If you have been in business a few years, you have a list somewhere. Old invoices, a text thread, a spreadsheet, a stack of job tickets in a drawer. Every name on it is a person who already paid you and already knows your work. That list is where your next twenty Google reviews come from, and most owners never touch it.
This is the whole idea behind the Local Guide Method. Your customers do your SEO for you. You are not writing keywords or chasing links. You are asking people you already served to say what happened, in their own words, on your Google Business Profile.
Start with the list you already have
Pull every past customer you can find into one place. Invoices, your phone, your email, your booking software, paper files. You do not need all of them. Fifty names is plenty to start.
Then sort them fast. Put a star next to anyone you remember being happy with the work. Those are your first asks. Skip anyone whose job went badly. You are not hiding from criticism, you just do not need to go looking for it on day one.
If you are not sure what your profile even looks like to those customers right now, run a free profile audit first. It will tell you whether your review link, your hours and your photos are in order before you start sending people there.
Get your Google review link before you send anything
Google gives you a link that drops a customer straight onto the review box. Open your Business Profile, find the option to ask for reviews, and copy it. Google's own help page says you can ask customers to visit a Google link or scan a QR code to leave a review, so you can also print the same link as a QR code for your counter or your invoices.
One thing to know up front. Google says customers have to be signed in to a Google Account to leave a review, and that account does not have to use a Gmail address. Some of your older customers will stall there. That is normal and it is not your fault.
Write one short message and send it as yourself
Short beats polished. Three or four lines, your name, the job you did, and the link. Something like this:
- Hi Dana, it is [your name] from [your business]. We replaced the water heater at your place back in March.
- I am trying to get found by more neighbors on Google, and reviews are how that happens.
- Would you mind writing a line or two about how the job went? Here is the link: [your review link]
- Takes about a minute. No worries either way.
Ask for an honest review, not a good one. Do not tell them what to say and do not send a draft to paste. Google's rules say merchants should not request that specific content be included, and ten reviews that read the same way help nobody.
Send a few a day, not the whole list at once
This is the part people get wrong. Firing off three hundred requests in one afternoon can produce a sudden pile of reviews, and Google's policy names unusual volumes or patterns of review contributions that look like an effort to manipulate a rating as rating manipulation.
Five to ten a day is a good pace. Use text or email, whichever you already use with that customer. Send one round, wait, then send a single reminder a few days later to the people who did not get to it. One reminder, not four.
In our experience across 2,300+ profiles, a steady drip from an old customer list beats a one week push every time, because the reviews keep arriving for months instead of stopping dead.
Know what Google does not allow
- No incentives. Google says offering free or discounted goods or services in exchange for reviews is strictly prohibited.
- No filtering. Google does not allow merchants to discourage or prohibit negative reviews, or to selectively solicit positive ones.
- No scripts. Google says merchants should not request that specific content be included, or pressure people into writing a review while they are standing in your shop.
- No buying. Reviews that were paid for, or posted from several accounts at one person's request, get removed.
Those rules are not there to slow you down. They are the reason the reviews you do earn are worth something to the next customer reading them.
Reply to each one as it lands
Google's guidance on replies is plain. Be professional, keep it short, make it personal, and answer promptly. Use the customer's name, mention the actual job, and leave the sales pitch out of it. Google even says to avoid using a reply to offer deals, because the reviewer is already a customer.
The reply is really for the next person reading your profile. They get to see that you answer people.
Then build the ask into every job
Once you have worked through the old list, the backlog is gone and so is the easy win. Keep it going by asking at the end of every job, while the work is fresh and the customer is still standing there. Same link, same short ask, one person at a time.
Google says more reviews and positive ratings can help your local ranking. A customer list you already paid to earn is the cheapest place in your business to get them.
Idea spark: Chris Koerner and guest James Oaks on The Koerner Office podcast.
Quick answers
- How many past customers should I ask at once?
- Five to ten a day is a good pace. A sudden pile of reviews can look like rating manipulation to Google, and a slow drip keeps reviews arriving for months instead of stopping dead.
- Can I offer a discount for a review?
- No. Google says offering free or discounted goods or services in exchange for reviews is strictly prohibited, and reviews posted for an incentive get removed.
- How far back can I go?
- As far as your records go. Mention the job and roughly when it happened so the customer remembers you, and expect fewer replies the older the job is.
- What if a past customer leaves a bad review?
- Reply to it calmly, fix what you can, and move on. Google does not allow businesses to discourage negative reviews, and one honest reply does more for the next customer than a perfect rating.