Wanna Know What People Are Saying About You?

One of the more difficult aspects of being a local organization is trying to keep track of what people are saying about you around the web.  Whether you have a local business, church, school, or local ministry, there are so many places where someone can post a review of your organization that you would literally have to check a couple dozen sites every day just to try to keep up, and you’d still probably miss some…

…until now.

Google Reviews Around the Web:
Google has released a new feature in Google Places that will tell local organizations about all the reviews that Google finds around the web (except for Yelp*).  If you log into Google Places and click the “Reviews” tab on the left, you can view all the reviews Google has found.  This gives you a good overview of how much people are talking about your organization and what they are saying.

Respond to Reviews:
You can do more than just see what’s out there, you can click to view the entire review (the dashboard may just show a snippit) and post a response.  This shows people that you are engaged and helps to create relationships.

Analytics:
In addition to being able to view the reviews and respond to them, you can get some decent analytics information, such as:

• How many reviews do you have?
• What kind of ratings are you receiving?

This feature is just now being rolled out.  So, if you don’t see anything yet, give it a day or two.

What Do I do?
So, what should you do now that you have this cool feature that can help you keep track of all your reviews in one place (well, all but Yelp)?

1. First, go check it out and see what reviews you find.
2. If you find reviews and they are pretty fresh, go ahead and post a response.  You probably don’t need to do anything if they are older.
3. If you don’t have any reviews?  You need to start working to get some.

Here is some helpful information about reviews, such as how to get them, what to do with negative reviews, etc.

• Study Reveals Positive Reviews Boost Google Map Rankings
• More Reviews Equals More Visitors and Customers
• Tips on Managing Your Online Reviews

*Why not Yelp? Yelp has had some legal issues with Google stealing their reviews and content before.  So, my guess is Google isn’t allowed to get the content from Yelp.

Share Your Thoughts:

• Do you keep track of reviews?
• Is this feature something you plan to use?