You Need a Process to Collect Reviews from Customers You’ve Helped.
According to a BrightLocal survey, 87% of customers look at reviews when choosing a local service provider, and 72% of consumers have written a local business review. People needing your locksmith services are very active in reading and writing reviews for local services. You need to make sure that you’re actively getting reviews from clients, as well as performing top-notch work for customers.
Your Google Business Profile reviews are the most important place for you to earn positive reviews. Google uses reviews to determine ranking criteria for your local business in its local results. From Google – “More reviews and positive ratings can improve your business’s local ranking”. It is safe to assume that other Internet review sites also use reviews and your ratings as ranking factors on their own sites.
Do I have the ability to remove my Google Business Listing? Listings on other Sites?
Not even if you ask them nicely.
You are not able to choose what platforms collect reviews for your business. Review sites on the Internet are able to list your business and collect reviews for your Locksmith company. They won’t delist your site or stop collecting reviews for your business.
Your only option is to use these online reviews as a marketing tool. Do great work. Get your customers to leave you a review after you’re done providing your services to your customers.
Gathering Reviews for Locksmith Company Owners
Collecting as many customer reviews is essential. It must be done in accordance with the terms and conditions of review websites. For certain review services, like Google, you can request reviews. For review services such as Yelp, you aren’t able to directly request reviews according to their terms of service.
It is important to determine according to the review platform what types of review collection activities are allowed.
For the review services where you can solicit reviews from customers, there are numerous ways to get a customer to give you a review. Here are some of the most frequently used ways to get more locksmith reviews.
Text Your Customer a Review Link
When wrapping up service, the best way to get reviews for your locksmithing services is to send them a link to your review page on Google
The most effective way to encourage your customers to rate you is to text them that include links to your review page on a review website. It’s simple to them and easy for you. Before you send them a message, please ask them to decide if they’d like to leave a comment.
This should be done while you’re wrapping up your locksmith services at the customers residence. Because the service they received is new, it will improve your chances of obtaining a customer to leave a review.
Google is the best way for reviews. You can follow a step-by-step process to obtain the review link on your Google Business Profile. From your Google Business Profile, you should be able to click on the “Share Review Form” box to get a link you can give to your customers in order to get more reviews.
Go to Your Google Business Profile and select “Share Review Form” under the Get More Reviews section
Email a Review Link
You may also send an email to your customer to submit an online review of your locksmith services. This will likely get less response than the text link. Your email could get hidden in their spam filter, or they may just not have time to do a review after your email arrives.
Use a Review Service
There are a variety of review sites that can make the review collection process easier for your company.
GatherUp
GatherUp provides review collection services starting at $99/month for up to 3,500 customers. To collect reviews, the service includes email (3,000/mo), and text (300/mo).
This service provides you with review monitoring of your reviews from other websites (like Yelp, Google, etc.). A review widget is also provided for you by GatherUp. This widget can be used to show off your reviews on your Locksmith website.
GatherUp gives you a 14-day trial for free. trial.
Grade.US
Grade. US is $110/mo. It’s targeted towards marketing agencies. But, you can directly and just manage it yourself. For an additional cost, you’ll have the option to text 200 customers for reviews through their website. They also provide you with a review widget that you can install on your locksmith company home page.
Grade.US also has a free trial for 14 days.
Fake Reviews
If you’ve developed a strong review collection procedure using the techniques above, getting authentic reviews shouldn’t pose a problem. You won’t feel the need to pump up your ratings with prohibited tactics such as generating fake reviews.
Don’t ever solicit anyone to write a false review of your locksmith business. Don’t ask people who have never been customers to leave reviews on Google or anywhere else.
The FTC is taking action against fake reviews as they are a deceptive business practice. Don’t permit your friends or family members to leave reviews about your business. Do not hire companies to write reviews for your locksmith services. It’s not just limited to text reviews – false endorsements in any manner (including something as simple as”likes” on Facebook) could be viewed as a deceptive business method.
Incentivizing Reviews
You’re not allowed to offer prizes or contests in exchange for reviews
Another method that is not allowed by the FTC is to incentivize reviews. This could result in serious trouble with both the FTC as well as the review platform. Review platforms must ensure that their reviews are genuine in order to let users continue to use their site. Don’t incentivize reviews like this – it can get you in hot water with government regulators and review platforms
Your locksmith business can’t provide any kind of prize, offer a contest, or the chance to win as part of leaving a review. These tactics are unnecessary anyway as long as you’re providing stellar service.
Monitoring of online reviews
It is important that you’re responding to reviews as often as possible – that means weekly at minimum for most businesses. Most of the online review services discussed earlier in this article offer review monitoring, making it a breeze to determine when you’ve received reviews on different review platforms. You’re going to have to consistently monitor and respond to customer reviews for your locksmithing services
How Locksmiths Should Respond to Reviews
In general, you should be responsive to everyone who leaves reviews for you on review websites. This shows the customer that you’re engaged in the process and appreciate the feedback. It displays a level of involvement and concern about quality service that may differentiate you from your competitors.
Reacting to Positive Reviews
It’s easy to answer favorable reviews of your business. Tell them how much it was a pleasure to help them with their needs and thank them for choosing your business.
The technician or the owner of the business doesn’t even have to be the one responding to the reviews. Team members can learn the proper way to respond.
You Should Also Respond to negative reviews
Do you have the best locksmith business in the United States? The World? Doesn’t matter. You’re still going to get a bad review once in a while. There are occasional customers that will never be satisfied that make the life of a contractor difficult.
The occasional negative review will have minimal impact on your business – so don’t panic. This may sound surprising, but negative reviews can be a good thing. If your company has nothing except positive reviews, it can look fake to your prospects.
Search Engine Land reports that 90% of users won’t be swayed too much by occasional negative reviews as long as the business owner addresses the negative reviews properly. Make sure that you’re responding in a calm and rational manner to the bad review. Don’t ever get emotional or argue with a customer online.
Marketing Opportunity that is geared toward Prospects
It might seem odd, however, when you reply to a negative review, your response is more focused on your potential customers than it is for your client who left the negative review. The person responsible for the negative review will probably not do business with you again. When you respond, you need to be crafting your response for all the prospects who are reading the negative review.
If a customer is rude and has a rant in their review, it is likely that people will look at and recognize that the issue could be with your angry customer, not with you. Regardless of how irate they may seem with your services, be sure to provide them with a measured, rational well-thought-out response. Try to make the situation as of right as you can. Show that you care. Steer clear of conflicts.
You Messed Up and Received a Bad Review
Take ownership of it. Apologize for any mixups and be contrite. Resolve the problem with the homeowner or business owner if at all possible. Make amends with your customer for any mistakes that you may have made.
Now is the time to analyze the mistake. Make sure it doesn’t happen again so you don’t receive another negative review. Fix your systems and processes to improve the overall quality of your locksmith services.
If You Didn’t Do Anything Wrong
There are times when you receive negative feedback in spite of providing excellent service. They are among the most difficult to address. Again, you don’t want to provoke a customer into a heated argument online.
Thank them for their feedback. Be understanding of their dilemma and try to contact them directly to reach an amicable resolution. Try to get to the root of the misunderstanding and fix the situation.
Dealing with fake negative reviews
Fake reviews are everywhere online. There are even third-party websites whose job is to try to identify fake reviews. Fakespot is one example. It is used so that Amazon shoppers can try to identify what reviews are real – and which may be fake.
Businesses that have been around for a while and who have collected double-digit reviews likely have received a fake review or two. It’s possible your Locksmith business has received one of these fake reviews from a “customer” you’ve never even heard of.
Many times, unethical competitors hire an agency to leave your business negative reviews.
When you’re 100% sure you’re dealing with a fake negative review, you need to act:
1 Contact the Review Platform
Inform them that the reviewer was not a customer of your locksmith services.
Unfortunately, the review services are typically unhelpful, and most likely won’t take action based on your objection, therefore I suggest that you:
2.) Respond to the Review
If the review website allows reviews from the owner of the business, be sure to make it clear that the person (who wrote the review) is not a customer of your business. In your review mention, your company is dedicated to providing the highest quality service possible and the negative reviewer wasn’t an actual customer. You may wish to go on to mention that in the very rare instances where there is an issue that your company prides itself on customer satisfaction and finding a remedy for any issues.
Best Review Platforms Locksmiths
It is important to keep an eye on the reviews you receive about your locksmith company through the various review sites online.
One way to find out where people leave reviews online for your company is to type in the name of your business followed by the word “reviews”. Below is a screenshot of the results of my search for “prime locksmith company reviews”, a locksmith that services the south Denver area of Colorado. Note that I have no connection to this company despite residing in Denver metro.
You can see in the search results below that reviews of the company are found on other websites – including review websites. It is essential to maintain and monitor these pages. This is a brief summary of the information we’ve gathered:
Google Reviews
Google Reviews are shown as (A) in the image above. Google reviews are the most important and will be displayed when potential customers search for your business. Track and respond to Google reviews, since they are likely to be seen more than reviews on any other website.
Yelp Reviews
(B) in the screenshot above. In certain instances you’ll find Yelp listed as a top result in the results of searches for your Locksmith company. You must create and maintain your Yelp page and reply to reviews. You’ll notice that the stars are displayed right on the results page of Google. This means that prospects don’t even have to click on the Yelp result to see your rating. You’ll want to provide high quality service to keep that rating as close as possible to 5 stars.
HomeAdvisor and Angi.com Listings and Reviews
(C) in the screenshot above. Angi.com and HomeAdvisor are separate sites owned by the same company. A listing and star rating for your company may be maintained at both sites. The star rating may appear right on the Google search results page (similar to Yelp). If you’re using either of these services, you need to provide your customers with an amazing locksmith experience to maintain your high ratings.
Other Sites
(D) in the screenshot above if for nicelocal.com This is a local business directory type website. It will vary by business and region, but if a website appears on page 1 or page 2 of the search results when someone searches for your company, you’re going to want to claim your listing on those sites. Then you’ll want to monitor and respond to reviews that people leave for your business on the websites.
Other review sites that you could see when you search for your company include:
- referrallist.com
- thumbtack.com
- Yellowpages.com
- houzz.com
Local Services Ads Review
Note that if your Locksmith business makes use of Local Services Ads, Google will automatically provide your customers with review requests via the Local Services Ads platform. This makes it easy for you to collect some reviews.
Note though that these reviews are only available to customers who use Local Services Ads. They will not be part of the Google Business Profile reviews – which should be collected separately.
Management of Online Reviews
Your locksmith business will be listed on numerous websites that you can’t control – including review sites. These websites will not allow the removal of your business from their listings.
While it can be annoying that third parties can collect reviews on your behalf, it is also an opportunity. Be active with reviews and view them as a way to more effectively promote your locksmith services.
Get your company listed on all major review sites. All reviews, positive or negative, should be responded to.
If a customer leaves an unfavorable review, regardless of whether it’s your fault or not, do your best to remedy the situation. When you respond to reviews – you need to focus on prospects who will be reading your replies. Customers will get an idea of how professional your business is run based on your response.
Negative reviews are inevitable but aren’t going to sink your business if you respond properly.
Try to resolve conflicts offline, and avoid arguing with customers on the Internet.
