At Charter Connect, our goal is to help charter schools reach a larger audience by improving their online presence. One of the most overlooked ways to improve a website’s visibility on Google is by enabling Google Reviews on your website.
Google Reviews are reviews that show up next to your website information on Google Maps and Search. It helps users get an idea of the level of service they should expect before they even visit the website. There are a few important benefits to having Google Reviews, like acquiring testimonials, finding out what can be improved, and improving how credible Google thinks your website is.
The Testimonials
The first benefit of having Google Reviews is acquiring testimonials to use on your website. These testimonials can be put anywhere on your website to provide an example of someone that has experienced your service and enjoyed it. Testimonials influence other customers to buy your items more than any other marketing can. Customers tend to check reviews before they buy and they trust websites that list their reviews. The more trust that customers can put into a company and its website, the more likely they are to consider using that service.
What happens if there is a bad review? Bad reviews are not always a negative thing for your company if you take care of them properly. Responding politely and helping the customers that leave bad reviews shows potential new customers, and repeat customers, that you care about them. It also increases the chance that those customers that had a bad experience might try again. Bad reviews are bound to happen, and it is unrealistic to expect five star reviews everytime. In fact, bad reviews can help your company in even more ways.
Improvements
Through reviews your company can discover what can be improved and what is working well. Customers can leave reviews for your company anywhere. Social media, Yelp, anywhere your site is listed reviews will be left. It is important to push customers to leave reviews on your website. This will make the reviews more effective when getting Google to notice them and allows you to have the most control over the reviews.
Although you can find reviews all over the internet, having a distinct place specifically for reviews makes it easier to find testimonials, verify for potential customers what they should expect, and make your website more credible to Google. Then, your company can use these reviews to improve the areas where customers are having trouble. Whether it is the website itself, or a bad experience, reviews help you identify where something went wrong for the customer. This lets you identify and improve things more quickly.
SEO and Credibility
The last, and most important, benefit of Google Reviews is that they improve the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) of your website, and how credible Google, and consumers, think your website is. Google wants to see how your website is perceived by people along with what your business does. Reviews show Google how people really feel about your company. Google looks at the quality and quantity of the reviews as an important factor when ranking websites. They look at how many reviews you received and the average rating of all the reviews, along with other factors, to help determine where your website should be listed on the search results page. Allowing Google Reviews is an easy way to help improve your website’s chance of getting a higher ranking.
Reviews are also helpful because when consumers scan their search results they are more likely to click on a result that shows their reviews. Consumers see websites with reviews as more credible. They are more likely to believe what other consumers of the service have to say about it over any other form of marketing. To them, it is like asking a neighbor or a friend if they have used a product and what they thought about it. It is a level of trust that is more natural for consumers than to trust what a business says about themselves.
Reminders
There is one important factor that every company must follow when using Google Reviews. The reviews must be genuine and honest. Google looks at how many reviews are left and their average ratings. If all the reviews left are perfect five-star ratings it tells Google that something is off about the reviews. Perfect reviews are not expected or necessary to have a good website and to rank higher on SEO. The most important factors are that they are trustworthy to potential customers.
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