Online reviews greatly impact your franchise business, and as we’ve been discussing in our latest series on this topic, business owners can and should be a part of the process. We’ve discussed claiming your profile on popular review sites and what you can do to encourage customers to leave reviews. Another way to be active in this area is to monitor reviews, which is the topic of this article.
Review monitoring is a process of reading and responding to reviews. You can handle the task manually or use review monitoring software, so we cover both methods below. Our goal in writing this article is to teach you how to monitor reviews, so you feel comfortable and confident with review monitoring. But before we dive in, let’s discuss why business owners should monitor reviews first.
Why Monitor Reviews
Before we get into the how-to, we want to make the case that monitoring reviews is worthy of your time. And to do that, we look to the latest research from BrightLocal, which conducts a survey on customer review trends every year. The 2022 survey found that:
- 55 percent of consumers feel more positive toward a business that responds to reviews
- 89 percent of consumers would be ‘fairly’ or ‘highly’ likely to use a company that responds to all reviews (positive and negative)
- 57 percent of consumers would be ‘not very’ or ‘not at all’ likely to use a business that doesn’t respond to reviews at all
Responding to reviews demonstrates to customers that you care about their feedback and experience with your business. In the case of a bad review, you can show empathy and professionalism that may sway the person reading the review back in your favor. In general, responding to reviews allows you to protect your reputation and build customer relationships, so even though it is time-consuming, it’s a good use of your time.
7 Tips for Monitoring Reviews
Perhaps you know you have customer reviews online but haven’t considered monitoring them. These tips will teach you how to monitor reviews simply and effectively.
1. Choose Your Focus
Many online review websites exist today, and you may not have the time to monitor them all. With review monitoring software, it’s a breeze! But if you’re handling things manually, we suggest you choose 1-3 review websites to focus on (and add more if desired or as needed later). In a previous article, we suggested Google and Yelp as two sites to start with, and you can check out other options here.
2. Claim Your Profile
If you haven’t done so yet, you’ll want to claim your business profile on the review websites of your choice. Doing so will allow you to update your information, monitor reviews, and respond to reviewers. After you claim your profile, explore the platform a little, so you understand how to monitor reviews and respond to reviewers. For the most popular review sites, you may find an online guide, such as this HubSpot article, that walks you through the process of replying to Google reviews.
3. Opt-In for Notifications
Many review websites will allow you to opt-in to get an email notification every time you get a new review. While you can check manually, too (just in case a notification is missed), this feature will help you stay on top of recent reviews.
4. Respond Quickly
Creating a routine for monitoring reviews will help you respond quickly and ensure no reviews are missed. Dedicate time one or two days a week to monitor reviews and add replies. If you don’t have time, find someone in your business who is trained in customer service to handle the task.
5. Thank the Reviewer
In all cases, your response should include a thank you to the reviewer. In the case of good reviews, this may be all you need! In the case of bad reviews, your thanks indicate that their feedback, even though negative, is valuable.
6. Use Names
If the review includes the person’s first name, use it in your response as a kind and personal gesture. Experts also recommend signing with your name to indicate that a real person is responding. You may consider ending your reply with your first name or initials, then your title. (For example, “Sam (owner)” or “Maria (manager)”).
7. Save the Data
As you monitor reviews, take a couple of extra moments to log the review in your own file for future reference and analysis. Having the data in one location is helpful when monitoring reviews from multiple websites. Even if you’re only monitoring Google reviews, storing the data will allow you to analyze reviews to find themes and track changes over time.
Review Monitoring Software
Manually monitoring reviews can be quite time-consuming, so like everything else in business, there is now technology to make the process faster and easier. Review monitoring software has several benefits:
- Bring reviews from multiple websites into a single dashboard
- Monitor reviews and respond from the dashboard
- Get notifications, daily reports, and other data
- Analyze reviews to identify patterns and trends
- Track your competitors
The capabilities of review monitoring software vary by platform and price. In CrazyEgg’s 2022 review, their top choices included Brand24, NetReputation, InternetReputation.com, Podium, Reputation.com, Mention, Swell, Chekkit, and Chatmeter. You can read more about these tools here.
What About Negative Reviews?
The tips offered in this article will guide you in monitoring most of the reviews you get since you’re likely to get mostly positive or neutral reviews from customers. But what happens when you get a negative review? That’s a great question and one that deserves a thorough answer. Negative reviews can hurt your business, but responding to them can swing potential customers back in your favor. To help you out, we’ll be covering this important topic in our next article.
As you move forward, remember that a big part of monitoring reviews is simply taking the time to do it! Whether you monitor reviews manually or use review monitoring software, carve some time in your already-busy schedule for this important task.
