Local SEO - Review's Strategy
-
I'm trying to brainstorm some ideas for obtaining positive reviews for a my client who's a local business on Yelp and Google+.
I think it's best to capture a customer in the "happy moment" after a successful transaction with that business. I'm thinking integrating the option for customers to leave a review on Yelp or Google+ during the transaction process would be best.
Do you have any suggestions or experiences on the best way to integrate this into a transaction process where a customer physically walks into their business to make the transaction? (it's an Auto Body Shop BTW)
Also any other strategies for getting customers to give reviews?
Much appreciated!
-
Sure, good response. It is a waste of time as well with Yelp as if the reviewers are not trusted Yelp reviewers then the review will be at best ignored and at worst suspicious.
-
No worries! Glad it helped. Reviews are one of those things it is easy to overlook (or over think!). Get a solid process in place, be consistent and it will take care of itself over time.
-
Hi Steve,
You've received some very thoughtful replies here. I am just popping in to say that while the above suggestions sound good to me if applied to Google+ reviews, Yelp does not permit review solicitation in any form. In other words, your client should not be asking customers to review them on Yelp in any way. Not verbally, via email, via CTAs on the website, etc. Their policy is the most stringent in the industry - they want all reviews to be the results of spontaneous activity on the part of consumers. So, while I think you've received some excellent advice here, I would not recommend applying it to Yelp. Hope this saves you some headaches!
-
This makes 100% sense to me, and I think I'll be taking this approach to integrating review gathering workflow for my clients. Thanks a lot for the idea Marcus!
-
Hey Steve
It really can be fairly simple to generate positive reviews for the business and I find that all you really have to do is
A) Ask
B) Make it really, really easy for people to do soAsking at the point of sale in a bricks and mortar shop is not going to work AND it's important to note that asking people to conduct a review is okay but soliciting a review whilst that user is on your property is not okay and could cause problems down the road (all reviews from same IP address etc). It's also a bit mean to pressure people like that so not a good policy even if we ignore online.
A simple approach we have followed works like this:
- Obtain an email for your customer at point of sale
- Email the customer to ask them if they were happy with the service
- If the customer responds in a positive way then ask them for a review
Now, this tackles two important areas
- We ensure the user is happy who we are asking to place the review
- We make it easy for them by linking directly to where we wish the review to be placed and including instructions
You can also steer the ship a bit here (not in a manipulative way) and ask them to mention the location, service etc. This makes the content of the reviews solid for search purposes and useful for other users considering using your service. Win Win.
We go into more detail here with some simple email templates etc: http://www.bowlerhat.co.uk/blog/a-review-strategy-for-local-seo/
Hope that helps! Getting good reviews requires that folks are actually good at what they do (which I am sure your client are) and then asking people to place the review whilst making it as easy as possible to do so.
Refs:
-
If you have a great product then do not bring this up while they are buying from you because this way it looks like you are hungry about it. For one of my client what i did was I setup an automated email that will go after a week of their purchase and ask them to share their experience with others in the community.
Remember you have to have a great product or else this idea can kill your local business.
-
Hi Steve,
You should check out Customer Lobby. They solicit phone reviews from the clients and have different packages. One one of our team member's recent visits to a local medical clinic, the doctor's secretary actually handed out business cards with links to Yelp and Google+ review pages for the doctor and was encouraging everyone to leave their feedback on the sites... Something to think about.
Cheers,
SEO5..
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Could product sample giveaways be seen as 'paying for links'?
One of our main methods of advertising for my startup business is by sending samples to bloggers for review. I've read a lot of good things about this method and many of my competitors use it very well - I've even seen it suggested on the Moz blog several times in the past. The one thing I do worry about is that Google may see this as a form of 'link purchasing', as I'm offering something in exchange for a link and some of the blog posts may reference that fact (or at least most likely use the word "Review" - Which could be some kind of footprint?).
Branding | | azu25
We don't intend to ask for anchor texts, so at the very least that should look natural. What are your opinions? Could this be seen as paid linkbuilding or is it regarded as a natural marketing method? [EDIT]:
One idea we had was to potentially offer bloggers the chance to earn a portion of their purchase back by writing a review on their blog. They'd buy from us and let us know they have a blog, then we'd reimburse them some credit towards their next order for every blog post they write about us. Does this sound like a good idea or is this potentially more dangerous than simply offering free samples?0 -
Do Dashes in Domain names hurt SEO ranking?
I have found conflicting reports online whether or not dashes in domain names hurt/help ranking. Example yourbrandonline.com vs your-brand-online.com? I found Rand's write up on how to select a domain and he suggests staying away from hyphens but mainly because its hard to remember or people my enter it in wrong. Here's his comment. "Reject Hyphens and Numbers
Branding | | JoshKimber
Both hyphens and numbers make it hard to give your domain name verbally and falls down on being easy to remember or type. I'd suggest not using spelled-out or roman numerals in domains, as both can be confusing and mistaken for the other." Aside from people possibly struggling to get there directly because of the domain name, are they OK to use? Or, are domains with hyphens considered spammy? Thanks in advance.1 -
How does a business name affect SEO?
We have a client that's changing the name of their medical practice from the doctor's name to their region + "eye care." However, they recently told us they're changing it from "eye care" to "eye center." Many of their direct competitors use "eye care" in their name. I ran a quick keyword analysis and it shows "eye care" gets a million US searches a month, whereas "eye center" gets 450k searches a month. While that alone would make me suggest they keep "eye care," I ran a keyword difficulty analysis and found that "eye center" has a KW difficulty of 41 and "eye care" has a KW difficulty of 78. Should we recommend they stay with "eye care" because it gets more searches? Or is it better to go with "eye center" because it'll be easier to rank for?
Branding | | optimalwebinc0 -
Infographic for SEO
How can an infographic be used for seo purposes? What tools should I use to create one or should I just outsource the work? How much does an infographic cost to make?
Branding | | bronxpad0 -
How to get Google to link external review sites in Google Places
Hi, I have several company profiles in Google Places and Google Sites, I also have the same profiles for those companies in review sites like Yelp! and so on. I have seen that other sites have links on the bottom where Google points to those external review sites, but that doesn't happen for me yet, is there a way to tell Google that I have profiles on other review sites so they can link them or is it Google whenever they find them that will link them? Here's an example: http://maps.google.com/maps/place?cid=14126341780178539960&hl=en At the bottom you'll see that it says: Reviews from around the web Now this is one of mine: http://maps.google.com/maps/place?cid=12168877126282825032&hl=en Now how do I get that line at the bottom provided that I know there are reviews out there in other sites? Is there something I can do? Or is it all about Google doing it whenever they see fit? Thank you!
Branding | | tass0 -
Local Business Listings
We have about 60+ local businesses under our main brand we are hoping to manage "easily". We are looking at these three, but unsure which will work the best: www.ubl.org localeze.com yext.com Our past vendor worked with localeze, but had some problems with axicom listings. We are leaning towards Yext, but not sure what all the differences are and if we are comparing apples to apples. Thanks!
Branding | | kerplow0 -
Benefit of Historical PDF Press Articles for SEO
Hello Is there SEO benefit to keep PDF news articles from 2/3 years ago live on our website? We have a page displaying positive press/pr articles to our visitors. Some of the articles are now from 2009 and I am unsure if these should remain for SEO benefit or should they be taken down or archived? Are they good content? Are they read by Search Engines? If they are old do the count against us with Search Engines? Look forward to some advice Gary McDonald
Branding | | DonaldRussell0 -
Russian and Arabic SEO and Translation
Hi guys, We've a small 15 page site in English for renting out our own boat to tourists which seems to be especially popular with Russian and Arab visitors, so they are our priority languages for translation right now. We would like to translate our site into a condensed single page summary for each language of the services we offer for now and trying to make it rank in Russian/Arab serarch engines. I do some seo in English on our site and it's starting to rank well, but that's my only language, so I would definitely need to hire someone to do it for us in Russian and Arabic translation and related keyword phrases and how to rank in the search engines those countries most use etc. Can you recommend any companies for doing this russian-seo or arabic-seo stuff? Or any other advice.. Thanks!
Branding | | emerald0