How To Get Higher Quality Reviews in Local SEO

How To Get Higher Quality Reviews in Local SEO

Online review can make or break your business

Many customers conduct internet research before choosing a product or service to buy. Part of the decision-making process often includes learning what product users think about the item by reading online reviews. Learning about online reviews help you use them to improve products, enhance company’s brand reputation and reach new customers.

What is an online review?

An online review is an opinion of a product or service, written by someone who has used it. Reviews can appear as part of the product page on retail sites, or they may appear as part of a search engine’s results.

Importance of online reviews:-

Online reviews are important for businesses, impacting users’ behaviour. Several ways online reviews benefit your company include improvement in the website’s rankings in search engines, helping in making more visibility to shoppers, convincing customers to buy a product or service, building customer loyalty, making the brand more accessible, and overall business growth.

What is Local SEO?

Search engines want to give users the best possible experience. When someone searches for a service or product, Google looks for businesses that are trustworthy, active, and well-reviewed. Online reviews impact on local SEO: reviewing boosts local search ratings, improve click through rates, builds trust & credibility, encourages customer engagement, and increases conversions.

Google algorithm considers reviewing quantity, quality, and frequency when ranking local businesses, with more high-quality reviews tending to rank higher in local search results. A business with a strong rating and positive reviews stands out in search results, and when users see a business with a high star rating and glowing reviews, they are more likely to click on it than one with no reviews or poor ratings. Most customers rely on social proof when making decisions, and reviews build trust and influence purchasing behaviour. Furthermore, customer engagement positively impacts rankings as well as increases your conversion rate.

Best Practices For Local Search

1. Verify Your Location

Verified locations are a canonical feature in Google Search and Maps results. These locations have an existing and verified owner. To change ownership from one Google Account to another, ownership request is needed. However, inclaimed locations created by local guides or the user community are considered unverified.

To set up your locations with Business Profile APIs, you need to create a platform for merchants to manage their business on Google.

2. Add High-Quality Photos

Local SEO and photos means usually referring to is Google Business Profile photos. An optimized GBP listing, complete with accurate and up to data business information, categories, and recent reviews, is great for local SEO, but high-quality photos can take it to the next level.

Further, Google is placing emphasis on images in its local search results and rankings.

Businesses with profiles featuring photos seeing 35% more click-throughs than profiles without images. Additionally, listings with photos receiving 42% more requests for driving directions.

3. Keep Your Google Business Profile (GBP) Up-To-Date

Editing your verified Business Profile on Google to keep your business info accurate and up to date. You keep updating details such as address, hours, contact info, and photos to help customers find and learn more about your business.

31% of consumers reported that they are more likely to look at a local business’s GBP listing before visiting than they did before the pandemic.

4. Use Keywords

Using Semrush’s Keyword Overview tool, enable to get an estimated 7.6k visits per month from organic search. This page is also likely to attract traffic from social media, backlinks, and other sources.

Furthermore, location keywords are powerful as 72% of consumer searching for a local business visit a business within 5 miles of their current location.

5. Increase & Manage Your Online Reviews

Online reviews are an important local SEO search ranking factor, helping local SEO rankings by providing current and valuable information about a business. This high-value, user-generated content

Monitoring customer reviews about your brand on various platforms and responding to them is important for all businesses to actively monitor and analyze reviews, and to have a strategy in place to address negative and fake reviews while promoting good ones to build a positive brand image. This not only improves online reputation but also increases visibility and drives more traffic to the website.

6. Respond To Reviews

This involves a reputation management platform, and you can begin to engage with reviewers to continue improving your reputation. Google reviews make up the vast majority of online reviews (as much as 73%). And how you manage and respond to a Google review can help you build more trust with potential customers. Google reviews appear within your Google Business Profile (GBP) on Maps and Search.

Owner responses is important for your local businesses and for becoming an active contributor to your online reputation, rather than a powerless bystander.

Responding to Google reviews, both good and bad, is essential for managing your business’s online reputation. And building meaningful relationships with your customers. Tools like Review Management respond to customer feedback promptly and compassionately