One of the most frequent questions we get is, “Do I need to respond to Google reviews?” Short answer: YES! It not only builds on customer rapport, but gives a boost to local SEO.
Importance of Google Reviews
Allowing patients to leave Google reviews and providing them a link boosts your local rankings. High-quality reviews shows patients that you are an office they can trust. Responses to reviews shows that you care about the relationship.
Responding to Reviews
When you respond to a patient’s reviews, everyone can see it. This is a big boost to patient trust. Here’s how to respond to Google reviews.
Google Guidelines on Responses:
Business owner responses help you build relationships with customers, but they’re also public. When you reply to your customers, keep these guidelines in mind:
- Be nice and don’t get personal. This isn’t just a guideline—it’s also a good idea as a business owner. It’s difficult to win an argument with a frustrated customer and you want to leave a positive impression. Keep your responses useful, readable, and courteous. In addition, responses should comply with our local content policy.
- Keep it short and sweet. Users are looking for useful and genuine responses, but they can easily be overwhelmed by a long response. Examples: “Great to see you today!” and “You’ve made us smile with this review!”
- Thank your reviewers. Respond to happy reviewers when you have new or relevant information to share. You don’t need to thank every reviewer publicly, since each response reaches lots of customers.
- Be a friend, not a salesperson. Your reviewers are already customers, so there’s no need to offer incentives or advertisements. Tell reviewers something new about your business, or share something they might not have learned from their first visit.
Who Has Time?
Your staff are busy taking care of dental work, schedules, insurance and more. We get it! If you have one staff member respond for half hour per week, this should be plenty of time. Assign the task to a staff member who will know and recognize the patients. Please note, this should not be outsourced to a marketing company.
What About Negative Reviews?
First step, always pick up the phone and try to talk to the patient if possible. If not, then write a reply that is courteous. Apologize if necessary.
Too many docs overly sweat the one negative review. It happens. Talk to the patient and staff. And then move on to focus on all the positive reviews. Keep your eye on the positives! 🙂