I was in Simmons to day for a coffee came home and Notice in the notification on my android phone an option to rate Simmons on Google, so my question is... is it possible to set your phone to push the same sort of notification to customers who are near you i.e. At home when you have cleaned there windows....I would like a few google reviews on my business page, but don't like to ask..
Welcome to the UK Window Cleaning Forums
Starting or own a window cleaning business? We're a network of window cleaners sharing advice, tips & experience. Rounds for sale & more. Join us today!
Question for the tec savey
- Thread starter Dragbag
- Start date
Help Support WCF:
Did you find you picked up more business having reviews as to not having any, can imagine it's a hard thing to qualify..
Sent using the Window Cleaning Forums mobile app
Sent using the Window Cleaning Forums mobile app
A
Alec
Works through wifi & im sure your phone must allow access..Reviews are Ling mate, people today review everything as it's all part of the tech process lol.. if you do certain things on net you could be no 1 for that search term. I'm no one on google at the moment..
Sent using the Window Cleaning Forums mobile app
Sent using the Window Cleaning Forums mobile app
@Dragbag hard to answer yes. I know from speaking to some customers that they went out their way to search for someone based on review though yes.
Also it is important on your fb page I'd say. This week I secured a care home on round and I'd previously mailed them a nice professional email with a link to my business page and mention of what my reviews were. Can't say that would have done me harm.
Google reviews are good. After 5 it'll light up a star beside your compamy name. If no one else has that,guess who stands out...I fb pmd a few of my customers to get these ones. Copied the link of my Google business page and hit them with that...used link text to fb page on lots of first clean tickets
Also it is important on your fb page I'd say. This week I secured a care home on round and I'd previously mailed them a nice professional email with a link to my business page and mention of what my reviews were. Can't say that would have done me harm.
Google reviews are good. After 5 it'll light up a star beside your compamy name. If no one else has that,guess who stands out...I fb pmd a few of my customers to get these ones. Copied the link of my Google business page and hit them with that...used link text to fb page on lots of first clean tickets
Google reviews are important for 2 reasons:
1) Yes,some other potential customers do take notice of good reviews and a number have told me they contacted me because of them
2) Reviews in Google are now a ranking factor in the search results algorithms and 5 star reviews are definitely beneficial in boosting your rank. Only reviews on Google have a direct impact on ranking so although ideally u want good reviews also on sites like yell and yelp,the priority is Google because more people see them and direct influence they have on SERPS.
According to the experts like Moz and Search Engine Land the crucial amount to get is five 5 star reviews to start seeing real boost in rank.
If u click this link and follow instructions u can create a link to forward to customers and put on your website....
https://support.google.com/business/answer/7035772?hl=en-GB
1) Yes,some other potential customers do take notice of good reviews and a number have told me they contacted me because of them
2) Reviews in Google are now a ranking factor in the search results algorithms and 5 star reviews are definitely beneficial in boosting your rank. Only reviews on Google have a direct impact on ranking so although ideally u want good reviews also on sites like yell and yelp,the priority is Google because more people see them and direct influence they have on SERPS.
According to the experts like Moz and Search Engine Land the crucial amount to get is five 5 star reviews to start seeing real boost in rank.
If u click this link and follow instructions u can create a link to forward to customers and put on your website....
https://support.google.com/business/answer/7035772?hl=en-GB
Has google recently changed this? Reviews are not a direct ranking factor but do play a huge part. The reason why is that traffic is a ranking factor.
So reviews kind of have an indirect impact
You stand out with reviews which = more traffic, being that more traffic is a ranking factor it then improves your serps giving the impression that reviews are a ranking factor. Either way it's clear google reviews are important. That said I have seen some serps where google has started to put reviews from Facebook and others. Always better to get google reviews though.
Last edited by a moderator:
Hello Gav,
No, reviews are definitely a direct ranking factor and I have attached a a screenshot from Moz - arguably the worls's leading SEO specialists and certainly one of the biggest - and their top 8 ranking factors 2017 for GMB 3 pack and local organic results.
As you can see 'review signals' is 5th and 7th respectively.
Also attached is another screenshot from SEO Power Suite who place even more emphasis on reviews and their importance...
".Of all the factors examined, the number of a business' Google reviews had the highest correlation with rankings."
Google started to introduce the policy and new algorithm late 2016 when they also relaxed their reviews policy and started making it easier for customers to leave them.
Until then only people with a Google+ account could leave reviews and their policy was overly strict e.g I had 2 customers actually open a Google+ account to leave me reviews and both were rejected on the basis that someone can't create account solely for the purpose of leaving a review! The argument being such reviews lacked authenticity.
Then suddenly they went the other way and decided reviews were useful and improved the searcher's experience and businesses were encouraged to actively seek reviews,links were made possible to ease the process and hey presto they became a ranking factor.
But of course,it was Google reviews that became all important.
When u delve deeper into the detail a review using actual keywords within the text are more beneficial - just like anchor text for links,and 5 is the number required to really start showing a boost in rank.
Reviews from other authoritative tier 1 sites like yell and yelp do assist but have much less importance. As always consistency in structured citation info , particularly to NAP,is very important.
You're quite right Gav about the importance of traffic and click through rate also being a ranking factor (for organic results and paid ads) but just to expand on that a little the other equally important aspect of traffic to your site is bounce rate.
I know obviously u know what it is but for those that may not it basically means the time searchers spend on your site and how many pages do they visit etc. A high bounce rate is when people click on and immediately click off again - or bounce - which Google interprets as the site not being useful to the searcher and the more this happens the more harmful it can be to rank.
So lots of clicks onto a site but with a very high bounce rate can actually do more harm than good.
The way round it is to try and make your content as engaging,relevant and useful as possible to keep people on your site and hopefully clicking onto further pages.
No, reviews are definitely a direct ranking factor and I have attached a a screenshot from Moz - arguably the worls's leading SEO specialists and certainly one of the biggest - and their top 8 ranking factors 2017 for GMB 3 pack and local organic results.
As you can see 'review signals' is 5th and 7th respectively.
Also attached is another screenshot from SEO Power Suite who place even more emphasis on reviews and their importance...
".Of all the factors examined, the number of a business' Google reviews had the highest correlation with rankings."
Google started to introduce the policy and new algorithm late 2016 when they also relaxed their reviews policy and started making it easier for customers to leave them.
Until then only people with a Google+ account could leave reviews and their policy was overly strict e.g I had 2 customers actually open a Google+ account to leave me reviews and both were rejected on the basis that someone can't create account solely for the purpose of leaving a review! The argument being such reviews lacked authenticity.
Then suddenly they went the other way and decided reviews were useful and improved the searcher's experience and businesses were encouraged to actively seek reviews,links were made possible to ease the process and hey presto they became a ranking factor.
But of course,it was Google reviews that became all important.
When u delve deeper into the detail a review using actual keywords within the text are more beneficial - just like anchor text for links,and 5 is the number required to really start showing a boost in rank.
Reviews from other authoritative tier 1 sites like yell and yelp do assist but have much less importance. As always consistency in structured citation info , particularly to NAP,is very important.
You're quite right Gav about the importance of traffic and click through rate also being a ranking factor (for organic results and paid ads) but just to expand on that a little the other equally important aspect of traffic to your site is bounce rate.
I know obviously u know what it is but for those that may not it basically means the time searchers spend on your site and how many pages do they visit etc. A high bounce rate is when people click on and immediately click off again - or bounce - which Google interprets as the site not being useful to the searcher and the more this happens the more harmful it can be to rank.
So lots of clicks onto a site but with a very high bounce rate can actually do more harm than good.
The way round it is to try and make your content as engaging,relevant and useful as possible to keep people on your site and hopefully clicking onto further pages.
Cheers and yes totally agree moz is probably the best of them all. They know their stuff for sure! The only reason I asked was it was in one of their videos I think possibly a white board Friday they were saying how important reviews were and as you mentioned was one of the important ranking factors but I am sure I remember them saying that in Google's algorithm reviews were not actually a ranking signal. Irrespective if it is or is not it's clear it's very important and everyone should be looking to get genuine reviews.
Similar threads
- Article
