How often do you check online reviews for a restaurant it’s possible you’ll visit or a website you are considering purchasing from? Online reviews are essential social proof confirming a company’s quality and credibility. How can your organization leverage these reviews?
This guide to managing online reviews will allow you to refine your strategy and implement the vital tools and tactics. Each step will include detailed sub-steps and suggestions, so whether you are a small business or a growing local business, you may turn each positive and negative reviews into evidence of your commitment to customer support.
What is online review management?
Online review management consists of 4 key elements:
1) Monitor
2) Reply
3) Analyze
4) Encourage.
This signifies that online review management is a multi-faceted strategy for dealing with positive and negative online reviews so that they profit reasonably than harm what you are promoting.
Online reviews deal with all types of companies. Whether you provide accounting services or run a small gardening business, no matter the size of what you are promoting, it is best to manage your online presence, including your reviews.
Let’s break down these 4 key parts of managing online reviews:
1. Monitor
You need to track reviews posted on all platforms, which can include Google and Yelp, in addition to social media sites. Regularly visiting these platforms will allow you to not sleep to date with what customers are saying about your organization and allow you to respond quickly if vital.
2. Reply
Regardless of whether the review is positive or negative, it is best to respond to it. It may very well be so simple as “thanks for the review” or a detailed response to criticism that shows you’ve got taken note of the feedback. Make sure your responses are timely and thoughtful, and don’t attack reviewers simply for criticizing your services.
3. Analyze
Consumer reviews not only are they useful for attracting potential customers, but in addition they provide priceless feedback that you would be able to use to improve your products or services. An essential aspect of managing online reviews is analyzing your review data to spot trends and patterns and any common themes so you may make informed decisions in the future.
4. Encourage
To reap the advantages of online reviews, you first need to get them. This means encouraging customers to express their opinions about your products or services. This may mean sending post-purchase surveys via email, reaching out to customers on social media, or following up via email contact center as a service software to find a way to talk to them directly.
How to improve your online review management strategy in X steps
1. Identify your key review platforms
There are many online review channels. You can find business reviews in all places, from third-party review sites like Google Maps to video reviews and social media posts. While a comprehensive understanding of your online status is essential, you will probably focus on a few key review monitoring platforms.
Here are some steps to take to discover key review platforms:
- Get to know your audience: What social media channels and platforms do your goal customers use? Where do they appear for real reviews when making purchasing decisions? If you are unsure, consider conducting market research or even asking your current customers.
- Take advantage of web analytics: Where does the traffic to your website come from? Website referrals will be an invaluable source of knowledge when managing your online status, as they may quickly tell you which ones web sites or social media channels are the hottest sources. It may even allow you to detect if you have an international audience, equivalent to customers visiting from a .au or .au domain domain .ae.
- Search for your personal company: A fast way to see where customer reviews appear first is to search for what you are promoting on Google. What third-party review sites appear first?
- Search popular review platforms: Try to be area of interest specific and discover what the best review platforms are in your industry. For example, TripAdvisor is popular with restaurants and hotels, while reviews on Google Maps and Facebook are more likely to be for local businesses equivalent to cleaners and decorators.
2. Implement monitoring tools
You don’t have to monitor your current reviews yourself with manual monitoring. There are many tools available for viewing and monitoring social media.
These review monitoring tools might help with your overall status management strategy by allowing you to track positive and negative reviews in addition to social media posts and mentions, and some even provide a dashboard for tracking complaints. You can arrange alerts for quick response, arrange performance tracking, and monitor and delete fake reviews.
Some review management software it’s possible you’ll consider include:
- Yex Reviews: A comprehensive platform offering real-time review monitoring and management across multiple platforms, including Google and Facebook. It provides useful tools equivalent to automatic replies and feedback evaluation.
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- Best for: Businesses of all sizes, especially those operating across multiple online platforms and industries.
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- Reputation.com: It comes with many essential status management software tools, equivalent to automatic cross-platform feedback and a mobile app.
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- Best for: Medium to large firms operating in competitive industries and looking for advanced status management and analytics features.
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- Browse trackers: It allows businesses to monitor reviews from over 100 review sites and provides customizable dashboards and reporting tools.
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- Best for: Businesses of all sizes, especially those with a large variety of online reviews, in addition to businesses with multiple locations and franchises.
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- Good job: It helps firms collect and present customer reviews and manage their online status. It also offers integrations with popular CRM and marketing platforms.
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- Best for: small businesses and freelancers in service industries.
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- Podium: It allows businesses to manage and collect reviews, in addition to connect with customers via text messaging and social media.
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- Best for: Businesses in service industries and those looking to use text messaging and social media as a communication channel to communicate customer feedback.
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- Watch Brand: It offers social listening and analytics tools to monitor brand mentions and online conversations across platforms. It also provides insights equivalent to competitive evaluation and industry trends.
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- Best for: Medium to large firms across a number of industries, especially those with a strong social media presence and need comprehensive social listening capabilities.
3. Develop response guidelines
Speed and consistency are key when it comes to responding to online reviews and managing customer relationships effectively. While the monitoring tools above can allow you to respond to reviews faster, it is also a good idea to have guidelines in place for yourself and any employees managing your online presence.
Here are some easy steps to creating response guidelines:
- Understand your brand voice: The answers needs to be consistent with your brand. This may mean formal, skilled responses or more friendly and humorous responses. Whatever you choose, include it in your guidelines.
- Segment responses: Depending on the review, it’s possible you’ll receive typical, automated responses. Your approach to responding to a review needs to be segmented based on your attitude towards the review, whether it is positive or negative (or neutral).
- Provide solutions: Negative reviews they are an opportunity for you to outline any steps you are taking to show that you just take the review seriously and are working to improve it.
- Be positive and grateful: Regardless of the tone of the review, a skilled and positive response is essential, expressing gratitude to the customer for taking the time to review.
- Take a personalized approach: While copy-and-paste responses can save time, consider how you may make your responses personal. From calling a reviewer by name to confirming the details of their review, a personalized response can improve customer relationships.
4. Encourage customer reviews
If you would like to get more positive reviews on your Google My Business page or social media presence, it’s possible you’ll need to provide some incentives along the way.
Let’s say you are looking virtual contact center solutions. You search on Google and see that one company has two 5-star reviews and one other has over a hundred reviews ranging from 3 to 5 stars. While 5 stars for company 1 may look good, the overall variety of reviews for company 2 may prove to be more reliable, especially since it’s possible you’ll determine to subscribe to this service for a very long time.
To get more reviews, you wish to provide excellent customer support, but you may take a few additional steps:
- Ask for reviews: Don’t ask, don’t receive. Sometimes you simply need to ask satisfied customers to leave reviews to encourage them.
- Offer discounts: A small discount on a customer’s next purchase will easily encourage them to take a few minutes to leave a review.
- Launch gifts: Another incentive may very well be entering a competition or giveaway. Every customer who leaves a review has a likelihood to win a freebie, a gift card or a significant discount.
- Send follow-up emails: We are all forgetful and busy. A straightforward follow-up email after a visit or purchase can gently remind customers to review your services.
Conclusion: Make reviews work in your favor
Reviews help potential customers determine whether or not they want to engage with your organization. However, online reviews are not only about helping the customer. They can even help business.
By following the steps above, from using comprehensive monitoring tools to running a review incentive program, you may not only encourage more reviews, but also monitor them to improve what you are promoting along the way. A brand new review doesn’t have to be scary, as a substitute see it as an opportunity for growth and engagement.