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Imagine you want to take someone out on a charming date and you’re sweating cold bullets. It’s gotta be good. And you know it.\nYou know that your date loves Mexican cuisine, so you pull up a web browser and punch in the search query “mexican restaurants near me.” The first result is a list of top Mexican restaurants on Yelp.com, the popular local business review site that seems to always be at the top of the page when it comes to local restaurant searches.\nYou find two spots. You investigate their websites and find that they’re essentially carbon copies of each other. Exactly the same. They’re equidistant from your house. The entrees and margaritas are priced in the same range.\nHow do you decide between them? The star rating, which comes from online customer reviews, breaks the tie.\nThe online “word of mouth” site Yelp had approximately 178 million people read its reviews on an average monthly basis. \nSo what?\nAbove all, this means more people find your restaurant on Yelp than from your own website. Scenarios like the one above happen millions of times every day. Explorative customers search Yelp to make the right decision for their night-out budgets, so you can’t ignore it if you want to attract customers.\nRestaurants especially can’t ignore Yelp reviews\nWhether they had a dazzling night or a sour experience, most people go to Yelp to talk about their experience at a restaurant. Of the (as of 2021) 224 million reviews on Yelp, the “Restaurants” category is tied with Home & Local Services as the most reviewed category \naccording to Yelp data\n.\nThe good news for restaurant owners is that \n51% of Yelp reviews are five stars\n. That means over half of the visitors to Yelp are there to rave about their positive experiences.\nAnd if you’re curious, the other 49% breaks down like this:\n4 Stars 17%\n3 Stars 8%\n2 Stars 6%\n1 Star 18%\nAre you paying attention to Yelp now?\nIf you’re a restaurant owner, consider this logic:\n92% of consumers read online reviews before making a purchase, recent \nstudies\n say (up from 88% in 2014).\nYelp is the \n4th most visited customer review site\n on the Internet, after Google, Facebook, and Amazon (and Amazon isn’t really used for restaurants, so we could argue Yelp is actually 3rd on the Internet).\nTherefore, 9 out of 10 customers visiting your restaurant (for the first time) likely checked Yelp first.\nThe question for you as a restaurant owner is then this: did you meet them there?\nThe more you are where your customer is, the more sales you will probably make. After all, this is the goal of your marketing and advertising budget — to put your message in front of your customers.\nSo if the majority of your customers are visiting Yelp, then maybe it’s time to meet them there.\nIs Yelp worth the time and effort?\nI know this already, you might be saying. It’s not worth my time.\nA \nHarvard Business School study\n shows that a one-star Yelp rating increase can lead to a 9% revenue increase. You may not think customer engagement matters, but it does. In any event, money talks, and a 9% revenue increase is probably worth someone’s time on your staff.\nYour business is automatically listed on Yelp and users can leave reviews, whether you do anything or not. It’s on you to claim your business. Photos, menu items, and open hours won’t fill in themselves.\n2 crucial reasons to claim your business listing on Yelp\nBe found online: 91% of all online searchers use Google Search, as of January 2022. And the bulk of Yelp’s users come from Google. Yelp’s CEO Jeremy Stoppelman \ntold TechCrunch\n, “About 75% of Yelp’s traffic, overall, is sourced through Google one way or another. About 50% is traffic coming from people who start their search on Google and eventually find their way to Yelp; the other 25% is people qualifying ‘Yelp’ as one of the keywords in their search…” In other words, millions of people start searching for a bite to eat in Google and end up looking at Yelp profiles.\nCustomer reviews on Yelp can be a source of inspiration, ideas, and encouragement. Whether it’s \nputting a honey bear in the guest’s condiment area\n or just \n“keep doing what you’re doing!”\n, combing through customer reviews can lead to the affirmation or improvement restaurant owners want. \nOne Noodle Bar owner in Palm Beach, Florida said\n he always looks forward to reading over his Yelp reviews, both the good ones and the not-so-good ones.\nOne owner said, “All and any customer feedback is helpful! It’s a must for growing our business, this is why we value tools like Yelp to help better our restaurants, whether it’s positive or negative feedback it’s how you use these tools to better your business that’s most important!”\nWhether you’re not on Yelp yet or you’re an experienced Yelper, it’s time to augment your Yelp activity and generate more foot traffic for your restaurant.


Restaurant owners: Why Yelp is more important than your own website

In this article:\nCan I remove a Facebook review?\nShould I remove Facebook reviews?\nWhen should I remove Facebook reviews?\nHow do I remove reviews from my Facebook business page?\nBest practices for Facebook reviews\nOnline reviews are an important part of reputation management for any business, including small local businesses. Consumers look to online reviews on Facebook and other sites to see if their friends like your business and what others are saying about you. \nSometimes, however, the reviews that we get on Facebook are less than ideal. Whether they include false claims or come from a disgruntled customer, bad reviews are never fun to get. We’ll walk you through a few different scenarios in which you may want to remove a Facebook review. \nCan I remove a Facebook review?\nLet’s start by answering this question: Is it even possible to remove a Facebook review completely? \nThe answer is yes, but this process doesn’t come without its challenges. Some reviews are easier to remove than others. \nFor example, if the review clearly violates Facebook’s policies, whether it be spam, hate speech, and any other discriminatory content, then Facebook is usually pretty good about removing these right away. \nSometimes false reviews can go undetected though, and that’s where you may need to get involved to take the review down. \nman giving thumbs down gesture for negative facebook reviews\n\nShould I remove Facebook reviews?\nBefore we get into how to remove Facebook reviews, let’s talk about whether or not you should try to remove every bad review that comes across your business’s Facebook page. \nNot all bad reviews are necessarily bad for business. Sometimes a bad review, if legitimate, can even be good for business if you handle it well by responding and resolving the issue with your customer. \nBad reviews can provide valuable feedback, bringing to light issues with your products, services, staff, or facilities that you might not hear about from other sources. \nAnd if you take the opportunity remedy the situation, this often results in a more loyal customer than one who doesn’t leave a review at all. \nSo, to answer the “should I remove negative Facebook reviews?” question: if the review is legit and from a real customer, you should probably not try remove it. \nThis brings us to another good question. \nWhen should I remove Facebook reviews?\nWhen a Facebook review seems suspicious, fake, or spammy, that’s when it is a good idea to try and get it removed. \nHere are some tips for spotting fake Facebook reviews:\nThe description is vague (no specific detail about the business offerings)\nThe reviewer is connected with a competitor\nThe reviewer is connected with a former employee\nRead more: \nHow to spot fake online reviews\nHow do I remove reviews from my Facebook business page?\nThere are two main ways to remove reviews from your Facebook page: reporting the review to Facebook or turning off reviews and recommendations on your Facebook page. \nWe recommend the first option because turning off your reviews completely isn’t going to help your online reputation. Customers expect to be able to read reviews, and if you don’t allow them, it may seem like you’re trying to hide something. \nSo, let’s go over the process of reporting reviews. \nHow to report reviews on your Facebook page\nIf you are fairly certain that a review is fake, then you should definitely report it. To report a review, go to the review on your page and click on the exclamation point in the comment box icon. \n(Image)\n\nFrom there, you will have the option to tell Facebook what about the review goes against their policies:\nNot relevant to the company\nUnfair review\nNudity\nHarassment\nViolence\nSuicide or self-injury\nDrugs\nHate speech\nSpam\nMore often than not, if you are reporting a false review it will fall under “not relevant” or “spam.” Select the reason that fits best, and then click “Send.”\n(Image)\n\nFrom there, Facebook will determine whether or not the review qualifies for removal. And that’s about as far as you can take it on your own. \nIf you personally know who left the review, you can also reach out to them and ask that they remove the review. \nHow to turn reviews off on your Facebook page\nThe other option is to hide your reviews from your Facebook page completely. The benefit of this is that no one can leave false reviews on your Facebook page. The downside is that no one can leave any reviews on your Facebook page. So, if possible, try to avoid this option in order to provide a better experience for consumers who are researching your business. \nTo turn off Facebook reviews, follow these instructions:\nGo to your Facebook page and click Settings. 
\n(Image)\n\nOn the left menu bar, click Templates and Tabs.
\n(Image)\n\nScroll down to the Tabs list and find Reviews. Click Settings. 
\n(Image)\n\nClick the ON switch so it says “OFF” and then click Save. 
\n(Image)\n\nIf you’d like to remove Recommendations from your business page as well, you can follow these same instructions for Recommendations. \nBest practices for Facebook reviews\nThe number one best practice that we can give you for Facebook reviews is to always respond to them. Even if the review is clearly fake, you still need to wait for Facebook to check your report and remove it. In the meantime, respond to the review letting the reviewer (and all who read the review) know that you don’t have a record of them as a customer. \nWhenever a review comes in—good, bad, or fake—leave a prompt response that shows you acknowledged the review and, if bad, are working on fixing the situation. \nLearn more: \nHow to respond to negative reviews\n\nA few easy best practices to keep in mind when it comes to Facebook reviews:\nAlways respond\nRespond quickly\nRemind people that you appreciate their feedback to encourage regular reviews\n

How to remove Facebook reviews from your local business page

Today’s customers have opinions about your business, and lots of them! It’s never been easier to learn what your customers think. If you’re not getting the message, you’re not listening.\nCustomer feedback is essential to improving your product and keeping your customers happy. And though most companies know that customer feedback is essential to business success, many don’t know where to start. Fortunately, there are many customer feedback tools that you can use to start receiving customer feedback today.\nCreate a survey\nAsking your customers to complete a survey can be one of the most effective ways to find out exactly what they’re thinking, but where do you begin? To make sure your survey is successful, start by clearly defining your goal. What is it you want to know? When developing the customer feedback questions, keep them short and easy. If there are too many questions, or if the questions are complicated, customers will quit.\nIf you’re wondering what to ask, there are several free customer feedback \ntemplates\n and online tools (like SurveyMonkey) to help build your survey. If you use a template, make sure to add your company’s personality and let your brand shine through.\nFinally, make sure the survey ends up in your customer’s hands. Either email it to them, display a clear link on your website or on a receipt, or create an in-app prompt. Always close the feedback loop by thanking them for their time and input, analyzing their thoughts, and taking action on their suggestions.\nPut a feedback box on your website\nAdding a feedback box directly to your website or app is a great way to quickly survey your customers. A feedback box is similar to a customer feedback survey, but is much smaller and should be even easier for your customers to complete. You can create a page on your website with a form, or use a pop-up/\nYour feedback form should ask very direct questions — no more than five closed-ended questions and three open-ended questions. Keep it simple! Always thank the customer for their opinion with an automated email response or webpage redirect. Just like in a traditional survey, the most important step is to analyze the results and use the customer’s input to improve your company.\nAsk customers to text you\nIf you really want to make the customer feedback process easy for your customers, consider accepting feedback by text message. That’s right — there are customer feedback tools that allow your customers to send you their thoughts directly via text.\nIt’s an easy, convenient, and effective way to receive their feedback and open a one-on-one dialogue with customers. Another benefit to text message feedback is it allows your customers to send you a complaint directly instead of airing their grievances online. If you respond quickly and correctly, they’re less likely to post a negative online review.\nRead online reviews\nOnline reviews have become the dominant venue for customer feedback. Customers love shouting the good, bad and ugly from the hilltops of the online world. And, would-be customers go straight to online reviews to research brands and products before ever making a purchase. Make sure you read all of your reviews and take them seriously.\nTake action\nYour customers have opinions about your company — find out what they are! Whether you receive customer feedback through surveys, text messages or online reviews, the key to customer retention is truly listening to your customers’ positive and negative opinions about your business, and then using their feedback to make it even better. 

4 ways to get customer feedback

In this article:\nWhy use OpenTable\nHow to add your restaurant to OpenTable\nAbout optional OpenTable services\nOpenTable leads the industry in online restaurant reservations. On average, this trusted platform seats 128 million people per month in restaurants worldwide. \nTo take advantage of the opportunities OpenTable can provide your restaurant, you need to add your listing to their website. \nWhy use OpenTable for your restaurant\nOpenTable helps local consumers find top-rated restaurants near them. When someone is looking for a new place to dine, this is a common place they will go to look. \nHere are some of the cool benefits that OpenTable can provide to your restaurant:\nReserve more seats and increase revenue with their marketing platform\nImprove customer relationships and gather online ratings\nFull-service solution helps you market, manage, and operate your restaurant\nFree online training for OpenTable services with professionals in the restaurant industry\nOpenTable partners with Yelp, Google, and other directories to allow customers to book reservations from these sites\nRestaurants pay OpenTable a monthly subscription fee for their full-service plan, which includes electronic reservation software, customer support, and unlimited upgrades, along with a one-time installation fee that covers on-site installation of the software and training for employees. \nAnother option (which is also included with their full-service plan) is to only use the reservation capabilities. For this, they charge a $1.00-$2.50 fee per seat booked on OpenTable (and other online directories) or $0.25 per seat booked through your website (via OpenTable’s software). But for most restaurants, it only takes three reservations to break even on the monthly costs of this plan. (Please confirm current pricing.)\nYou don’t have to take advantage of all of OpenTable’s products and services to create your listing, but it’s nice to know that these capabilities are available to you—and if you need a little extra help with marketing, they have some great tools!\nHow to create or claim your restaurant’s OpenTable profile\nIn this section, we’ll take you through each step of adding your restaurant to OpenTable. There are two options for doing this: suggest your restaurant to OpenTable or submit your restaurant’s information to OpenTable through their form. \nOption 1 – Suggest your restaurant to OpenTable\nWith this option, you can suggest your restaurant to be added to OpenTable’s directory. \nThis form\n is intended for customers to add their favorite restaurants to OpenTable, and your restaurant can be your favorite!\nJust add the following information and hit submit:\nRestaurant name\nRestaurant city and state\nRestaurant zip (optional)\nWhy this restaurant should be on OpenTable (optional)\nAt the end of the form it asks, “May we share this info with the restaurant?” If you check yes, OpenTable will try to pass this form onto you to show that customers are interested in your restaurant. Feel free to check “no” on this to keep them from sending you your own information. \nOption 2 – Submit your restaurant to OpenTable through their website\nGo to OpenTable’s \nsite for restaurateurs\n and click “Get Started” to fill out their \nform\n, or call their customer support line at (866) 951-7154.\nYou’ll need to provide the following information:\nFirst and last name\nRestaurant name\nEmail address\nPhone number\nRestaurant city, state, zip, and country\nAfter you’ve completed the form and submitted it, OpenTable will contact you via email or phone to provide more information about their services. You don’t need to opt-in to their services in order to get listed in their directory. \nOpenTable will list any restaurant in their directory for free, but if you want to have full access to make changes to your restaurant’s profile and use OpenTable’s online reservation tools, you’ll have to subscribe to their services. \nIn order to update your listing information without paying for OpenTable’s services, you can email \nsupport@opentable.com\n.\nOptional OpenTable features\nOpenTable has three main products they offer to restaurants that join their network. Here’s a little more information about them so you can decide if you’d like to try them out. \n1. Electronic Reservation Book\nThe most common product on OpenTable is its Electronic Reservation Book (ERB). This tool handles all reservations online and in-store, allowing you to see your floor plan to better manage seating arrangements for customers. \n2. Connect Service\nThis solution allows you to connect your online booking capabilities to different platforms, like Google, Yelp, TripAdvisor, and more. You can accept and track reservations across these different websites through a mobile app or on your desktop computer. \n3. GuestCenter Plan\nThis is OpenTable’s full-service package. They provide reservation management along with shift summaries for employees, multiple table management, and the ability to create guest profiles. You can also integrate it with your POS system and get real-time analytics and reporting. \nGet set up on OpenTable and see how it can benefit your restaurant!

How to add your restaurant to OpenTable

In this 8-minute read:\n24 free listing sites to add your restaurant to\nHow to manage your listings\nThe great thing about owning a restaurant is that everyone loves food, and there’s never going to be a decrease in demand for top-quality places to eat. But how do you make sure that your restaurant is showing up above the tons of other restaurants in your area? \nShowing up in the local search results on Google—and Google Maps results—is crucial to getting your restaurant in front of new customers. One way to help \nimprove your local search engine rankings\n is to add your business information to online directories. This helps Google and other search engines to verify your information and gives your restaurant more credibility. It also puts your restaurant on other websites where customers are searching for new places to eat. Win, win!\nBe sure to add your restaurant to these 24 free listing websites and watch as the calls and reviews start coming in. \n1. Google My Business\nGoogle My Business is how you get your restaurant to show up on Google Maps in the first place. Without this, the other online listings still help you, but they don’t provide as much value for you on Google. \nAlso, research shows that in terms of its correlation to increased sales, Google is the most important of any of the single review sites. Businesses who claim their Google listing average 10% more in annual revenue than the average business, but those who don’t claim theirs average \n24% less\n in annual revenue, so you want to make sure you are showing up here. \nFollow our simple steps and learn \nhow claim your Google Business listing\n. \nGo deeper: read about \nGoogle Maps Advertising\n2. Yelp is essential for restaurants\nYelp is a crucial \nonline review\n platform for restaurants to add their information to. As the third most popular online review site, Yelp provides you great opportunities to grow the reach for your restaurant. You need to have a Yelp listing to get reviews on Yelp, and so many people check these reviews when trying to decide what new restaurant they want to try out on date night. \nGuide: \nHow to claim your business listing on Yelp\n3. GrubHub: the new hotness\nGrubHub is free to list your restaurant, however, if you are capturing orders on their site, that’s when they’ll charge a small fee for their service. A great benefit of GrubHub, besides appealing to the introvert in all of us, is that when you create your GrubHub listing it will feed over to other sites like MenuPages and Seamless (also popular restaurant listing sites). \n4. Zagat: the premier restaurant listing\nZagat is a little more exclusive and won’t just list any restaurant, but they are free and if you can get on their radar, it’s a great opportunity for you. The nice thing too is that they pull directly from Google My Business. \n5. Allmenus is great for restaurants\nAllmenus lists more than 345,000 across the United States, and it is their goal to help restaurant owners like you get more customers. You can join AllMenus by using their \nform here\n. \n6. OpenTable: more than reservations\nOpenTable is the restaurant listing website for tens of thousands of restaurants worldwide. With reviews and online booking capabilities, they can help you get noticed by even more customers. Suggest your restaurant to be on their site for free with \nthis form\n.\n7. 8coupons\nEveryone loves a deal! And 8coupons provides the perfect platform for your restaurant to offer sweet deals and entice more customers to knock on your doors. \n8. TripAdvisor? Yes please!\nWith TripAdvisor’s 390 million unique visitors each month, this is a listing that your restaurant has to have, especially if you live in a tourist town. When friends and family are visiting loved ones in your town or others are on vacation looking for a good place to eat, TripAdvisor is a popular site that people go to. \nGuide: \nHow to claim your business listing on TripAdvisor\n9. Set up your restaurant’s Facebook page\nYour restaurant should absolutely be on Facebook too! Not only is this a great way to promote brand awareness and get involved in local online communities, but Facebook is another platform that people love to leave reviews and recommendations on. \nFacebook has a great tutorial to help you set up your \nbusiness page\n. \n10. Instagram is great with younger diners\nInstagram is highly popular among, well everyone, but especially the younger demographic. If you’re trying to reach a younger target customer, you definitely want your restaurant to be here. Not only can your Instagram account show up in the search results and direct people to your website, but if you have highly photogenic food (and let’s be real, people love to ‘gram their food) you can gain a huge following that drives even more customers to your restaurant. \n11. Twitter? Use it for announcing deals\nOkay, so Twitter is a little different from the rest of these and may not compel customers into your restaurant, but it does have its benefits. Along with showing up in the search results, it is a super easy way for customers to reach out to you with questions and suggestions for your business. Twitter is also awesome for spreading the news on sweet deals that you’re offering. \nWendy’s\n is an awesome example of a restaurant that excels on Twitter. \n12. Apple Maps\nWhile Android dominates the market with an 87% market share, iOS holds around 13% of that market share which is still over a billion users. The primary map app on iOS devices is Apple Maps, another free directory in which you can and should make sure your restaurant is listed. You will need an Apple ID to create or edit your Apple Maps listing, but that’s free to create too if you don’t already have one. Get started at \nmapsconnect.apple.com\n. \n13. MapQuest: Yes, it’s still a thing\nAnother site that travelers tend to use a lot, you’ll want to make sure you’re included in their searches. MapQuest support is awesome and can get your restaurant added to its platform within days. Here’s their guide to \nadd a listing on MapQuest\n. \n14. YouTube? “FoodTube”\nYes, even restaurants can win at YouTube. YouTube is the second largest search engine in the world, so if you can produce some awesome videos that people fall in love with, that’s a great way to promote your restaurant! \n15. Don’t forget Bing\nPeople do use Bing as a search engine, so it’s important to make sure that you have a Bing Places listing too. You can get started \nhere\n, or sign in with your Google account and import your Google My Business listing. \n16. \nSolo profile\nWith a free Solo profile, even the smallest local restaurant, pop-up, food cart, or hole-in-the-wall can have a helpful, functional SEO-friendly online presence for free. Building and maintaining a traditional website is simply too much for many restaurant owners to deal with. This is one reason a Solo profile can be such an amazing benefit. \nYour customizable Solo profile can list your business’s location, relevant contact information, links to your social pages, and any business details you want included. Sign up at \nSolo.co\n.\n17. MerchantCircle\nWith more than 2 million merchants and over 100 million visits each month, this is a good one to end our list. MerchantCircle sorts its businesses by category, and restaurants is a big one. Go \nhere\n to claim your listing on MerchantCircle. \n18. YP.com\nYP.com, or YellowPages, is a large directory listing site that 60 million people still use. You can set up and claim your free YellowPages listing \nhere\n. \n19. Old school listing: Better Business Bureau (BBB)\nThe Better Business Bureau (BBB) is a trusted resource for reporting scams. With your restaurant rated by the BBB, your customers or potential employees will feel a lot more confident in placing their trust in you. Follow \nthese steps\n to get your restaurant added. \n20. Manta helps consistency across listings\nManta is, you guessed it, another online directory listing. But they have some cool features to take advantage of. Once you put your business information into Manta’s platform, they will scan their database and check if your restaurant’s information matches up with other listing sites across the web. This helps you to make sure your information is consistent across multiple listing sites, which is an important ranking factor on Google. \n21. CitySearch: locally focused\nCitySearch is your friendly neighborhood listing site. They help consumers find businesses near them. With fun features like voting, award badges, and special deals, CitySearch has your best interest in mind as it drives customers toward you. Add your restaurant to CitySearch through the \nCityGrid database\n. \n22. Local.com\nLocal.com is all about showing users the best places in their cities. Make sure your restaurant is one of those places! Sign your business up on local.com \nhere\n. \n23. Foursquare\nWith its 55 million monthly viewers, it’s safe to say Foursquare is a biggie. Customers can check into your restaurant and leave tips about it for others—like what they should order the next time they visit!\n24. Whitepages/Yext\nWith over \n5 billion records\n, Whitepages is an enormous database of global people and businesses. One unique feature of Whitepages is its \nAPIs\n, which allow businesses to buy and use the company’s extensive data to build their own software. This means a WP listing shows up not only on whitepages.com but also across all of their API customers’ sites as well. \nWhitepages uses Yext to create listings, meaning the two can go hand-in-hand. Yext is a pretty cool platform that allows you to see how you show up across a bunch of listing sites. While they do cost money to update all of your listings from one place (convenient, right?), they do let you check your restaurant listings for free on their site. \nYou’ve claimed your restaurant listings. What’s next?\nNow that you’ve claimed your restaurant’s listings across multiple websites, you’ll want to make sure you keep track of them and be in the loop when someone asks you a question or posts a review to that listing. Set up alerts via the platforms if available, or consider using reputation management software to help you stay on top of it all.\nAlso, when you get a review on any of these platforms, be sure to respond if the feature is available. Replying to reviews (both positive and negative) goes a long way to show your current and potential customers that you take their feedback seriously, and are committed to resolving any problems that may arise.

24 free listing sites every restaurant should be on

In this article:\nWhy you need to respond to Google reviews\nHow to respond to Google reviews\nStrategy for replying to negative online reviews\nWord of mouth has moved online.\nYou’ve probably heard that phrase (or something like it) countless times over the past several years. \nEspecially\n if you own or manage a local business. You know better than most how the rules of the game have changed. Where word of mouth used to be a vague sense of how the community felt about your business, it’s now boiled down to whether your customers give you 1-5 stars and how you respond to Google reviews, Yelp reviews, and more.\nAs a business owner, it’s understandable to feel powerless and frustrated by review sites and longing for the “good old days.”\nDon’t get trapped by that line of thinking.\nWhenever we talk to business owners about the new age of online review sites, we like to ask them all the same question: “How often do you respond to your reviews?” The typical response ranges from “We’re pretty good at responding, but only to complaints,” to “You can respond to reviews?” We almost never get the answer we’re hoping to hear: \n“Always.”\nResponding to Google Reviews\nPosting responses to your Google reviews, both positive and negative, can go a long way to build customer loyalty and boost your online reputation. We’ll get into exactly how and why this practice is so important later on in the article, but let’s start with a quick overview on how to respond to Google reviews.\nClaim your Google my Business listing (if you haven’t already)\nYou can’t respond to a Google review unless you’ve first claimed your business listing. At last count, only 44% of Google listings have been claimed, which leaves a lot of your competition already a step behind. Plus, research shows that businesses that claim their listings on multiple online business reviews sites make more money!\nIf you’ve already claimed your listing, feel free to jump to the next step. If you haven’t, don’t worry, it’s free and easy. Click here to learn \nhow to claim your Google my Business listing\n.\nOnce you’ve claimed your business, you have a few options available to respond to reviews. We’ll walk you through each of them. \nYou might also like: \nHow to set up Google customer reviews for your business\n.\nHow to Respond to Google reviews from Google’s Business Dashboard\n1) Log into your account at business.google.com\nIf you have more than one location, select the location you’d like to manage.\n(Image)\n\n2) Click on Reviews in the left-hand navigation\n(Image)\n\n3) Click the Reply button under the review you’re responding to\n(Image)\n\n4) Write your response and click Post Reply\nHow to respond to Google reviews from Google Search or Maps results\n1) Search for your business\nMake sure you’re logged into the Google account you use to manage your Google business listing\n(Image)\n\n2) Scroll to your reviews and click to view them all\n(Image)\n\n3) Click Reply under the review you’d like to respond to\n(Image)\n\n4) Write your response and click Submit\nShould I respond to Google reviews?\nYes. The game has changed. Your business’s online reputation matters now more than ever. 97% of consumers read online reviews for local businesses. Most consumers trust online reviews as much as personal recommendations from friends and family. But there’s a bright side to this new world of local business marketing that too few businesses take full advantage of. \nYou now have a voice in the conversation. In the past, business owners had little to no visibility into what people said about them, and they certainly didn’t have a seat at the table. These days, that’s all changed with review sites like Google My Business, Yelp, TripAdvisor, and more. \nWin loyalty by showing customers you care\nWhereas before word of mouth was something vague and undefined, it’s now exists in an interactive online space. If a customer has a bad experience with your business and vents their frustration in a bad Google review, you now have the opportunity to engage that customer personally to mend the situation. \nThis not only gives you the chance to win back upset customers, but it also gives you a platform to show future customers that you care.\nMake a good first impression\nDon’t limit yourself to responding only to resolve issues and complaints. As mentioned earlier, you should respond to \nall \nyour Google reviews. Even the positive ones. Think of it like this: if a satisfied customer took a moment to share their positive experience with you in person, you wouldn’t respond with just a smile and a nod, right?\nTreat your Google reviews like you would any in-person review. A list of Google reviews complete with engaged responses from a business goes a \nlong \nway to set your business apart and make a curious searcher feel welcome and invited before they ever set foot in your place of business.\nIncrease revenue by boosting your online reputation\nBut you don’t just have to take us at our word on this. Studies have shown that when businesses start responding to online reviews, they receive an increase both in the total number of reviews received and their overall rating.\nWe’re not suggesting that responding to reviews will result in an immediate flood of hundreds of new 5-star reviews, of course. But according to research from Cornell, even incremental changes in your business’s online rating can affect your revenue by up to 39% for better or worse. \nIf you find yourself ready to respond to reviews but unsure what to say, read our helpful guide on \nhow to respond to negative reviews\n. The most important thing, though, is to stay consistent and be prompt. Don’t let your reviews sit for weeks or even days without responding.\nWord of mouth has moved online. Don’t leave yourself out of the conversation.

62 articles found in “Reviews”

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