Reputation, Reputation, Reputation...
Businesses with strong, positive, reputations attract better customers
Business is picking up again in many of the my key markets, restaurants and hotels are once again filling with live, and in-person events are back - time to pick up were I left off pre-COVID.
A business’ online reputation has always been important, but - like so many other things - engagement on the main review platforms (Google, TripAdvisor, Facebook, Yelp, Zomato, etc.) slowed down considerably for many companies during the height of the COVID pandemic. Guess what, though? Just like people are returning to offices, dining out (more) again in restaurants, and generally prepare to resume live in the “new normal”, online reviews are picking up again, too.
Did you know that just a one-star increase in your company’s online ratings leads to a 5 - 9 percent increase in revenue? When consumers judge a business, the star rating is the number 1 factor, followed by the pace and quantity of reviews. Here are some other interesting online reputation insights:
I recently put together a quick guide on how to claim, optimize, and use your company’s Google my Business listing. Google my Business (GMB) is, perhaps, the most underused tool in an online marketer’s toolbox. If you’ve never heard of GMB listings, you’ve probably been living under a rock or in one of the few countries where Google isn’t a thing. Don’t worry, though, because you can get a quick primer on GMB directly from Google here.
If you’re running a business, particularly a bricks & mortar, service-centric business - think restaurants, bars, shops, surgeries - or if you’re in the process of starting a business, click here to read my guide on optimising your business’s Google my Business listing in 5 easy steps here.
If your business still relies mainly on TripAdvisor for online reviews, e.g. restaurants, bars, cafes, hotels, or tourist attractions, you might be in for a rude awakening, because research shows that TripAdvisor is losing importance and is being overtaken by Google Reviews and other platforms. Pre-Covid, a fellow business consultant, who is based in the US, looked at the average review volumes, by platform, year on year, for the past four years for hotels in the United States. He found that between 2015 – 2019, TripAdvisor’s market share (i.e. the number of reviews) declined, Expedia’s (incl. hotels.com) share remained largely static, while Google’s share skyrocketed.
Just to see whether this trend also holds for restaurant reviews, I recently looked at the review volume, by platform, for one of Dubai’s busiest restaurants and found that, over the past 24 months, the majority of all reviews came from Google, followed by TripAdvisor and various smaller review platforms tied in second place.
You can read my article “The End of TripAdvisor”, which was published in the November 2021 edition of Hotel & Catering News ME, here (requires registration & login) - in it, I talk about the detailed results of my research, explain why other review services are quietly crushing TripAdvisor, and tell you what action you should take to safeguard and grow your business’s online reputation.
help? help!
If you’re running a service-centric, bricks and mortar, business and need help with your online reputation, review handling & replies, or increasing the number of reviews, you can schedule a FREE, no obligation, 100% entertaining, discovery call with me here and find out how I can help. You can also connect with me on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, or YouTube.