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The Strategy Of Replying To Reviews

Most merchants we speak with tell us they have not yet started replying to reviews. In fact, from our analysis 94% of businesses have never replied to an online review.

It is not that merchants do not want to reply, but rather, it’s quite the opposite. What merchants tell us is that they find it hard to know when a new review appears; difficult to know how they can login and reply, and challenging to know what to say.

Now with Merchant Centric, merchants have a system that makes it easy for them to do all of this.

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So now that you can take control of your online reputation by easily replying to reviews, you should choose a strategy for replying to reviews that is right for your business. Here are strategies to consider:

Businesses with Few Reviews

You no doubt want to get more reviews, but first, you should make sure you reply to the reviews that you currently have. Then it’s time to get more reviews by making sure it is easy for customers and prospects to find your business online.

If your customers can’t find you online, they can’t review your business.

To get found online you want make sure your business is listed on top sites and all of your listings are optimized with accurate and consistent information. You can take care of all of this on your Visibility page.

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Once your business is listed on top sites you can begin to encourage your customers to post reviews for your business. Encouraging reviews can be done in a number of ways, but perhaps the easiest is just to remind people to look for you on top sites like Yelp, Google and Facebook, either verbally or by placing posters in your place of business. The important thing is to let your customers know you are active in your online reputation management efforts and your loyal supporters should be more than happy to help.

For more in-depth information:

Businesses with Many Reviews

The key to managing your online reputation is to actively monitor the many reviews you receive on top sites. This will allow you to handle issues in your business before they grow and reply to reviews quickly. Merchant Centric makes this easy for you by providing email alerts so you can easily reply to both positive and negative reviews right from your smartphone.

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Replying to reviews will allow other consumers to see your appreciation for their praises as well as your graciousness when addressing critical reviews. It is important that you get the most out of your positive reviews and address the more challenging negative reviews correctly.

For more in-depth information:

Businesses with Low Review Score

When your Review Score drops, this signals an increase in negative reviews. Negative reviews will lower your average star-rating that consumers see, which is your online reputation. If this poor online reputation does not equate to the online reputation you feel you should have, it’s time to repair your reputation.

This could be the function of an attack from a competitor or the rants of few dissatisfied and vocal customers. It could also be an indication that there are real issues you need to pay attention to in your business and address before you attempt to attract more reviews from your customers.

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In this case, we recommend you use your reviews as ongoing feedback to learn from and make significant changes that not only improve your online reputation, but increase revenue.

No matter what your strategy is, replying to reviews opens up communication between you and your customers and can ultimately grow your business.

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