GMB Reviews: Why Getting Reviews on your GMB is Important in Helping You to Rank.
Should you try to get rid of bad reviews?
Google My Business, or GMB, is a free digital marketing tool offered by Google. It gives your customers important information, including your business name and hours of business, and allows you to manage how your business appears on Google Search and Maps. Your GMB can be optimized, include important photos, links, and event information, and allow critical customer interaction. It also allows your customers to review your business.
Customer reviews can be a double-edged sword in today’s digital world. We all know that unhappy customers tend to leave reviews far more frequently than happy customers. Still, these reviews are essential to your ranking on Google, and you should give serious time and effort to getting and responding to reviews.
Why Are GMB Reviews Important?
As consumers, we value others’ people’s opinions and suggestions. Historically, we relied on word-of-mouth to make decisions about what we bought and what services we used. But because ours is now a digital world, word-of-mouth looks different than it once did. Today’s word-of-mouth can be a friend’s suggestion or a social media influencer’s post. Many rely on online reviews by others on aggregators like Yelp.
It is estimated that nine out of ten consumers check online reviews before they make a purchase, and one of the most powerful places they check for these reviews is Google My Business, or GMB. Not only do reviews on your GMB give you and your customers a candid review of your products and services, they also help your local rankings.
How Do Reviews Help Your Rankings?
While Google keeps its algorithms very secret, it is clear about what helps your local business rankings. Google weighs relevance, distance, and prominence in how it ranks a local business. Additionally, the number of your reviews and your review score will also affect it. The more reviews and positive scores, the better your business’s local rankings. But what happens when you have some negative reviews?
Bad Reviews are Inevitable
Reviews are a vote of confidence and bad reviews can put your business in a bad light. Unfortunately, bad reviews will happen no matter how good your business is or how hard you try to please people.
If you’ve received a bad review and you feel it is fake or unfairly defamatory, you can report it to Google support by flagging the review. Even if you believe the review is fake, however, you will still want to respond to it. Take a professional and diplomatic approach by saying that you have no record of the issue or incident, but that you take these matters seriously. Suggest that they contact you directly to get it resolved. While it’s unsettling to receive fake reviews, how you respond to it may speak louder than the review itself.
The same should happen if you’ve received a legitimate negative review. Respond to it calmly and professionally, suggesting that the reviewer contact you to resolve the problem. While this may not completely take care of the issue or make the reviewer satisfied enough to remove their review, it shows others that you have taken the time to address it and offer to resolve the issue.
Building Up the Good Reviews
While dealing with bad reviews will be a fact of life, building up good reviews will offset the negative ones. This will positively impact your review score and rankings and build stronger customer relationships. You can do this by
- Encouraging all your customers to leave feedback
- Monitoring reviews and professionally responding to each of them, both positive and negative
Your reviews will enhance your online reputation, increase trust in your brand, and reflect your professionalism by how you deal with both positive and negative reviews. They will also help drive new business to your website and your doorstep.
Getting Serious Help With Your Online and Local Presence
Getting reviews on your GMB should be an integral part of your broader digital marketing strategy. but when you’re busy running a business, it can be difficult to do on your own. Let us help.
At Fuel Web Marketing, we know how to boost your online and local presence so you can do what you do best – run your business. Contact us online or call us at (888) 375-3835 to learn all the ways that we can help your customers find you.