Respond to Google Review as Business or Individual?
-
Hello Moz World!
My agency has never had a great strategy for reputation management, but have begun acquiring some Google reviews. We know it's best practice to respond – but I've never considered whether I should respond as an individual or with our company's GMB? The owner of our GMB is "Engenius" – a general admin account for our agency. I'm also a user on the account, as the "owner," but I'm technically not the owner of our company.
Should the owner be added as a user and respond directly? Or is it okay to respond as "Engenius" (the brand)? Or can I respond as the "owner," though I'm not technically?
I know ultimately it's probably not a huge deal, but any thoughts would be awesome! Thanks!
-
You're welcome, Brooks!
-
Thanks for this, Miriam! I love that take on thinking big.
-
I think it's best to respond as a company rather than as an individual. Company responses seem more legitimate and help to build trust especially when responding to a negative review. Personally, when I see these responses, I don't really think it's the actual owner but are representatives of the company.
-
This is a good question, Brooks!
My take: When scaling rep management for companies with 100s or 1,000s of locations, there's no way the owner is going to be personally responding to each review. Rather, he/she will be designating staff to act in his/her name. So, basically, you can think of this scenario this way. You're being empowered by the owner to act on his/her behalf, and putting the name "owner" on the review is an indication that the reply represents company policy, rather than the owner sitting at a laptop late into the night writing responses. I can't imagine John Mackey was logging hours replying to Whole Foods reviews.
So, this is one of those scenarios in which I say, "Think big." If the "big guys" have staff who respond in their names, then smaller businesses can follow suit. I think we're pretty safe in assuming that Google's generic language of "response from the owner" isn't convincing Whole Foods shoppers that they've just receive a personal reply from John Mackey
That being said, it would certainly behoove owners and C-suites to craft very clear policy governing how employees should respond to the public while representing the brand. This is a step that should not be overlooked in organizations large or small.
I hope others will weigh in on this, as this is just my opinion.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Does having a Google My Business website help my local seo?
Everybody says it's important to put as much information as you can into your Google My Business listing. I'm wondering if it helps to take Google up on it's offer to give you a free website in addition to the website I already have of my own.
Reviews and Ratings | | KenLapp1 -
Delete Google Business Listing
Hi there, I'm trying to delete a Google business address but need to know that this will not effect the other apps linked to my google business profile (analytics for example). Do these work independently? I dont really want to delete the profile but the company I work for feel the review section will be detrimental. Thanks!
Reviews and Ratings | | KateOBrien1 -
Potential Ethical Conflict: Google My Business Paid Reviews
I've been sitting on this for a while due to The Busies. So if this is nothing new, feel free to lash me several times with a somewhat moist noodle. And in that event, I promise not to make it weird. 😉 I use the Rewards application, from Google. Long story short, you fill in some demographic information and you receive Google Play credit when you complete surveys. It's a nice way to get a book, app, or music for little effort. But after giving a friend of mine a ride to a local hotel, I've received multiple survey requests that relate to that hotel brand. And it asks me to drop a local review, for extra Google Play credit. How is that ethical? Their own docs clearly state there is no way to pay for better local ranking, but they also admit reviews can improve local ranking. So isn't soliciting reviews, for any sort of compensation, at least a bit unethical? What are your thoughts? Attached are screenshots of the solicitation and GMB documentation. w4hEe
Reviews and Ratings | | Travis_Bailey1 -
I just found original business name for client - its not the same as GMB or any aggregate site. What to do?
the business filing with the Secretary of State is a name of an individual (e.g. Matthew Smith, M.D.). This is on reflected on Localeze and such. However, the business is operating under a name "Healthy Body and Minds Clinic", which is the Facebook, Google My Business, and website name and info. So, how is it best to get consistency in NAP with the two different business names being used? (Ideally, no change in State registration or filing for a DBA). Thanks much! One idea I have seen is to include both and separate them by a colon. As in "Healthy Body and Minds Clinic : Matthew Smith, M.D." I appreciate any suggestions or tips to help. Thanks.
Reviews and Ratings | | Marky_Mark0 -
Query on Product Reviews
Hello Experts, For my Ecommerce site I am using third party review service. Now my query is :- The reviews which is showing on my third party site if same review I can show on my product so will google consider this as duplicate content? Now that product listed on one of the category and that category page before footer section I have section of "Recently Reviewed" section in that section also it is showing same review of that product so is it fine? Will google consider it as duplicate content? Lastly I do have few subcategory pages before footer section I have section of "Recently Reviewed" section in that section also it is showing same review of that product so is it fine? Will google consider it as duplicate content?Note - Image attached of Review section - Which is visible on category and subcategory pages.FYI - This I am doing for two purpose 1) For Visitors purpose so he or she will know reviews about my products 2) As it is customer own written reviews so my pages will get fresh content.Please share your viewsBiKmp
Reviews and Ratings | | wright3350 -
Google Local Reviews : Creating a Recipricol Reviewing Network
Hi All! I recently came across an invitation for a group on Facebook (created by an internet marketer likely trying to drum up business) that is designed to get a bunch of business professionals to leave reviews for each other (not knowing each other or having worked with one another in any way) in an attempt to build good review profiles on Google local for all. Obviously this is frowned upon, but is it actually dangerous at this point? Are there filters or methods Google has to identify and punish businesses for this type of activity? As someone who always tries to do the right thing, it makes my skin boil when the scammers in our industry use manipulative tactics like this and even more annoyed when they actually work! Look forward to any specific info you all have on this. -Ricky
Reviews and Ratings | | RickyShockley0 -
Reviews Duplicate Issue
Hi, I have one query, Can we use the reviews displayed in one website to other website. I mean I have one product and has different websites for that. Can i use the reviews that i got in one of my website in my other website. Will it bring any duplicate content issue? Also one more question for example, consider i am running a review website, can i list the reviews that has been displayed in different websites to my review websites . Whether it will bring any copyright issue?
Reviews and Ratings | | WebOps-SEO0 -
Yelp Review From My Customer Removed
Hi, A customer of mine told me she created a yelp account just to give me a review. She's a good customer and wanted to show me her appreciation. I thanked her for taking the trouble. About a week later, I see that her review was marked as "not recommended." This was a legitimate review made by a real customer. I'm angry that it was removed for no reason. I noticed a competitor of mine has 18 yelp reviews and all of them show up just fine. I also noticed that this same competitor is paying for ads from Yelp. A couple of years ago, another customer reviewed me on yelp and it was also labeled as "not recommended." So I now have 2 "not recommended" reviews on Yelp that, if you ask me, imply that my reviews are fake. After Yelp and Yahoo merged, I lost the 14 Yahoo reviews I had obtained from customers over the last six years. I have also noticed over the years, that whenever I need to sign into my Yelp business account to update the data, it's locked until some pushy sales person calls and asks to speak to me in order to try to sell me ads on Yelp. Anyone else hate Yelp? They're obviously not really interested in making sure reviews are "real," they're just interested in selling expensive ads.
Reviews and Ratings | | Ophelia6191