How to get Google reviews as a tradesperson

Why almost nobody asks

It is not reluctance. It is that the moment passes. The job finishes at half four, you are loading the van, the customer is happy, and asking feels like it would spoil a good ending. So you decide to email later, and later never has the same weight.

Two weeks on, your message is one of two hundred in their inbox, the kitchen looks normal to them now, and the thing they were delighted by has become the thing that is simply there. The same person who would have left five stars on the day will not open the email.

So the timing is not a detail, it is the whole technique. Ask while they are looking at the work.

The link, and where to find it

Google generates a short review link for every verified profile. It is in the dashboard, under the prompt to ask for reviews, and it drops the customer straight onto the star rating rather than making them search your name and find the right button.

Get it out once and save it properly: into your phone's notes, into a text shortcut, and onto the bottom of your invoice template. The point is that asking should never involve hunting for it, because the one time it does is the time you skip the ask.

If you send work by text anyway, put it in the same message as the final invoice. The moment somebody is settling up is a moment they are already thinking about whether you did a good job.

The ask, word for word

Short, no apology, no paragraph explaining what reviews mean to a small business. The customer does not need convincing, they need the link and permission to take thirty seconds.

Hi [name], all finished and thanks for the brew. If you've got half a minute, a quick Google review would really help me out: [link]

Anything not right, ring me first and I'll come back.

What the rules actually forbid

There is a lot of folklore here and the actual policy is narrower than people think. You are allowed to ask. You are allowed to ask every customer, in person, by text, on the invoice, on a card in the van. Asking is fine.

What is not allowed is paying for it, in any form. A discount for a review, entry into a draw, a free callout, money off the next job. Incentivised reviews breach Google's policy and get removed when they are noticed, and the pattern of removal usually takes honest reviews with it.

You also cannot ask selectively, which is the one that catches people out. Filtering customers so that only the happy ones are sent the link is review gating, and it is against the policy even though it feels like common sense. Ask everybody or ask nobody.

Writing them yourself, or having family write them, is the version that ends the profile rather than the review. It is detectable, it is reported by competitors, and it is a reason for suspension rather than a slap on the wrist.

The bad one

You will get one eventually, and you cannot have it removed for being unfair. Google removes reviews that break its policies, not reviews that are wrong about you, and the distinction feels thin when you are on the end of it.

Reply once, in public, short and factual. Then stop, even when they reply again. The reply is not written for the person who left it. It is written for the next reader, and what the next reader is checking is whether you are the sort of tradesperson who argues with customers.

A profile with nothing but five stars reads as bought anyway. One bad review answered calmly, sitting underneath twenty good ones, does more for your credibility than a clean sheet does.

Sorry it fell short, [name]. We agreed [what the job was] on [date] and I'd rather sort it than leave it here. I've tried to reach you on [number] and the offer stands.

Anyone reading this: happy to talk through what happened.

Reviews Google owns, and reviews you own

These are two different assets and it is worth knowing which is which. Google reviews do their work in the search results, at the moment somebody is deciding who to ring. They are also permanently on Google's side of the fence: you cannot export them, move them, or take them with you.

Reviews on a page you control sit next to your prices, your photographs and your credentials, at the moment somebody is deciding rather than finding. They are also yours. The same is true, in reverse, of the reviews you build up on a paid directory: those sit on that directory's domain, under their account, and leaving means starting again.

The useful habit is to point at both. Ask for the Google one on the day, because that is the one that wins you the next stranger, and let your own profile page carry the fuller picture for anybody already weighing you up.