The things said about your business online never goes away, but Podium is a tool that anyone can use to at least try to ensure the good stuff is mentioned too.
If you’re a business trying to make your mark online, one of the most powerful ways to give your brand a boost is via online testimonials vouching for you and your services via Google reviews. The best part? It’s completely free, and yet the potential rewards are lucrative.
Think about it. Before we book a service with a new mechanic, we check their reviews. Before we purchase a new set of shoes, we check what others have to say about not just the product, but the brand that is selling them. Word of mouth is one of the most powerful marketing tools out there, and the past experiences of others on a platform like Google reviews can’t be fudged, or removed.
Google reviews allow any business to essentially prove themselves to their potential customers. While any operator can talk the talk, this online platform enables the good ones to walk the walk. A part of its appeal is that people are able to go online and list their thoughts about the company without having to download an app. Google Reviews work wonders when it comes to levelling the playing field between small and larger enterprises, and are making marketing hype, expensive paid campaigns, and slick copy less relevant.
If you aren’t yet converted, some of the other benefits of actively chasing Google Reviews include the following:
Lead Generation – Did you know that 88% of consumers trust online reviews as much as they do personal recommendations? Building up your reviews, in turn, encourages searchers to engage with your business upon finding it online or via Google Maps, where they can see both the positive (and negative) feedback that surrounds your brand.
Higher Conversions – Whether we like it or not, it’s a simple fact that consumers actively research and read reviews before making purchase decisions. So much so, that they generally read a minimum of ten reviews on average before feeling confident in making a buying decision. Thus, the more Google customer reviews you have, the more likely a purchase is to be made.
Boost Your SEO – Did you know that the bigwigs at Google actually reward businesses that have both positive and frequent reviews listed on the platform? In fact, it’s listed as a definitive local SEO ranking factor, as confirmed by Google itself. Not only will it help you rank on the search engine’s listings, but it’s also essentially free advertising.
While getting some regular and positive Google reviews under your brand’s belt does take a little bit of work, at the end of the day – all you have to do is ask. In saying that, is there a way to streamline the process? Absolutely.
Introducing Podium For Google Reviews
There are many ways in which brands and businesses can actively chase Google reviews. For some, it’s a handwritten note left in a ‘click and collect’ package. For others, it’s manually sending an email to request one – but what if there was a way to both automate and streamline your review requests?
Marketed as ‘messaging tools for local businesses’, Podium is a software platform that consolidates customer interactions and online reviews into a single dashboard to help users manage online review management. From the dashboard, users can send review invitations, respond to online reviews in real time, and send and receive text messages with customers and potential customers. The settings allows brands to pinpoint exactly where they would like any reviews published, such as Facebook or Google Reviews.
Not only can Podium automate and trigger review requests via text message, but it‘s design also allows users to track their progress. Users can both set and keep review goals, with in-depth reporting that gives you a comprehensive view of your online reputation – and what you need to do in order to hit those goals. In addition, Podium’s platform provides businesses with reports on the business’ day to day operations, including sentiment analysis and competitive benchmarking, that can help businesses identify potential areas for improvement.
Unsurprisingly, the software has also got a large number of positive reviews from users from all corners of the internet, and from a wide variety of industries and sectors. Needless to say, the team at Podium practices what they preach.
Getting On Top Of Your Brand’s Search Engine Marketing Strategy
Much like securing positive reviews, producing quality, consistent and on brand content takes time, effort, experience and resources – and you’re not alone if you can’t quite commit to that. As a core essential of any SEO strategy, avoiding blogging for business altogether may actually be doing your brand a disservice. Thankfully, outsourcing and in turn investing in a solid content marketing strategy has never been easier.
Here at Content Hive, producing top quality digital content is exactly what we do best. We have itemised a list of digital content services, and allocated credits next to each of these. This means that each month, you can use your credits with us to produce digital content such as blog articles, social media posts, videos and even animated Instagram stories. By using this model, we believe that it enables us to produce high quality content with faster delivery times. It also means that because you have a monthly credit, you are going to want to make sure you use these up – and so do we – meaning that your digital content is always consistent.
If you aren’t quite sure where to start on your digital marketing journey and would like to speak to a professional, why not book a free discovery call with us at Content Hive today to discuss how we can get your brand buzzing online.
