What happens next?
Would you trust a store that has an average Yelp star-rating of 2.1? Probably not. Nobody wants to risk going to a business that has a lot of negative reviews and low star ratings online. Even if your business’ star rating isn’t that low, you’re probably never gonna stir interest amongst consumers like your competitor who has an average star rating of 4.6. In fact, this Harvard Business School study says that a one-star increase on your Yelp rating translates to a five to nine percent increase in revenue for your business.
So, long story short, your Yelp profile needs to have great reviews if you want to attract more customers to your business. If you’ve been having trouble doing this, here are four actionable steps for improving your star rating on Yelp.
Make sure that your Yelp profile has accurate information about your business’ address and phone number, and an ample number of pictures of both the interior and exterior of your store. Add all the tags that you need to make sure you are found when customers search for keywords that are relevant to your business. If you’re not sure about how you can do all this, check out this guide to optimizing your Yelp profile.
The more data that you give your customers, the more they know about your business. And the more they know about your business, the more likely they are to walk into your store or call you up. Besides, having rich data on your Yelp profile might help customers find specific things that they are searching for, like WiFi in a restaurant, or whether you’re pet friendly.
If you don’t want to lose out on customers because of a bad rating, then work on slowly making it better. Your online reputation management can play a significant role in keeping your business front and center for customers. Firstly, respond to your positive reviews. A lot of businesses miss out on this because they only focus on the negative ones. By letting your happy customers know you're listening and appreciate their review not only strengthens their advocacy, but it lets others know you're a customer-first brand. Next, don't shy away from the bad reviews. Tackle them head on and try to solve their challenge immediately. You are 90% more likely to retain a customer where you were able to mend their bad experience, than a customer who never experienced a problem at all.
You can have exclusive deals available for customers using Yelp’s deals and gift certificates. Incentivizing people to give you an online review will lead you to be called out by Yelp, and you don’t want to do that. However, deals and gift certificates introduce customers to your business’ Yelp profile, since they are prepaid vouchers that customers can purchase exclusively for your business. Customers who have purchased deals/gift cards from your business’ profile are more likely to leave you a review and a good Yelp star-rating.
Yelp ships Find Us on Yelp stickers to all US and Canadian businesses. Having these at your establishment acts as a visual cue for customers to check out your business’ profile on Yelp. All you need to do to get these stickers is fill up this form. You can also use the “People Love Us on Yelp” badge, which will prompt more customers to see how good your Yelp profile really is.
And, less time obsessing about your local presence