How do you ask people to write reviews?

Last week, I spoke at Social Media for Social Good on harnessing the power of online reviews. As Community Manager at Good HQ, one of the first questions I’m asked is “how do I encourage people to write reviews?” There are some easy wins when you first claim your page, like asking your trustees and volunteers. But how do you ensure you get regular feedback? According to research, 70% of people when asked to write a review, will. So if it’s as easy as just asking, how and when do you ask? Lets’ start with the obvious… Most organisations will ask for feedback after a person has completed some form of engagement with them, whether that’s at the end of a fundraising event, after a course or when someone has finished using your service. Start asking for public feedback too! You could either do this at the end of your usual feedback form or be more drastic and just direct people straight to Good HQ where they can easily share their experience. Essentially, embed asking for reviews into your existing feedback processes. A great example of this is Chest, Heart & Stroke Scotland who asked volunteers after a recent event to complete their feedback survey. At the end of the survey they asked people to share their experience on Good HQ and now have two reviews as a result. Face to face Asking people in person is an easy way to encourage them to share reviews and sometimes asking ‘in the moment’ is the best way to ensure action! So if you’re at an event, take along some tablets and encourage people to share their experience there and then. If you don’t have the capacity to do this, ask in person and follow up the next day with a gentle reminder by email. Ensuring all staff are aware of the importance of feedback is key to gaining reviews. Educate your team on how you collect feedback, the power of reviews and advise best practice. Digi-tale There are lots of digital opportunities to encourage people to share their charity tales. Regular asks on social media can help generate traffic. For example when Stirling Soup first joined Good HQ, they asked their supporters on Facebook to share their experience and received three great reviews. Another good way on social is to keep an eye on hashtags, including campaigns like Giving Tuesday, #BeLikeStAndrew and Volunteers’ Week. They are a great way to add to existing conversations and encourage people to write reviews. You could also add a widget to your website – this shows your average rating and asks people to share their story. On Good HQ, you’ll find a widget if you go to your profile and click ‘edit,’ here you’ll find a tab called ‘promote.’ Just copy and paste the code and add it to your website. You might also want to consider doing a regular blog post, sharing reviews from Good HQ as well as other platforms, and finish with a call to action encouraging more people to share their story. Don’t forget your e-newsletter! If you send a regular updates, you could include information on reviews. It doesn’t always need to be an ask, you could simply feature your favourite review each month with a small call to action afterwards encouraging people to share their own stories. It’s not all about digital Asking people for reviews isn’t all about being digital – don’t forget your marketing materials! Add information to your leaflets that might be the logo for Good HQ or a more obvious ask, encouraging people to share their experience. You could also pop some business card sized asks in goody bags or with other materials you send out to encourage reviews. And what about good old posters! Put some up around your public facing spaces asking people to share their experiences. For example, LAYC have a posted in their training room encouraging people to share feedback on Good HQ. Got other ideas? If you’ve got another idea or a suggestion about what works well, send us a tweet or drop us an email. We’d love to hear what’s working for you! And if you haven’t claimed your page on Good HQ yet, sign up today and start collecting feedback. With all of these great ideas, you can get off to a great start! For the full presentation from Be Good Be Social take a look at the slides which are available on Slideshare.