At Altrincham HQ there is one thing that we’re known in our industry and the wider business community

We have a hell of a lot of customer reviews and what our customers say is more important than anything else

We literally are only as good as our last review and every week we reset the ego to zero and say it’s time to prove we’re deserving of the title Social Media Marketer

At the time of writing this blog we have 400 Reviews for Social Media Training and Management Services – which to put in perspective is about 10x the amount of average competitor has (yes – we checked)

Think about that for a while – what does it say about our business that we have 10x the amount of the reviews than our competitors?

In this blog we look at Everything You Need To Know About Getting More Reviews for Your Business so you can wow potential customers and grow your business

1. 3 Things Count With Your Reviews
When it comes to reviews there are 3 things that count with your reviews

– Quality Of Reviews
– Quantity of Reviews
– Recency of Reviews

You need to tick all 3 boxes for them to really hit home

Imagine for instance if we had 400 reviews, but out last review was back in 2013

Imagine that all the reviews were simply “Great Lad” rather than paragraphs explaining how we’d helped

And imagine if we had 4 reviews rather than 400

If you tick every box above you’re winning – but fail to tick one of them it’s not nearly as powerful

2. Ask for reviews at the point of happiness
Think about when your customer is really happy

For us it’s at the end of a Social Media Training session where they realise how much they didn’t know, they have a full strategy in place and they’re raring to go

When it’s a social media management client we ask after the initial 3 month contract when we’ve shown we’re growing their business

Think about your own business

When is the wow moment?

When is the moment they’re blown away?

At what point have you delivered amazing results?

That is the point to ask for a review

And yes – you have to ask for reviews, as people generally need a prompt to do so

3. You Need To Amplify Your Reviews

By that – I mean post them on social media so more people see them

You have hundreds or thousands of followers on Social Media who don’t have it in their daily routine to check your LinkedIn, Facebook, Google or Trades Body reviews

Post your reviews where they spend their time on Social Media and be known as the business who constantly gets great customer reviews

I know every time that we post one of our reviews on Social Media thousands of people get to see it

And often we get phone calls directly after doing this

4. LinkedIn Testimonials are the 2nd most trusted form of recommendation

Think about where you’re asking for reviews

We’re Ranked Number 1 For Social Media Marketing in the UK on Freeindex out of nearly 1000 social media companies, we have reviews on Facebook and Google

But the one place we have most of our reviews – the 400+ reviews we keep mentioning – is LinkedIn

And we do that because of the trust element and the fact that serious businesses use LinkedIn on a regular basis. We want to be associated with a platform where reviews are considered trustworthy

The only thing more trustworthy than LinkedIn Recommendations are video testimonials, but for most people getting out a smart phone for reviews is not always practical

5. Compare the number and quality of your reviews to your competitors
Reviews are still massively important

– Everyone looks at Amazon reviews before buying
– Everyone looks at TripAdvisor / google reviews when going on holiday
– You wouldn’t buy from a professional services company that had negative reviews on LinkedIn / Google / Facebook etc

And equally if someone doesn’t personally know you or your competitor then the number of reviews will come into play

Do an audit of your reviews vs your competitors

Who comes out top?

6. Check if your latest review is within the last 30 days

If not – you need to try harder

Seriously

You’re running a business that clearly has customers as opening doors alone doesn’t pay the bills

Look at the date of your last review and see if it’s within the last 30 days

So often we will work with businesses and they let out a nervous laugh when we mention the reviews and they haven’t had a new review since 2012

You have to go out and ask for them

7. Do To Others As You Expect To Done To Yourself
This shouldn’t need saying – but many don’t do this

If you expect others to review your business for great service, then review businesses you’ve used that have provided great service

That doesn’t mean review for review is a patting back exercise. It means reviewing the businesses that you’re genuinely happy with the service of

Support other businesses

NEED HELP WITH YOUR SOCIAL MEDIA?
Chat to us about Social Media Marketing for YOUR organisation , so we can better understand YOU and what will grow your organisation

We can only find out what is unique to your business by chatting with you

Look at our Social Media Training and Social Media Management services

We offer Social Media Training on
* Twitter
* Facebook
* LinkedIn
* Instagram
* Blogging

We can do this
* 121
* Corporate Workshops
* Group Workshops
* Face to Face or Via Skype

Or Please call Alex on 07806774279 or email alex@altrinchamhq.co.uk

Alex

Alex McCann is owner of Altrincham HQ – a social media management and training company based in Altrincham, Cheshire that has worked with 100s of local business developing their social media strategy. Alex has 500+ LinkedIn testimonials and is Ranked Number 1 for Social Media Marketing in the UK via independent customer reviews on Freeindex.