What’s the first thing you do when researching a business online? If you are like most people, you probably look at a company’s reviews before anything else. No matter the industry, every business with a web presence will have customer reviews available online. And this is one of the main reasons why customer reviews are so important for organic SEO rankings.
Reviews can play a critical role in the sustained success of the business. The most obvious reason for this is that positive reviews will be attractive to prospective customers. Every business owner would rather earn a 5-star rating than a 3-star rating! However, the positive effect of customer reviews goes beyond simply attracting online shoppers who have already landed on your page.
Reviews can also help increase the organic traffic on your company’s website. Strong customer reviews will greatly improve your company’s organic SEO rankings, which means more visibility, more clicks, and more eyes on your page and all of its glowing reviews. Here’s how it works.
SEO Rankings 101
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is all about finding ways to stand out on a search engine landing page. Most Google users, for instance, don’t even look at the second page of search results. So the goal for any business is to land near the top of the first page of any relevant searches.
There are many key factors that a search engine like Google will use to determine which results make it to the top, and customer reviews are one of them. It turns out that prospective consumers are not the only ones who trust customer reviews. Search engine algorithms also trust what other people have to say about your business, and so a company with many recent positive reviews will rank higher than ones with negative reviews or without as many recent reviews.
Organic SEO solutions like strong customer reviews are a great benefit to all businesses, both big and small, because they help to establish you and your business as an authority in your industry both in the eyes of the public and in search engine algorithms, all at no cost to you. So, besides simply running a good business and having satisfied customers, what are some steps you can take to help improve your SEO rankings through customer reviews?
How to Improve SEO Rankings Through Reviews
The formula for improving your rankings through reviews is rather simple: more favorable customer reviews equals a higher ranking. The formula for receiving those reviews, however, is less straightforward. There are a number of ways you can go about attracting more customer reviews to make these SEO improvements.
One strategy is to simply ask your customers for reviews. There are a few ways to approach this tactfully, as no one likes being bombarded with requests for action. If your business has a mailing list for past customers, you can send direct emails to your customers asking for reviews. If this isn’t enough, you can also incentivize customers to leave a review for your business. Even a small incentive, like 5-10% off a purchase after leaving a review, can be enough of a call to action for many customers. Another strategy is to include a request for reviews on customer receipts, or to send emails to recent customers a day or two after they have done business with you. Many customers will be more enthusiastic about leaving you a favorable review when the experience is still fresh on their minds.
Set Up a Strategy
It can be challenging for a business to keep up with marketing demands. If you are looking for help managing your customer reviews, or make any other SEO improvements for your company, you need to work with a company that understands the ever-evolving landscape of digital marketing. V12 Strategies will work with you to create the strategy that your business needs to succeed in the modern world.
