Did you know… the number of Google reviews is one of the biggest factors in Google’s local search algorithm?
Take a moment and see for yourself:
- Google “church in [your city].”
- Look under the map at the “Local 3 Pack,” add together the number of reviews the 3 churches there have, and divide by 3 to get the average number of reviews.
- Click the map in the Local 3 Pack to see the top 20 results in Google maps
- Scroll down and take a look at how many reviews churches towards the bottom of the top 20 have.
Big difference, right?
How do you get more Google reviews for your church?
Glad you asked. Here are…
3 Ways to Get More Google Reviews for Your Church
1) Add a Google Business Profile icon/link in the header or footer of your website.
Churches often put social media icons that link to their profiles on social sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Add an icon and link to your Google Business Profile. Some of your members will see the icon, click and post a review. It also helps visitors to see all the good reviews your church already has.
2) Post a request for reviews to social media.
If you use Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or other social media sites, post a request for reviews to your social channels and include a link to your Google Business Profile. When you do, let people know that by posting a review, they are helping to improve your church’s search rankings, which will help your church connect with more people online. Positive reviews that cite specific ways God has used your church to change people’s lives help motivate people to visit on Sunday to see what God is up to in your church.
3) Send email and/or texts to members asking them to post a review.
It’s getting more and more difficult to reach people via social media. Email still has a high open rate, and the open rate for texts is nearly 100%. Plus you can make your ask more personal in an email or text.
The same advice given for social media applies to email and texts – include a link and cast vision for how their reviews will help the church accomplish its mission.
One additional bit of advice for email (or any medium you may use to ask for reviews)… Google knows it has a problem with fake reviews. It uses an algorithm to look for patterns in reviews that look unnatural. If your church has a handful of reviews and then all of the sudden gets 50 reviews in one day, it’s going to look suspicious. Nobody knows how many reviews in a short amount of time is too many. But the goal should be to continuously add more reviews.
Therefore, instead of emailing your entire congregation at one time, go through your email list gradually. Try to get around 5 reviews a week. Start by emailing 20 people, wait a week and see how many new reviews you received. If you got 10 new reviews, scale it down and email 10 people the next week. If you got 2 reviews, scale it up and email 50 people the next week.
When it comes to online reviews, you have not because you ask not. -Mark Steinbrueck
For more info on online reviews, read our Ultimate Guide to Online Reviews.
If you would like to gain more online reviews for your organization without having to do all the work described above, check out our Online Review Service.
Or if you would like help improving your church’s search rankings so you can better reach people in your community, complete the form below to request a free phone consultation to discuss your church SEO.
Comment Below and Discus:
- How many Google Reviews does your church have?
- What methods have you tried to get more reviews and how effective have those methods been?
Read more articles in our What is Church SEO? series.
7 Comments
Hi Paul, Thank you for your useful information. Anyway, can you help me for this problem? I have a schema rating in my website but not have the visible to user, Google accept my rating and show in result of keywords, but i wonder if people can see the rating feature, do i have penalty ? Hope for your answer soon. Thank you.
Where is the “schema rating”?
I liked the article, does it work with any size-independent church?
Yes
This is a wonderful guide. It’s so sad that some people make bad reviews in a church. They should respect and honor the church.
Greetings, Paul! I searched around on the OCC website for an example of tip #1 (a Google Business Profile icon/link in the header or footer), but found none. Is this only something you recommend for churches, and not websites in general?
Also, can you speak at all to those of us who may feel uneasy about asking for reviews of our church, as if we were pandering for approval? I don’t want to give the appearance that we’re putting fear of man over fear of God, or cause visitors to question whether we might be prioritizing popularity over integrity.
Hi Teresa, good question. Putting a Google Business Profile icon/link in the header or footer is something I recommend for any locally-focused organizations including local churches. If you go to your WP-EZ Dashboard, hover over the “More” menu and select the “Social Media” option, you’ll see there is place to add your “Google My Business” URL (That’s the old name for Google Business Profile. We need to update the label.)
>>Also, can you speak at all to those of us who may feel uneasy about asking for reviews of our church, as if we were pandering for approval?
Sure. As I wrote in the blog article, “Let people know that by posting a review, they are helping to improve your church’s search rankings, which will help your church connect with more people online. Positive reviews that cite specific ways God has used your church to change people’s lives help motivate people to visit on Sunday to see what God is up to in your church.”
In other words, its all about helping people understand that their review will help your church reach people and live out its mission.