Reviews are the single biggest factor in whether a homeowner calls you. The maths: a tradie with 4.9★ across 80 reviews gets 4× the call volume of a 4.6★ tradie with 12 reviews. Same skills, very different business.
The four-step system
1. Ask every customer, every time. Sounds obvious, doesn't happen. The biggest single improvement most tradies can make is a simple review-request workflow built into job completion.
2. Time it right. Best moment: when you're packing up and the customer is happiest. Worst moment: a week later via email when they've forgotten how good you were.
3. Make it one tap. Use a Google review short-link (or a QR code on your invoice) that goes straight to the review form. Every extra tap costs you 50% of customers.
4. Reply to every review. Yes, even the 5-stars. Google's ranking algorithm weights review activity, not just average score.
What NOT to do
- Offer discounts or rewards for reviews — explicit Google ToS violation, gets reviews removed.
- Filter to only-happy customers — also a ToS violation, and dishonest.
- Pay for reviews — they get detected and removed, and your account flagged.
- Use review-generation services that auto-submit — almost all of these violate Google's policy.
Handling a bad review
Bad reviews are inevitable. The handling matters more than the review itself. A calm, professional, fact-based response to a 1-star actually improves conversion — it shows future customers how you handle problems. The worst response is no response, or a defensive one.
