Whether you’re someone who peruses testimonials prior to paying for a product or service, or you’re sceptical about their authenticity, there are many people who rely on Google reviews every day. Local business owners need to see people leaving positive reviews of their work, whether it’s a brief comment about customer service, a positive comment on the speed of the delivery, or a more comprehensive testimonial of the start-to-finish service.

Businesses of all sizes and across every sector can use Google reviews in their marketing to develop a stronger relationship with their customers, promote their quality to others and even decipher what they’re doing well, not so well, and just right (you could say that Goldilocks herself was a pioneer of the simple, succinct customer testimonial!). A Google review can make quite a difference to the average consumer’s perception of a given company or service, with more than 70% of people placing more trust in a local business as a result of authentic and positive online testimonials.

Even a negative review provides an opportunity for a business to improve on certain elements of their service, and to be seen as responding positively and proactively to customers in full view of their peers.

Finally, in terms of the impact of where these reviews are being left – a Google review is a sure sign to the world’s most popular search engine that ‘this’ business… means business!

Leaving a review on Google is a relatively simple process, doesn’t take much time at all, and could make all the difference to a local business owner.

Step 1 – search for the business on your browser. It should appear on the right-hand side of the search engine results page (SERP).

Step 2 – scroll a little way down the page until you see the ‘Write a Review’ option, and select it.

Step 3 – in the pop-up ‘Rate and Review’ box, you can select a ‘Star’ rating from 0 – 5, and then write a few words to explain your rating (writing is optional).

Step 4 – Click ‘Post’.

And that’s it. Four steps to showing your support of a local business, or warning others of a negative experience you’ve had. Naturally, your review is entirely subjective, which means that any others you read are too, so you should use your own intuition to decide whether other reviews are enough to draw you to, or away from a given business.

Do be aware that a 100% 5-Star rating across all of a company’s reviews is unusual, especially if the business has already received a high number of reviews (as an example, The Great Wall of China has an average rating of 4.2 Stars!). However, this doesn’t mean you shouldn’t leave 5 Stars yourself, if you believe the service you have received is worthy of this flawless rating.

So, there you have it: a short, simple guide to a potentially big deal for a local business. Whether it’s a trade company like Vantage Roofing & Building undertaking flat roof repairs in Newcastle upon Tyne, or perhaps a taxi company, restaurant, or even your local leisure centre, you now know how a little of your time spent writing a review of your experience could mean a lot to the businesses you purchase from and deal with on a day-to-day basis.