reviews and pictures of their experiences with your business.

  1. Better Business Bureau (BBB).

The Better Business Bureau (BBB) is a nonprofit site that examines several types of businesses, comparing their products or services with best business standards and depicting the customer satisfaction rate. The Better Business Bureau does not endorse a certain business or recommend it to the public as the best, but it provides people with information about businesses and if they meet with the site’s accreditation standards.  

The site evaluates both non-accredited and accredited businesses. A general Better Business Bureau profile of a company contains information about the business, its accreditation status, a list of complaints and reviews posted by customers and information on its dissolution. The Better Business Bureau rates businesses from A (highest) to F (lowest) based on the business’s complaint history; the type of business it is; how long the business has been open; how transparent it is; licensing and government issues; and known advertising issues.

  1. Yelp.

According to Yelp, Yelpers wrote more than 102 million reviews by the end of Q1 2016. Yelp allows people to rate a company and post reviews about their experiences, while allowing companies to respond. A company can create a Yelp profile, which includes its hours and location, and users can register to review the company for free. Companies can only respond to a certain number of reviews or messages each day.

Your business should work toward attaining positive reviews so that they appear at the top of your Yelp page. Having a profile on Yelp increases your company’s chance of showing up on Google’s search results.

  1. Yellow Pages.

Yellow Pages, a partner of Yelp, is a leading local marketing solutions provider in the U.S. Yellow Pages provides listings, coupons and reviews for millions of businesses. Yellow Pages uses an online reviews and ratings system so that customers can share their experiences with everyone else.

  1. Facebook.

Facebook provides users with the option to review a business by clicking on “Facebook Ratings & Reviews,” which users can find on the left-hand side of their pages. Users can choose to make their posts public to all, only to friends or only to them. People can also post a review on a business’s Facebook page, which automatically goes on its wall for all to see.

  1. TripAdvisor.

Businesses in the travel, tourism, entertainment, hotel and restaurant industry should check out TripAdvisor to see what people are saying about them. The site has more than 225 million opinions, pictures and reviews posted by consumers and customers. The review site offers information on airfares, rental listings, travel guides and advice forums. It’s useful for customers who are deciding where to visit and eat while they are traveling.

A great way to remain aware of what people are saying about your company online is by investing in an online reputation management software like ReviewMaxer. ReviewMaxer collects reviews from more than 500 review sites and puts them into one central database where you can respond to the reviews and share them on social media. 

 

Photo credit: 123RF Stock Photo

Written by: Paul Cook


- 1 comment
READ MORE