How to Get More Google Reviews for Your Business
By Marai ·
Your service may be excellent. Your team, impeccable. Your prices, fair. But if someone searches for your type of business on Google and your competitor has 180 reviews with a 4.7 average while you have 12 with a 4.9, the client is going to call the other one. That’s how digital trust works: volume matters as much as the score.
Google Business Profile reviews are not just vanity. They are the factor that most influences local rankings and the client’s final decision. And the good news is that getting them doesn’t require any tricks — it requires a system.
Why Google Rewards Reviews
Local Rankings
When someone searches for “hairdresser near me” or “physiotherapist in Madrid,” Google shows three results on the map (the famous local pack). The criteria for appearing there include relevance, distance, and prominence — and reviews are the primary component of prominence.
More recent reviews with a good rating = a greater chance of appearing on the map. It’s that straightforward.
Trust Before the First Visit
A new client has no way to evaluate your service before experiencing it. Reviews from other clients fill that gap. They function like a personal recommendation from someone who has already been through the same thing.
Genuine Feedback
Reviews don’t just attract clients — they tell you what you’re doing well and what you can improve. A recurring pattern of comments about wait times, a specific professional’s manner, or the cleanliness of the premises is information that no internal survey will give you with the same honesty.
When to Ask for the Review (and When Not to)
Timing is everything. Asking at the wrong moment can be counterproductive.
The Ideal Window: 1 to 4 Hours After the Appointment
The client has just left, the experience is fresh, and they’ve had time to get home and relax. Now they can spend two minutes writing their review without rushing.
Moments to Avoid
- Right as they’re paying — The client wants to leave, not fill out forms while looking for their card
- Several days later — The experience has faded and the probability of a response drops sharply
- After a problem — If something went wrong, resolve it first. The review can wait; the relationship with that client cannot
- Every time they visit — Once is enough. Asking for a review on every visit is exhausting and counterproductive
How to Ask Without Making It Awkward
The key is reducing friction to a minimum. Every additional step the client has to take reduces the probability of them completing the process.
Direct Link to Your Google Listing
Google allows you to generate a link that opens directly to your business’s review form. The client clicks it and only needs to select stars and, optionally, write a comment. Search Google for “Google review link generator” or access it from your Google Business Profile dashboard.
Via WhatsApp
WhatsApp has a far higher open rate than email. A brief, personalised message with the direct link works like this:
Hi Maria, thanks for your visit today. If you have a moment, your review on Google would mean a lot to us: [link]. Thank you!
No long paragraphs, no excessive use of emojis. Brief, direct, and respectful.
Via Email
For those who prefer email, the same principle applies: a clear subject line (“How was your experience?”), brief text, and a direct link. No attachments, no heavy images, no distractions.
QR Code in Your Premises
A printed QR code next to the checkout or in the waiting area allows clients to scan and leave a review on the spot, right after the service. This is particularly useful for high-turnover businesses.
What You Should Never Do
Buy Reviews
Services selling “packages of 50 five-star reviews” exist everywhere. Google detects them, removes them, and can penalise your entire listing. It’s not worth the risk.
Make Up Reviews
Creating fake accounts or asking family members who have never been clients to leave reviews is the same as buying them, only with more effort. Google cross-references location data, browsing history, and behaviour patterns. If the reviews don’t add up, they disappear.
Offer Discounts in Exchange for Reviews
This directly violates Google’s policies. You can encourage clients to share their opinion, but you cannot make a benefit (a discount, a free service, a gift) conditional on them leaving one. The difference is subtle but important.
Filter Only the Positive Ones
Asking for reviews only from clients you know are delighted skews your profile. Worse, you’ll miss the opportunity to catch real problems. Ask everyone: the satisfied ones will give 5 stars; those who had an issue will tell you before posting about it on their own.
How to Handle Negative Reviews
A negative review doesn’t destroy your reputation. What does destroy it is not responding, getting defensive, or entering a public argument.
Always respond. A business that handles criticism professionally generates more trust than one that only has perfect reviews. Follow this structure:
- Thank them — “Thank you for your feedback, Maria”
- Acknowledge — If there was a fault, acknowledge it without excuses
- Offer a solution — “We’d like to talk with you to sort this out. Could you write to us at…?”
- Keep it brief — Two or three sentences are enough. Don’t write an essay
A profile with 4.5 stars and a well-handled negative review is more credible than one with 5.0 and eight reviews. Absolute perfection looks suspicious.
Automating the Process: The Only Way to Scale
If you have 10 appointments per day, you’re not going to send 10 messages manually every evening. And if one day you forget, that opportunity doesn’t come back.
The solution is to automate the request. A system that detects when an appointment is completed, waits the configured amount of time, and sends the message with the link. You don’t have to do a thing.
In Marai, automatic review collection works exactly like that. When a professional marks an appointment as completed, the system sends the request through the channel you choose — WhatsApp, email, or both — at the time you configure. Each review is linked to the client and the appointment in their CRM profile.
The result isn’t magic: it’s automated consistency. Three reviews per week over a year is more than 150 new reviews. That moves the needle.
Action Plan Based on Your Starting Point
Fewer Than 20 Reviews
Your priority is volume. Activate the automatic request for every completed appointment and don’t filter. With a response rate of 20–30%, in a month you’ll have a profile with enough substance to compete.
Between 20 and 100 Reviews
Now regularity matters more than one-off volume. Keep the request active and add WhatsApp as a channel to improve your response rate. Respond to all reviews, positive and negative.
More Than 100 Reviews
Your profile already generates trust on its own. Focus on quality: read the comments, identify patterns, and use that information to improve your service. Reviews that mention specific professionals, specific services, or concrete details are the most valuable.
Google reviews aren’t won with tricks. They’re won by asking systematically, at the right moment, and through the right channel. Automate the process and let the system work for you every day.
Discover how Marai automates reviews →
Start for free → — Review collection included from the free plan.