How to get more Google reviews: 8 ways to ask, and when to send them
The tactics are the easy part. What moves a Google rating is when you ask, how often you follow up, and how many reviews it takes to shift the number people see.
Lachlan Fea 12 min read
In this article10 sections
To get more Google reviews, ask every customer once when the job is done, give them a direct review link, then follow up once if they have not acted. A business that sends a plain text message to forty customers a week will collect far more reviews than one that runs an inventive campaign twice a year.
Below: the eight ways to ask, the schedule to send them on, what Google and the US Federal Trade Commission forbid, and the arithmetic of how many reviews it takes to move a star rating.
Get your Google review link and QR code
Start with one thing: a link that opens the Google review box on your listing. Without it, people have to search, pick the right profile from the near misses and find the review button themselves. Most will not bother. For the full walkthrough, including what to do when the link opens the wrong listing, see how to get your Google review link.
Google generates the link for you. These are Google's own instructions, as they stand in September 2026:
- Sign in to the Google account that manages the profile and go to your Business Profile. Searching your own business name while signed in is the quickest way there.
- Select Read Reviews, then Get more reviews.
- To copy the review link, select Copy.
- For the QR code, right-click it and select Save image as.
There is one catch. Google says reviews QR codes "can only be generated on a computer browser, not on mobile devices", so set this up from a desk, not on the way to a site visit.
If you need to build the link rather than copy it, find your business in Google's Place ID finder and put the ID after https://search.google.com/local/writereview?placeid=. Google does not document that URL and it could change, so use Copy where you can. The Place ID route is a fallback for wiring the link into something yourself.
Put the link and code where you actually ask. Google suggests receipts, thank-you emails, the end of a chat and a printed code in the store. Add the docket, van and packing slip. If you want a code and printable poster without touching Business Profile, try this free Google review QR code generator, then read review links and QR codes as a working system.
How to leave a Google review: the steps to send a customer
Staff will be asked this, as will customers who want to help but cannot work it out. Put these steps on a card or paste them into a reply.
On a phone, with your link:
- Tap the link. The Google review box opens on your business.
- Choose a star rating.
- Write a sentence or two. A bare rating tells the next reader nothing.
- Tap Post.
Without your link, the route through Google Maps is: search for the business, open the listing, scroll to Reviews, then tap Write a review. It works, but every extra step loses people. That is the case for sending the link.
Leaving a Google review without a Google account
Google is explicit: "Customers must be signed into a Google Account to leave a review." Maps reviews are public and cannot be anonymous. For some customers, that is where the process ends.
The same Google help page notes that an account can be set up against a non-Gmail address. On the sign-in screen the customer chooses to create an account, picks the option to use their existing email, and Google attaches it to the Outlook, Hotmail or work address they already have.
It is still a detour between goodwill and a posted review. Give people another place to review you too. Google matters most for local search, but a Facebook or industry-site review beats no review at all.
Make it easy on a phone
Most reviews are written on a phone, in a spare minute. Text the link to yourself and use it. If it opens search results, or a listing that needs scrolling, fix the link. Nothing else in this guide compensates for that friction.
Eight clever ways to ask for reviews
The right channel depends on the business. Pick another option for the people the first one misses. The first four work cheaply for every customer. The last four suit more particular situations.
1. Ask in person, at the counter
The person who has just thanked you is the most likely reviewer you will have. Keep it plain and give them the route.
"Glad it worked out. If you have got a minute, a Google review really helps us. There is a QR code on the counter, or I can text you the link now."
Two rules matter here. Ask everyone, not only customers who seem pleased, because selectively soliciting positive reviews breaches the policy. Then leave them to it. Google bars merchants from pressuring users to leave a review on the premises, and a customer writing under supervision is unlikely to say much of use.
2. Ask by text
Text gets read and reaches the device where the review will be written, so it removes a step that email cannot. Use one sentence, one link and a name the customer recognises.
Hi Emma, thanks for coming in today. Would you mind leaving Coastline Physio a quick Google review? It takes about a minute: [link]
Then one follow-up, three days later:
Hi Emma, in case it got buried: here is that review link for Coastline Physio. No trouble at all if not. [link]
More wording is in our review request templates, and which channel to lead with is a question of its own.
3. Ask by email
Email is slower, but it reaches further and suits relationships that already run by email. The subject line does much of the work, so test that first. We have a whole post on subject lines for review requests. Keep the message shorter than you think: context, ask, link.
Subject: How did we do, Emma?
Hi Emma,
Thanks for choosing Coastline Physio last week. If you have a minute, a short Google review helps other people in the area work out whether we are right for them.
[Leave a Google review]
Thanks, Sam
Never suggest what rating to leave, and never write a request that only makes sense if the answer is a good one. See what a five star review request should and should not say.
4. Put a QR code where the customer already is
A QR code catches every customer whose contact details you never collected, which is often most of hospitality and retail. Put it on the counter card, docket, van or packing slip. A useful code has a line explaining it and sits where people already have a phone out. The payment terminal beats the far wall.
5. Send a handwritten note
Almost nobody does this, which is why it can stand out. For a renovation, wedding or property sale, any job that ran for weeks and mattered, post a card with a printed QR code. It is more likely to be opened than a third follow-up email. Keep it short and name the job.
6. Pick up the phone
If you were already going to call, ask at the end and send the link while you are still on the phone. It does not scale, but a business doing ten jobs a month does not need it to.
7. Record a short video ask
A fifteen second video from the owner does not look automated. That is why it can work. It suits owner-led businesses where customers bought partly into the person, not a network of forty sites. Say who you are, name the job, ask, stop. Put the link in the message, not the video. Asking a customer to record one is a different job, covered in how to ask for a video testimonial and best video testimonial software.
8. Add it to your website and your email signature
This is passive, permanent and cheap. A "Review us on Google" link in every staff email signature, plus a reviews section on your site, catches people already considering it. It is easier to add to something that already exists than start from scratch. Here is how to embed Google reviews on your website, or on a Wix site.
Two more are worth setting up once. A line and link in automated receipts and invoices can keep adding reviews for years. A social post works once or twice a year, no more. The people who see it are your most engaged customers, which explains both why it converts and why the well runs dry.
Time the ask to the job, not to the calendar
Most tip lists miss this, though it matters more than any individual tactic. AskNicely's sixteen tips and Google's own "Tips to get more reviews" both say to remind customers after a good experience. Neither tells you which event in your own system should send the message. That is the difference between a programme that runs and one remembered on a Friday.
Use the event that tells you the customer's job is finished as the trigger. Not "every Friday" or "the first of the month". Use the completed appointment, paid invoice or signed-off job.
| Business | Trigger the ask on | Send |
|---|---|---|
| Physio, dental, allied health | Appointment marked complete, patient arrived | Same day, a few hours after |
| Salon, barber, clinic | Checkout, or the invoice closing | Same day |
| Trades and home services | Job signed off, or the invoice paid | The next morning |
| Professional services | Matter or project closed | Same day, while the outcome is fresh |
| Retail and ecommerce | Delivery confirmed, not the order placed | Two to three days after delivery |
| Restaurants and cafes | The bill paid | That evening or the next morning |
Avoid two mistakes. Do not ask before the customer has experienced what they would review, which is what happens when an order triggers the message instead of delivery. Do not wait until they have to reconstruct the experience, which is what monthly batches do. Some trades ask through a platform instead: hospitality in how to get more Tripadvisor reviews, property in real estate review requests and Zillow review requests.
Restaurants and cafes: ask after the table has left
Hospitality has a timing problem other businesses do not. Ask after the meal and bill, never during service, and remember that walk-ins rarely leave a mobile number. Restaurants and cafes should lean on a QR code on the docket or table card, and reserve messages for bookings and functions where they have details. If you run several venues, ask in the venue's name, not the group's. The customer is reviewing the restaurant they visited.
Ask once, and follow up once
Frequency is where good intentions become complaints. These rules hold up:
- One ask per customer, per visit, not one per transaction. A regular who comes in fortnightly should not be asked fortnightly.
- One follow-up, three to seven days later. It recovers a good share of the people who meant to and forgot. A second recovers very little and irritates people.
- Stop when they review. Nobody should be chased after they have already written about you.
- Skip anyone who reviewed you recently. They have nothing new to say and will read the ask as spam.
- Never re-enrol someone who opted out. Once is a mistake. Twice is a complaint.
Doing this by hand across a customer list is where most programmes fall over. Cloutly's review campaigns connect the ask to your own booking or payment system, on the timing you set, whether that is Square, Mindbody, Zenoti, Xero, Zapier or a CSV. A repeat customer remains one contact asked once, rather than one ask per transaction. Anyone who reviewed you in the last 90 days is skipped, opted-out contacts are never re-enrolled, and follow-ups stop when the review lands.
Respond to every review
Responding does not get you more reviews. It is the cheapest way to make the reviews you have more useful. Readers notice how a business handles criticism, and replies show that someone is still paying attention.
Keep replies short and specific. Templates for positive reviews are in positive review response examples. If a review breaches Google's policies, see how to remove negative reviews from Google. Disagreement is not grounds for removal: Google says plainly that it "doesn't get involved in conflict between businesses and customers".
What Google and the FTC will not allow
Most shortcuts people ask about breach Google's policy, and some now breach US law.
No incentives. Google's position is unambiguous: "Offering incentives, like free or discounted goods or services, in exchange for customers to post reviews, change reviews, or remove negative reviews is considered fake & misleading content and is strictly prohibited." That includes discounts for a review, prize-draw entries and free coffee. You may ask as often as you like. You cannot pay, in money or in kind.
No gating, and no asking only the happy ones. Google's prohibited and restricted content policy bars merchants from "discourag[ing] or prohibit[ing] negative reviews, or selectively solicit[ing] positive reviews from customers". That rules out surveying a customer privately first and showing the review link only to satisfied people. It is called review gating, several vendors still sell it, and it breaches that policy. Cloutly has not gated since 2021.
No buying reviews, and no pressuring people out of them. In the United States this is law, not just a policy question. The FTC's Rule on the Use of Consumer Reviews and Testimonials (16 CFR Part 465) took effect on 21 October 2024 and is still in force. It bans reviews from people who never used the business, undisclosed insider reviews, compensation tied to a particular sentiment, and unfounded legal threats or intimidation used to suppress a negative review. Courts can impose civil penalties for knowing violations. The rule applies to businesses, not a customer writing honestly about their own experience.
No pressuring on the premises. Google also bars merchants from requiring or pressuring users to leave a rating while they are in the shop, and from asking for particular content to be included.
The rest of this page stays within the rules. Google can restrict a Business Profile for a policy violation. That is a poor trade for a handful of reviews.
How to get more Google reviews across more than one location
Every guide on this topic assumes one shopfront. At five, or fifty, the problem changes shape.
Use the same ask and process everywhere. Compare performance between sites, not different processes. If one site texts while another emails monthly, their review-count gap tells you nothing useful.
Each location needs its own link, QR code and Business Profile, because a review must land on the profile the customer visited. A group-level link starves the other locations.
Credit every review to its site. Otherwise you cannot see which locations are behind, and they are usually behind for a reason you can fix. Ask in the location's name too: people review the salon they visited, not the holding company.
Put it all in one place. The failure at scale is rarely that no one asks. It is that no one can see who is asking. Reviews per site per week, compared side by side, does more than any tactic above.
To credit reviews to staff as well as sites, give each person their own review link or QR code. Name matching in review text fills gaps, but can credit the wrong person. A personal link is exact. Read more about running this across a network on our multi-location page.
How many Google reviews do you actually need?
Most people asking this want a target. The answer is arithmetic. Do it before setting one, because the result is often bigger than expected. How many Google reviews you need runs the same sums.
reviews needed = current count x (target rating - current rating) / (5 - target rating)
Coastline Physio sits at 4.2 stars from 60 reviews and wants 4.5. That is 60 x 0.3 / 0.5, so 36 new five star reviews. Reaching 4.7 from the same start takes 100.
To put your own rating through the same sums, use the star rating calculator.
| Starting point | To reach 4.5 | To reach 4.7 |
|---|---|---|
| 3.8 from 50 reviews | 70 | 150 |
| 4.0 from 50 reviews | 50 | 117 |
| 4.2 from 50 reviews | 30 | 84 |
| 4.4 from 50 reviews | 10 | 50 |
| 4.6 from 50 reviews | already there | 17 |
The lower the starting rating, the more each tenth of a star costs, so moving up from 3.8 takes more than a month. Every step towards 5.0 is harder than the last. That is fine. A 4.7 from 300 reviews carries more weight than a 5.0 from 12.
One bad review has a cost too. Pulling an average back to 4.7 after one one-star review takes 13 new five star reviews. At 4.5 it takes 7, at 4.0 it takes 3. That does not depend on how many reviews you already have. Steady Google reviews will not stop a bad review, but they make it a smaller share of what people see.
Volume matters separately from the average. BrightLocal's Local Consumer Review Survey 2026, published in February 2026 from a sample of 1,002 US consumers, found that 97% of consumers read reviews for local businesses and 71% used Google to do it. A 4.8 from 9 reviews does not signal the same thing as a 4.6 from 400, and recency matters too. People looking today want to know what you are like this year.
Frequently asked questions
How do I get more Google reviews?
Ask every customer once when their job is finished, with a direct Google review link, then follow up once a few days later if they do not act. Use text when you hold mobile numbers, email when you do not, and put a QR code where walk-in customers stand.
Can I pay for Google reviews?
No. Buying reviews breaches Google's content policy and, in the United States, the FTC's Rule on the Use of Consumer Reviews and Testimonials, in force since 21 October 2024. Courts can impose civil penalties for knowing violations. Bought reviews are also routinely detected and removed, so you lose the money and the reviews.
Can I offer a discount for a review?
No. Google treats incentives, including discounts, free goods and prize draw entries, as fake and misleading content, whether the review that follows is positive or not. Thanking a customer afterwards is fine. Making anything conditional on a review is not.
How long does a Google review take to show up?
Usually minutes. Google checks reviews against its policies first and says that "in some cases, this process might take a few days, which can delay a review's appearance". A recently merged Business Profile can also take time to display the reviews it inherited.
Why did my Google review disappear?
Google removes reviews its spam detection or policy review flags, and says it will not restore reviews taken down for policy violations. A review also disappears when its customer deletes it, since it stays up only while its author leaves it there. Our post on Google reviews not showing up covers what to check.
Do Google reviews affect my local ranking?
Yes. Google says local results are based on relevance, distance and prominence, and that "more reviews and positive ratings can help your business's local ranking" (Google Business Profile Help). Nobody outside Google knows the weighting. Treat reviews as one input that customers also read before choosing you.