I just read a report from Nielsen saying that online reviews by both professional critics and consumers is more trusted than any other form of internet advertising.
For more evidence on why online reviews are important, I wrote a piece back in June of 2011 on Pew Research’s discovery that 58% of people who have never done business with you before will Google your company name to see if there’s any red flags out there before pulling the trigger and deciding to give you their money.
So what’s my main point? If you’re spending money marketing your business online, advertising your company name and phone # to people who have never heard about you before, they’re going to be very likely to go to Google and type in your company name. And if you have good reviews they’ll be more likely to do business. But if there are bad reviews out there, they’re going to be a lot, a lot, a lot less likely to do business.
For most small businesses nowadays, they don’t invest in reputation management and make an effort to get their customers to leave positive reviews because most of those companies don’t have any reviews out in circulation. 99% of the people that call me looking for help, it’s because they have a negative review, they feel pain, now they want to do something about it.
I know money is tight for everyone but if you’re already spending money online to advertise your business, it’s going to suck for you if you’re advertising to people that you’re a company that has bad reviews. That’s all I’m saying.