Ask everyone, at the moment the job finishes, with one short link. Do not screen for the happy ones first, do not offer anything in return, and do not write it for them. Those four rules cover almost everything that gets businesses in trouble, and the first one is the one most people break without realizing it.
Review gating, which means asking how it went and only sending the review link to the people who answer positively, is against Google's policies. It is also sold as best practice by a surprising number of tools. Getting caught can mean losing reviews you legitimately earned, which is a bad trade for filtering out the occasional three star.
When should I ask?
At the end of the job, in person, while the customer is standing in front of the work and pleased with it. That is the moment, and every hour after it the odds fall.
A follow up message an hour later with the link is the pairing that works. The verbal ask creates the intention, the message makes it a thirty second task. A message with no verbal ask beforehand gets ignored, and a verbal ask with no link gets forgotten in the parking lot.
What do I actually say?
Plainly. "If you were happy with how that went, a review on Google genuinely helps us. I will text you the link." That is it.
What you cannot say is anything that steers the content or the rating. No asking for five stars, no asking them to mention a particular service or town, no offering a discount on the next visit. The first two make the review less credible to a reader and the third is against the rules on every major platform.
Want the exact wording and timing?
We will send you the verbal ask, the follow up message and the reminder timing we use with clients. No charge and nothing to sign.
Get a free website and marketing auditCan I offer an incentive?
No. Not a discount, not a prize draw, not a coffee card, and not one offered only to people who leave a positive one.
Beyond the platform policies, there is a regulatory dimension in the United States: the Federal Trade Commission has rules about deceptive reviews and testimonials, and incentivised reviews that are not disclosed sit badly there. For a small local business the practical risk is reputational rather than legal, and reputational is the whole point of the exercise.
How do I make it one tap?
Get the short review link from your Google Business Profile and use that, every time. Not a link to your profile, not instructions to search for you, and not a QR code on a card somebody puts in a drawer.
Save it as a text shortcut on the phone of whoever finishes the job. The whole point is that the gap between the customer saying yes and the review existing should be under a minute, and every extra step in that path removes people.
| Do | Do not |
|---|---|
| Ask every customer, every time | Screen for happy customers first |
| Send one short review link | Offer a discount, prize or gift |
| Ask at the moment the job finishes | Ask for five stars or a particular wording |
| Send one polite reminder | Chase somebody more than twice |
| Reply to every review | Write the review for the customer |
What about the customers who say yes and never do it?
Most of them. That is normal and not a failure. A single polite reminder a few days later is fair. A second one is not, and a third turns a happy customer into an irritated one.
The way to raise the number is to ask everybody rather than to chase the people who said yes. A business that asks fifty customers and converts a small fraction will do better than one that asks five and pushes hard.
What about reviews on other platforms?
Same rules, and pick two platforms at most. Google plus whichever one matters in your trade. Spreading a modest number of reviews across six sites leaves you looking thin everywhere, and thin everywhere is worse than strong in one place.
Do not run a campaign that sends different customers to different platforms to balance the numbers. It reads as managed, and the point of a review is that it does not read as managed.
What about staff who forget to ask?
Make it part of finishing the job rather than a separate task somebody is supposed to remember. The van does not leave until the ask is made and the link is sent.
Two things make that stick. Tell the crew why it matters in terms that affect them, which for most trades is that reviews bring the kind of work they prefer doing. And take the counting seriously enough that somebody notices when a week goes by with none. We have watched review programs die quietly because the owner never mentioned them again after the launch meeting, and the crew reasonably concluded it was not important. Five minutes on the subject once a month keeps it alive.
The version that works, in one paragraph
Whoever finishes the job asks, out loud, at the end. They send the link from their phone before they drive away. Somebody at the office replies to every review within two or three days, short and specific. Once a month, somebody counts how many came in. That is the whole system and it costs nothing except the discipline of doing it every time rather than when somebody remembers.
If you want the wording and the reminder timing we use with clients, ask and we will send it. The managed version sits in our reputation work, it is part of the Growth Engine for clients on a plan, and what that costs is on the pricing page.