Learn the importance of tuning into your online reviews to learn what customers are saying about you. We provide tips for online reputation management.
Online reviews can serve as a personal recommendation from past customers that your business is trustworthy, reputable and the one that they should choose. While customers see the immense value of online reviews, many companies overlook the value of reputation management.
Reputation management is a process where you monitor what people are saying online about you. But you also work to influence what they are saying about you to produce certain results.
This does not in any way mean you should pay for online reviews. Paying for online reviews is not a trustworthy and honest way to build an online reputation and many review websites now have algorithms that might flag you for these practices.
Learn the importance of tuning into your online reviews and how to do it effectively.
Online searches impact customer decision-making. Not only does it impact online transactions, but it also impacts in-store transactions as many in-store customers are doing online research first.
91 percent of 18-34-year-olds trust online reviews as much as they trust personal recommendations. And not only that, but 93 percent of all consumers say that online reviews have impacted their purchasing decisions.
That means that you can guarantee that your customers are doing their research before coming to you for your products or services.
Which leads to the big question, are you tuning in to what customers are saying?
To listen to customer reviews, you need to claim your online business listings, such as Google My Business and Yelp.
Each industry will have different review websites that they should be monitoring. Take some time to learn more about your industry review sites and claim your listings.
Once you’ve done that, you should get notifications each time someone leaves a review for you. That way you can respond and keep track of trends to know areas of your business you need to improve.
Listening is just the first step. To see impactful changes for your company, you really need to take the next step in making changes based on the feedback you read about.
Transforming your reputation online means getting more customers to provide a review of your products and services. You might be surprised how this can also improve your customer relationships by showing them how much you care.
Here are a few ways to encourage customers to provide online reviews about your business.
One of the hardest parts of reputation management and one of the largest reasons why companies ignore their online reviews is having to read negative feedback. Sometimes this feedback is absurd and just a way for an angry or disgruntled customer to lash out. But other times, it provides insights you wouldn’t know about your company otherwise.
Responding politely to negative reviews and inviting the customer to further the conversation away from the public eye can do great things for rebounding from a negative review. If you leave those comments without a response, it will show potential customers that you don’t care about your customers’ thoughts and feelings.
The negative reviews can be just as important as the positive ones because they’ll display your true character.
If handling online reviews is challenging you or you can’t find a way to improve your online reputation, contact New Light Digital. Our reputation management services have helped many companies improve their ratings to earn more customers.
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