We’ve all read reviews that say something like, “Service was good. Will go back” and whilst it’s very kind of customers to take the time to leave a review, reviews like this don’t really provide too much useful information to your prospective customers, nor will they help boost your organic search engine optimisation (SEO), thereby moving your business up the all-important search engine rankings.
What to do?
Well, firstly we’d suggest looking at Google Trends. Google Trends is an online tool from Google that analyses the popularity of top search queries in Google search across various regions and languages. It can be used for comparative keyword research and to discover event-triggered spikes in keyword search volume (World Cup, for example). You can use Google Trends to see what searches are currently trending and you can also enter a search term into the search box at the top of the tool to see how search volume has varied for that term over time and in different locations. Change the location, timeframe, category or industry, and type of search (web, news, shopping or YouTube) for more detailed information.
Google search trends data is extremely useful in terms of helping you to market your business. For example, if you run a seasonal business (let’s say a garden centre for instance) you’ll want to increase your marketing efforts when search terms relevant to your type of business are trending. Google Trends search function can help you accurately define those time periods which may, in actual fact, be quite different to what you were expecting! If you’d like some pointers on how to use Google Trends effectively, click here.
Secondly, once you’ve researched the keywords that your business should be using in your SEO efforts, you can then quite legitimately encourage your customers to include those keywords in their reviews too. The easiest way to do that is to simply ask your customers to include them. If that feels awkward then you can encourage them to do the same thing through prompting them to talk about certain services and/or products or elements of your business when asking them to leave you a review. You can ask your customers questions that focus, for example, on areas that will include the keywords you’re targeting. For instance, if you’re wanting to be recognised for ‘kitchen remodelling’ or ‘window cleaning’ be sure to ask your customers what service they received. This will immediately prompt them to provide the sort of detailed information that mentions the keyword(s) of the specific service they received. Other potential customers will want to know this information so it’ll be extremely useful to them and it will also provide Google with a review rich in keywords relating to your business which will help your organic SEO quest too. A win win!
Here are a few questions to start you thinking;
- What specific service/product did you hire/purchase from us?
- What were the best parts about working with us?
- Have you had this service/product from another company and if so how did we compare to them?
- What location did you go to?
- Would you recommend us to anyone?
Top Tip: If you’re looking for your customers to mention a certain service, product or feature that you offer, it helps hugely to ask them as soon as they’ve experienced it because it’s still fresh in their minds!
Remember, reviews are an incredibly powerful strategy to help you grow your business and attract new customers to you. When you can guarantee that your customers will use specific keywords in their reviews you’ll experience even more benefits from each review.