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Online Reviews and Your Small Business: What Entrepreneurs Need to Know About User-Generated Feedback
It is not unreasonable to suggest that online reviews have never been more important, never hotter commodities — and if you doubt it, consider the fact that, in recent months, Google shelled out millions of dollars to acquire the online rights to Zagat restaurant reviews; Facebook introduced user-generated ratings and review for its local business pages; and, of course, the evergreen Yelp.com continues to be a premier online destination for consumers. Online reviews are all the rage; the evidence is everywhere.
Why are so many major enterprises banking on having a strong online review presence? For the simple reason that consumers care about online reviews. As mobile devices proliferate and the Internet is increasingly seen as a source of obtaining consumer information, reviews are coming to shape and influence consumer behavior more and more. There have been studies suggesting that the majority of consumers place more stock in online reviews — written by total strangers — than they do the personal recommendations of friends and family members!
What This Means for Your Small Business
So what does this mean for your enterprise? It means, quite frankly, that your online reviews are make-or-break. If a consumer Googles your company and finds five-star reviews and effusive comments from past clients, you are in good shape. An online search revealing a dismal Yelp profile and lackluster Facebook star ratings, meanwhile, could really sink your company — online reviews are that powerful, that influential among consumers.
For small business owners, then, it is critically important to take online reviews seriously, and do take the proper precautions to make sure those online star ratings are maxed out, and that those Google searches come back clean.
Control What You Can
The first thing that a small business owner must do is come to terms with the fact that online reviews cannot be controlled. You cannot force people to give you good reviews, and there is really nothing you can do to keep them from giving you bad ones. With that said, there are components of your online review profiles that you can control: By setting up your Yelp.com page and your Facebook local business page, for instance, you can choose the profile image displayed, you can make sure your contact information is up to date, and you can input a description of your company.
These may seem like minor acts — but if you take control of your online review profiles, and show that you are invested in your own company’s online reputation, then you are already several steps ahead of most other small business owners.
Monitoring Matters
Step two is remembering that online review management begins with online review monitoring. Does your company have a review page on Yelp, Urban Spoon, or Angie’s List? If so, then you should be checking that page daily, to see what people are saying about you. Knowing the buzz about your business is vital for responding to it appropriately; and, if there is a glut of negative reviews for your small business, do you really want to be the last one to know about them?
Asking for Feedback
It has already been said that, as a small business owner, you cannot force people to give you good reviews — but remember that you can solicit positive feedback from your best clients. Consider this scenario. You stop by your company’s Yelp page one day, and you see that someone has posted a one-star review. If that one-star review is one of just two or three reviews your company has, it effectively sinks your online image; if, however, it is one bad review in a sea of dozens upon dozens of positive reviews, then the damage done by the one-star review is really pretty negligible.
In other words: You cannot prevent bad reviews from happening, but you can effectively neutralize them, minimizing the damage done by stacking the deck with plenty of positive reviews. Send e-mails to your most faithful customers, simply asking them to leave you a five-star review. Include links to your online review pages on your company website or blog, and make it easy for your customers to weigh in.
The Right Response
A final word of advice to small business owners: The way in which you respond to reviews is crucially important. When the review is positive, you should respond promptly and gratefully. When the review offers reasonable, genuinely constructive criticism, you should offer a response that makes it clear you take your clients’ input seriously. And when the review is simply unreasonable and flat-out negative, you should respond to it privately — or not at all. A public response only draws more attention to the offending review, and, on a site like Yelp, it can actually give that negative review more search engine traction!
The bottom line is that online reviews are of paramount importance for your small business — and there are steps you can take to optimize your online review portfolio!
Mike Zammuto is the COO of http://www.reputationchanger.com. The company provides services for online reputation management, which in turn gives people and businesses full control over their online search results.
2013-04-12 13:49:22
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