Online reviews have become the number one way in which people making buying decisions use to see the reputation of a company, these days. The influence your online reputation has in making buying decisions cannot be understated. It has been stated by many different industry leading polls that 84% of people in the U.S. use and trust Online Reviews as much as friends. According to a Reviews Trackers poll 94 percent say an online review has convinced them to avoid a business. In regards to popularity and the order of importance for most industries, Google Reviews are the most important, Yelp Reviews is 2nd place and Facebook Reviews is 3rd place.
The majority of people are looking for at least a 4 Star Average Rating before buying from a company.
GOOGLE REVIEWS
One of the reasons that Google Reviews is number one in importance to your business is the SEO value combined with the visibility when doing a Google Search for your products and/or services. Unlike Yelp, Google Reviews are considered by many people to be more of an accurate representation of your companies reputation because they will allow just about any review to be posted on your account. If your average score on Google Reviews is lower than 4 Stars, it is a fairly easy thing to fix with the right plan in place.
YELP REVIEWS
Although Yelp Reviews are 2nd Place in priority, the amount of usage they have from the public and the SEO Juice Value should not be ignored. However, be aware that Yelp is much more difficult in every way to get your average Stars to 4. Yelp’s algorithm is extremely complex and everything has a variable. If you would like more details on the complexities of their Review Algorithm, just give me a call. The cost to get your Yelp Reviews fixed is more expensive, and that is because it takes more time and work to get it fixed.
Although Facebook Reviews is 3rd Place in importance, it should also not be ignored because of its’ SEO value. In addition, if you end up doing Facebook Advertising, the value of Facebook Reviews goes up tremendously. Unlike Google and Yelp Reviews, your Facebook Reviews are all in one place for companies that have multiple locations.
Getting your companies Online Reviews for Google, Yelp and Facebook to an average of 4 Stars, can be a monumental and very frustrating task if you don’t know how each review company works and how to create an individual plan to correct them for each review company. In addition, there are different plans of actions and importance based on the type of industry that you are in. The plan of action for a company that sells something to an individual on a continual basis is completely different than one who sells a product or service to a person one-time in their lifetime. Example, the plan for a Locksmith company would be completely different than a company who sells Pianos.
