Reviews? I Don't Need Any Stinkin' Reviews

Thanks to my dad, I am one of the lucky guys who has watched The Trea­sure of the Sier­ra Madre at least once. The famous badges line inspired today’s post,

Dobbs: ​“If you’re the police where are your badges?” Gold Hat Guy: ​“Badges? We ain’t got no badges. We don’t need no badges! I don’t have to show you any stinkin’ badges!”

Reviews Are The New Report Cards

Whether you like it or not, online reviews are here to stay. 10+ years ago, cus­tomer report cards, tes­ti­mo­ni­als and sur­veys were still hip. Today con­sumers go online and read reviews. Ama­zon was one of the mav­er­icks behind online reviews. Peo­ple pur­chased or walked away from prod­ucts based on the rat­ings of oth­er buy­ers. Now with ser­vices like Yelp, Ang­ie’s List, Home­Ad­vi­sors, Google+, Super​pages​.com etc. online reviews for the small busi­ness con­trac­tor is a vital part of one’s busi­ness mov­ing for­ward.

My Busi­ness Runs Fine With­out Online Reviews

Ok. That might work now, but what about in a few years? Will you be able to keep your com­peti­tors out of your key areas? I am amazed at the increase of reviews from new con­tract­ing com­pa­nies. 5 – 6 years ago they did not exist. Today these star­tups have fig­ured out a way to increase their online vis­i­bil­i­ty by hav­ing their cus­tomers write reviews at a far bet­ter rate than many old­er, more estab­lished com­pa­nies. The prob­lem for you might be this: many home­own­ers do their research online before mak­ing deci­sions. So they might go out and get 3 – 5 bids for a paint job. You, the old­er more estab­lished com­pa­ny, shows the cus­tomer a port­fo­lio of nice­ly typed up tes­ti­mo­ni­als from past clients. The con­sumer might raise an eye­brow or two and is some­what impressed. (note to self: they know you hand­picked the best tes­ti­mo­ni­als). Then the guy with the spiked hair & cool gad­gets comes in cel­e­brat­ing his 3^rd year in busi­ness. You roll your eye­balls think­ing, my com­pa­ny is way more pro­fes­sion­al and just over­all bet­ter. To your amaze­ment, the home­own­er hires the new com­pa­ny even though you have been the main con­trac­tor work­ing in and around his/​her neigh­bor­hood. When you ask why? The home­own­er will respond with some­thing like this, ​“Well, I read a bunch of their reviews on Ang­ie’s List and Yelp…which were all very pos­i­tive. Also their pric­ing was 20% cheap­er than you! So I’ll give them a shot!” 

Yes. You Need Those Stinkin’ Reviews

How do these com­pa­nies that don’t have the same long­time rep­u­ta­tion you have do it? How do they get so many reviews when you are strug­gling to get 1 a month? By doing it. These guys buck­le down, make it a part of their check­list and do it! To them, it is vital to the suc­cess of their busi­ness. To many of the con­trac­tors I know, get­ting reviews is worse than going to the den­tist for a root canal. It is painful and slow going. The key is chang­ing the way one thinks about reviews. My sug­ges­tion is: 

• Start by set­ting real­is­tic goals.
• Get your entire team involved: sales and production.
• Make it a part of your busi­ness mov­ing forward
• Don’t pres­sure peo­ple for reviews. Just polite­ly ask them at the end of a job and tell them why. (Tell them it is the new ​“tes­ti­mo­ni­al” and the way your cus­tomers find you).
• Make it easy if they need help. Writ­ing a review online is easy for some, hard for oth­ers. The down­side is one has to sign up for an account. So if they write a review on Google, they have to have a Google+ account. The same is true with Houzz, Yelp etc. If the cus­tomer is not sure where to post and is not sure how, send them a few ideas/​links. Just be care­ful about YELP. That is the site that fil­ters most reviews. Let that hap­pen nat­u­ral­ly (or by advertising).

I am curi­ous to see how you all ask for reviews now. Do you do it at the end of a job, the begin­ning? What has been your expe­ri­ence with get­ting reviews? Easy? Any chal­lenges and hur­dles? Let me know in the com­ments below or by email. Let’s change the title of this blog, shall we? Cus­tomer: ​“Show me your Reviews!” Busi­ness: ​“Reviews? Oh I’ve got plen­ty of reviews!”