A homeowner with a leaking roof pulls up three contractors on the map. One has 14 reviews, the most recent from last year. One has 180, mostly five stars, some with replies from the owner. One has 60, a mix, including a two-star review that the owner answered calmly and in detail.
Which do they call? We cannot tell you for certain, and nobody honestly can. But most people reading this have made that same choice about a restaurant or a mechanic, and know that the number, the recency and the replies all went into it.
Reviews do two jobs at once. Google ranks local results mainly on relevance, distance and prominence, and its own help pages say that review count and score factor into that ranking. And reviews are the sales copy nobody at your company wrote. A customer describing how the tech put down floor covers and explained the repair is more persuasive than anything on your website.
Why good shops have few reviews
Plenty of contractors who do good work have fewer reviews than they deserve. Often the reason is not that customers were unhappy. It is that nobody asked, or they asked at the wrong moment, or they asked in a way that took effort to act on.
A satisfied customer is happy to help, but they are also busy. If the request arrives three weeks later by email with a link to your homepage, very few will go looking for the review button. If the tech mentions it while the customer is standing in a cool house, and a text with a direct link arrives an hour later, many more will.
Asking every customer, the right way
The whole approach fits in one rule: ask every customer, the same way, soon after the job, and make it easy.
- Ask everyone. Not just the ones who seemed happy. More on why below.
- Ask soon. The same day, while the job is fresh. A follow-up a few days later for anyone who has not left one is fine; keep it to one reminder.
- Ask in person first. The tech says something simple at the end of the job: “If you have a minute later, a review on Google really helps us. I’ll have the office text you the link.”
- Send a direct link. Your Google Business Profile has a share-review link that opens the review form directly. Use that, not a link to your homepage or to the map listing.
- Keep the message short. Name, thanks, the link, done.
An example text, with made-up names, which you should rewrite in your own words:
Hi Maria, this is Dana from Eastside Plumbing. Thanks for having Luis out today to fix the water heater. If you have a minute, a Google review would really help us: [link]. Thank you!
The review request generator writes this message for text or email, in a few tones, with your business and the job filled in.
What not to do
This is where shops get into real trouble, often with good intentions.
Do not gate reviews. Review gating means asking customers first whether they were happy, then sending only the happy ones to Google and routing the others to a private feedback form. Google’s policies prohibit selectively soliciting positive reviews. The FTC’s rule on consumer reviews, in effect since October 2024, bans suppressing negative reviews through threats, intimidation or false accusations, and the FTC’s Endorsement Guides warn against any handling of reviews that distorts what customers think, which is what gating does. Some software still offers gating as a feature. It is a bad idea regardless.
Do not offer incentives. No discounts, gift cards, raffle entries or “$20 off your next service” in exchange for a review. Google’s policies do not allow it, and the FTC rule bans incentives conditioned, even implicitly, on a review being positive or negative. The safest approach is simple: no incentives at all.
Do not write your own, or have staff and family write them. Reviews from people who were not customers, or from employees, break the policies and tend to get removed, sometimes along with legitimate ones.
Do not buy them. This should not need saying, and yet offers to do it still arrive in plenty of owners’ inboxes.
Do not ask all at once. Mass-emailing your whole customer list from the past five years can produce a sudden burst that looks unnatural. Asking steadily after each job is better for everyone.
Responding to reviews
Replies are read by the next customer more than the reviewer. Write them with that person in mind.
Positive reviews. A short, specific thanks. Mention the work or the tech by first name if the reviewer did. Do not paste the same line on every review; readers notice, and it looks automated.
Negative reviews. Take a breath and wait a few hours. Then:
- Thank them for the feedback, even if it stings.
- Acknowledge the specific problem without arguing about the details in public.
- Say what you did or will do about it.
- Offer a way to continue the conversation offline, with a name and a phone number.
- Never share private details of the job or the customer.
A calm, specific response to an unfair review often reassures the next reader more than the review worried them. An angry one confirms the review.
Fake or policy-breaking reviews. If a review is from someone who was never a customer, or contains hate speech or personal information, you can report it through the profile. Google decides; it does not always agree. Reply calmly in the meantime.
A simple weekly routine
| Task | Who | When |
|---|---|---|
| Tech mentions reviews at the end of each job | Tech | Every job |
| Review link texted to the customer | Office or automated | Same day |
| One reminder to customers without a review | Office | Three to five days later |
| Reply to every new review | Owner or office lead | Within a day or two |
| Read recent reviews for patterns | Owner | Weekly |
The last row is the one people skip. Reviews are also free feedback. If three reviews in a month mention a tech being late, you have learned something about scheduling. If several mention the same tech by name, you have learned something about who to put on the difficult jobs.
Reviews are part of your Google Business Profile, not separate from it. Asking consistently is the part you control. The rest, over months, tends to follow.