Online reviews are vitally important for local businesses, not only for online reputations but for search engine rankings as well. Reviews can have a tremendous impact on consumers’ purchasing decisions. Ultimately, a single review, positive or negative, could influence a potential patient contacting one dental practice over another. The power of reviews on Google, Yelp, Dentist Finder and other local search directories continues to grow.
Review prominence in search results highlights this, Google reviews are displayed next to your practice information in the integrated Business listings (Snap Pack) on the 1st page of Google. The gold stars highlighting your reviews also really make the listing stand out for searchers:
Major search and review sites weight online reviews very highly, and the online “word-of-mouth” credibility they offer local businesses is huge. Reviews are gold citations for local marketers, and without them, many businesses risk not being found in local search results.
Reviews are critical to online visibility and your online reputation. Businesses can appear high in search results, but then lose a patient lead because they either have negative reviews circulating the web or, worse, no reviews at all.
So how can you make reviews work for your practice?
Dentists should first evaluate their visibility across major review sites and directories, e.g. Google, Yelp, Yell.com, Dentist Finder, Whatclinic and any relevant vertical-specific review sites. If your practice doesn’t have a presence on these sites, you should create or update your listing or business profiles.
Once a profile is created, businesses receive notifications when new reviews are posted. Monitoring existing reviews and patient feedback is also a good way to see how your reception team are performing as well as your patient experience overall.
It might seem natural to address only negative reviews, but business owners should respond to all reviews and ratings whether positive or negative. This makes an excellent impact on all future prospects reading reviews.
Furthermore, negative reviews have the potential to stay online for years, so it is important to deal with any issues quickly and provide resolution for the customer. As long as the majority of reviews aren’t negative, people will value the business’ professional approach and responsiveness.
Asking for online reviews shouldn’t be overwhelming, and local businesses need to make it easy for their team to encourage loyal customers to provide reviews. Placing a Yelp sticker on the business’ door, offering customers a printed card with instructions on how to leave a review, or even just making a verbal request, are all perfectly legitimate ways to encourage customers to leave feedback. Customer reviews are some of the most compelling marketing content available to businesses and have the greatest potential to influence new customers. Creating a Google review page on your website to direct patients may also help you increase your reviews
e.g http://www.spicerroaddentalpractice.com/testimonials/leave-us-review/
Dentist Finder also has the option to send out patient review requests, all you need is is the patients email address and the system will do the rest for you..
When a local business generates good reviews, it should always use those testimonials to their advantage by posting them on their website and/or Facebook page, including them within a company newsletter and sharing them with employees, since good reviews serve as a good team morale booster. Businesses need to circulate these reviews as wide as possible since they demonstrate their quality or leadership role within their industry.
Easy Review is an online review management system. It will alert you promptly when it locates a bad one, so you can turn any negative situation around. You will know when someone has left you a review online, good or bad. This puts you in the driving seat. On top of that, EasyReview Pro takes away the fuss and awkwardness of asking patients for reviews with an innovative, automated process. We guarantee more reviews – or your money back! If you would like more information about this service, please contact us.