Search for almost any product, service, or business on Google and you’re likely to be presented with a list of advertised links, many of which are accompanied by a rating out of five stars. The rating appears underneath the business’s URL and helps to instil buyer confidence in the prospective customer, improving profit margins and click-through rates.
These are what are called Google Seller Ratings.
Not only do Google ratings build your brand’s credibility, reputation, and denote the quality of your offering, they can also be fundamental to generating more clicks on your links and Ads, attracting new customers—or as we like to say, new ‘bees’ to your ‘hive’—and increasing sales.
To prove the point, it’s worth noting that around 95% of online customers read reviews before interacting with a business, with a further 58% reporting that they’d happily pay more for a highly-rated product or service.
But how do Google Seller Ratings actually work? Where do they come from? How can you get them? And what do you do when you receive a negative review? Read on to discover the secret role Google reviews could play in your success story…
Contents
- What are Google Seller Ratings?
- How to acquire Google Seller Ratings for your business: 5 steps
- How to encourage your customers to leave reviews: 6 expert tips
- Conclusion
What are Google Seller Ratings?
Google Seller Ratings, or Store Ratings, are aggregate reviews of your business (rather than individual products or services you offer) which Google displays as a rating out of five—represented in stars and the number of reviews you’ve received—displayed beneath your business’s listing on SERPs (Search Engine Results Pages).
Google automatically trawls the internet for verified reviews of your business from a network of trusted review partners, with which to develop your Google Seller Rating. It is important to note that not just any review will do—Google only uses reviews from verified purchasers collected through approved sites.
Nevertheless, there are still plenty of things you can actively do to encourage more reviews and a better overall rating. We’ll explore these techniques a little later in the article.
Free ratings
There are a few different online spaces where Google may display your Store Rating. Let’s start with the free options.
Rich results
Rich results are a special type of SERPs listing, which go beyond displaying text and a URL only. Rich results can include images, embedded video, carousels and more, and appear to customers when one of your links is relevant enough to the search query.
Google Ratings, if you have them, are displayed beneath Rich Results, including your rating out of five stars, the number of reviews this rating is based on, links to relevant recent reviews, and potentially also a qualifier describing why you have the rating you do—for example, customer service satisfaction or a prompt delivery time turnaround.
You can check whether your business’s website is generating rich results for prospective customers with Google’s free Rich Results test.
Free listings
Free listings are the standard text-based links displayed to prospective leads when they make a relevant search enquiry on Google. In simpler terms, they are unpaid links on Google SERPs. You don’t have to pay to display on Google, and if you meet the criteria for Google Seller Ratings, your rating will display beneath the blue URL to your company’s webpage.
Paid ratings
Though Seller Ratings on Google are entirely free and automatically generated, they can also be attached to your paid-for Google Ads.
Google Ads
Google Ads work via a pay-per-click, also known as a cost-per-click model. You bid to secure a spot for your Ad at the top of relevant search query results pages, and every time someone clicks on your Ad you pay Google for the privilege. With Google Seller Ratings attached to your Ad as an Ad extension, the link is likely to look all the more appealing to the potential customer, helping to drive high-quality, high-conversion traffic to your website and ultimately increase your sales.
Why are ratings important for your business?
It may seem fairly obvious why you might want to accrue positive Google reviews for display as Seller Ratings, but that doesn’t mean it won’t benefit you to refresh your mind. Here’s a brief guide to the key benefits of Google Seller Ratings for your business.
- Improve SEO: Search Engine Optimisation is critical to the success of many online businesses, especially for small businesses trying to break into the online marketplace. Whilst Google doesn’t explicitly link your Seller Rating with SEO, it is clear that a positive Seller Rating can improve both Ad visibility and click-through rates, which in turn positively impact your SEO.
- Ramp up your Click-Through Rate: The rate at which search engine users see and click on your Google Ads or free, free product listings is called your click-through rate. The higher your CTR, the more likely you are to see an improvement in conversions: turning visitors to your site into one-time, or potentially lifelong customers. A great Google Seller Rating has a solid chance of creating the sort of ‘buzz’ needed to improve your CTR.
- Increase conversions: And speaking of conversions… We stated before that consumers look to reviews before interacting with a company or its offering. The better your Google reviews are and Rating is, the more likely a customer is to feel confident in engaging with you, and thus the more likely they are to convert.
- Build consumer trust and brand reputation: Lastly, Google Seller Ratings can be a great boon to your brand image and international reputation. Seller Ratings display differently depending on the searcher’s geographic location—i.e., you’ll have a different rating in Brazil compared to in the UK, each built by the reviews of your customers in those countries. The more consistently positive your rating is across the globe, the stronger your brand reputation.
Seller Ratings versus Product Ratings
Before we move on, it’s important to note that there is a difference between Google Seller Ratings and a Google Shopping Review. A Google Shopping Review looks almost identical to the former, with the exception that it pertains to a single specific product or service of yours, as reviewed by your customer community.
For example, if you run a local bakery, then your Seller Rating would pertain to the overall quality of your business, whilst your Google Shopping Reviews will display alongside links to specific products you offer: your brioche, croissants, or your world famous ‘honeycomb hive’!
How to acquire Google Seller Ratings for your business: 5 steps
Now that you know what Google Seller Ratings are and how they can dramatically improve not only your online presence, but also your bottom line, you may be left wondering: ‘How do I actually get a Google Seller Rating?’ Let’s take a look at the five key steps.
1) Encourage your customers to leave reviews: Without reviews, there can be no Seller Rating. As such, the first step to any Store Rating success story is to accrue as many verified reviews as possible. We’ll explain how in the next section.
2) Partner with Google’s trusted third-party review websites: Google trawls through a few dozen trusted third-party review sites to find reliable, relevant reviews from which to pull your average score out of five stars. By partnering with these sites, you can build a relationship which both helps your customers to easily review your business, and encourages a more positive reviewer engagement. These sites are:
- Ausgezeichnet.org
- Bazaarvoice
- Birdeye
- Bizrate Insights
- eKomi
- Feedaty
- Feedback Company
- Feefo
- KiyOh
- Klantenvertellen
- Okendo
- PowerReviews
- ProductReview.com.au
- RA Trustvox
- Reco.se
- Reputation.com
- ResellerRatings
- Reviews.io
- Reevoo
- Shopper Approved
- ShopVote.de
- ShopAuskunft
- Sitejabber
- Stamped.io
- Trusted Shops
- TrustPilot
- TurnTo
- Verified Reviews
- Yotpo
3) Push reviews in each of your locations: Before you can get a Seller Rating on Google, you’ll need at least 100 unique and verified reviews to your name. Moreover, if you operate internationally, you’ll need 100+ reviews in each location before Google will display your local rating to customers living or searching from there.
4) Ensure your reviews are recent and equal an average rating of 3.5+ stars: Pulling outdated, decade-old reviews from backwoods websites won’t encourage Google to give you a rating. Instead, the world’s number one search engine wants you to have recent and relevant reviews of an average of 3.5 stars or higher.
5) Sit back and let Google work its magic: Google automatically generates a Seller Rating for your business once you’ve met all the criteria. It can, however, take up to six weeks of indexing before your rating starts to show.
How to add your Seller Ratings to your Google Ads profile
The great news here is that, technically speaking, you don’t have to lift a finger in order to add your Google Seller Rating to your Ads and organic links. It is an entirely automatic process conducted by Google, provided you meet the three core requirements outlined above:
- At least 100 unique, verified reviews
- With an average rating of 3.5+ stars
- Accrued over the last 12 months
If you’d like to check what your rating currently stands at, give our brand new, free-to-use Seller Rating Checker a whirl!
How to encourage your customers to leave reviews: 6 expert tips
Earlier, we made a point of saying that the very best way to accrue Google reviews for your Seller Rating is to encourage your customers to write them. Here’s how to do so effectively.
- Physically ask your in-store customers to leave reviews.
- Create an online post-fulfilment pop-up encouraging customers to leave reviews.
- Send follow-up emails and/or texts asking for feedback.
- Make the process as straightforward as possible for your customers—for example, provide them with a direct link to your own, or preferred third-party review page (i.e., one of those review sites you partnered with earlier!).
- Provide an excellent service, product, and customer experience from the outset.
- Engage in a personable manner with your customers and potential customers via your social media channels.
4 tips for improving the quality of your Google Seller Ratings
Last but not least, it is important to know how to maximise the positivity and number of reviews your customers are posting online, as well as what to do in the instance of a bad review. By continually improving upon your online review presence, you can foster a truly standout Google Seller Rating capable of attracting—and retaining!—customers.
1) Prioritise customer service and product excellence
Simple as it sounds, it’s true to say that the easiest and most effective way to improve the average quality of your online reviews is to deliver an outstanding customer experience in the first instance. Make your offering excellent, your delivery seamless, and follow-up with quality customer care to encourage happy customers to leave sparkling reviews.
2) Respond to every review
Responding to the reviews you receive may not sound all that important—after all, once the review’s published online, it should start contributing to your Google Store Ratings. However, the trick is to keep those positive reviews coming, and one of the most effective—and affordable—ways to do this is to establish an open dialogue with your customers. Replying to positive reviews doesn’t have to take too much time, either, but the benefits of saying “Hey, I acknowledge you for taking the time to post this, thank you!”—or something more personalised to that effect—can be game-changing.
3) Create a custom framework for dealing with bad reviews
As for negative reviews, it’s even more important that you reply to these! A negative review left to stew will almost always spiral out of control. Of course, once the poor review’s posted, it will automatically affect your Store Rating, but by replying to the reviewer and offering a solution to their negative experience, you do two things:
- Firstly, you nip the problem in the bud, making sure the review doesn’t spiral out of control or attract too much attention from prospective customers.
- Secondly, you show customers reading your reviews that you genuinely care about their experience and aren’t too proud to take responsibility when an accident occurs or a customer has a bad experience.
WebHummel’s compiled an entire guide on how to respond to negative reviews to help you master the process.
4) Look for trends in your reviews to improve your offering
Finally, it’s a good idea to trawl your reviews in the same way Google does. Read as many of them as you have the capacity (and energy!) to, and make notes of the recurring issues and trends found there.
Issues such as slow delivery time, for example, may show up in just one review—in which case it was probably an uncommon slip-up that doesn’t need to be addressed—or in a few dozen—in which case your delivery turnaround is something you should work on improving.
Trends such as praise for your latest app offering can also benefit your Google Rating by identifying areas of your business which are performing above average—these are areas you may want to double down on, thus accruing even more positive reviews, whilst the trend lasts. Strike, they say, while the iron’s hot! Or as we like to say, ‘make honey whilst the pollen count’s high!’
Conclusion
Making yourself more visible online can be an uphill struggle in today’s age of limitless content and competition for ecommerce, but that doesn’t mean it’s impossible.
By following our guide to improving your Google Seller Rating, it is our hope that you can quickly achieve the sort of numbers—stars and reviews—which ultimately convert into customer loyalty, sales, and improved brand reputation.
If you’d like further assistance with establishing a solid, lasting, impactful online presence, then take a look at the services offered here, at WebHummel, where helping businesses ‘bee’ found online is our mission.
