Google has gotten so used to dominating the Internet that it has insisted for years that Google+ was the next great social media platform. There is nothing inherently wrong with Google+, but it simply has not caught on with the public in general. There are several niche audiences that utilize Google+ quite a bit, but most people have no idea what Google+ is or how to use it. Most Gmail users don’t even realize that they get a Google+ account when they sign up for Gmail. That is a good indication of how unpopular Google+ has become.
If a business patron wanted to review their favorite business on Google, they had to do so through their Google+ account. Since most people have no idea what Google+ is, that meant that Google was diluting the importance of its local business review function by not getting nearly the amount of traffic it should be getting. After years of business owners begging for a solution, Google has finally come up with an answer to the Google reviews issue.
Customers No Longer Need A Google+ Account
From now on, anyone with a Google account of any kind can write a review that appears on the business’ Google profile. You can sign up for a Google account using any email address, and you can now leave reviews without having to figure out how Google+ works.
All people need to do to review a business is to be logged into their Google account and find the business using Google. A prompt will appear next to the business name to write a review, and the customer can rate the business and write a review. Needless to say, the volume of business reviews on Google has soared, and Google’s local business feature has become much more powerful.
Increasing The Reviewing Audience
To give you an idea of how many more people are now able to fill out Google reviews for local businesses, it is estimated that the number of people now able to quickly write reviews has grown from around 200 million up to around 900 million. This expansion of the review audience is a critical component for the success of many businesses around the world.
The Process Is Simple
If a customer already has a Google account, then they are probably automatically logged in by Google each time they go online. If a customer does not have a Google account, then it takes seconds to sign up for one and be able to do reviews. A process that used to be so confusing that it caused customers to not leave reviews that could help their favorite businesses to succeed, has now become something that takes seconds for anyone to do.
To get more Google reviews, all you need to do is recommend that your customers log into Google and look up your business. Now that Google+ is no longer involved in the process, any customer can easily log into a generic Google account and leave a rating and review for your business. Since you no longer have to explain how the process works for leaving Google reviews, you can start inviting your customers to leave good reviews about your business and help to start increasing you company’s revenue.