Local businesses can't afford to ignore their reviews, as they are vital for their online success.
For those of you who have a business locally, your reputation was once in one place – word of mouth. One customer enthusiastically told a friend, another another, and soon your name spread throughout the town. This still occurs today – but now in public, online, and whether you're looking or not. But that's not why online reviews should be an afterthought; they should be an integral part of your business process – not just something you do once every month.
The new front door is Reviews. If someone calls your shop or comes to your door, it's likely that they've done a search first. The ratings, comments, and recent feedback they receive in that instant can make all the difference to their willingness to show up. Many more satisfactory things will happen to your business from a few thoughtful and honest reviews than a month of your advertising.
They let you know what your business really ‘SMELLS’ like from the outside. You are an owner, and as such, you understand your business as no one else does – whether it was a good day or a bad day, what it took to put yourself in a position. The customer is only presented with the results.
A direct line to that outside view is in the form of reviews: what worked, what rubbed someone the wrong way, what was surprising them, but in a good way. This kind of feedback comes at no cost, and it is difficult to obtain this feedback in any other manner. It's more credible than the review itself. When a business responds to a review – whether to someone who wrote a thank you note or to a person who voiced their concerns in a negative review- it is an important message that indicates there is a human being behind this business and they are listening. Customers notice that.
It's usually more important if all the reviews are 5-star reviews than if any are not. That doesn't mean that some negative but sincere reviews aren't to be expected. In fact, a business that has nothing but 100% ratings could appear less genuine than a business that has a 90%.In fact, a business with nothing but 100% ratings could appear less genuine than a business that has 90%.
The secret to genuine confidence is experience, and that's a lot of positive, a little of mixed and a lot of genuine. That's where a platform such as Reviewwly comes in handy. We created Reviewwly to be a place for reviews to be separated from ads, where they aren't pre-biased or influenced by paid placement, but are genuine feedback from genuine people organised in a way that it is easy for customers and business owners to use.
That's a big difference for a local business, as your reviews become conspicuous instead of lost in the shuffle; they're right in front of the people who are already searching for you. Your listing on Reviewwly, monitoring what people are saying and answering when it counts, is not an extra job; it is one of the highest leverage times you can be spending on your business. All honest reviews – good or constructive – are an opportunity to let new customers know why they should be looking for you. The reputation that you've built is already being recorded on the Web. It's just Reviewwly that ensures it is being written fairly — and read by the people that matter most.