How to get more reviews for a trades business

Tradies have the best raw material for reviews and the least time to chase them. You finish a job, the customer is grateful, and then you are already driving to the next one. The review never gets asked for.

Here is a system that fits around the work. This is the overview for any trade, and each of these has a guide of its own:

• Plumbers: callouts, hot water cylinders, and a QR code on the van and the invoice.
• Electricians: the Certificate of Compliance email and switchboard labels.
• Builders and renovators: long projects, handover and the site sign.
• Cleaning companies: customers who are not home, and asking the same evening.
• Mechanics and car workshops: the counter, the keys envelope and the service sticker.

Why reviews matter more in the trades

When someone needs a plumber or a sparky, they are usually stressed, they do not have a regular, and they choose from the Google map pack in about thirty seconds. Star rating, review count, and how recent the reviews are. That is the whole decision for a lot of jobs.

The ACCC has also specifically named the trades when talking about review manipulation, so this is a sector where doing it properly matters.

Ask at the van, or the morning after

Two timings work for trades:

1. On site, before you leave. The job is done, it is tidy, the customer is happy. "If you have got a sec, a quick Google review really helps us out, I will pull it up on my phone." Hand it over.
2. The next morning by text. If you would rather not ask face to face, a short text the next day works nearly as well, and it catches the customers you did not see at handover.

If you invoice through job management software, sending the request a day after the invoice is paid takes you out of the loop entirely.

Make the link one tap

Your review link should open the review box directly on the customer's phone. Not a map, not a search. Put a QR code on your invoices and one in the van for in-person asks.

Ask every customer

Do not pick and choose. Every completed job gets the same request. Beyond being the law, it is also how the numbers actually add up: if you only ask the jobs you are sure about, you are asking maybe a third of your customers.

Offer every customer a private way to raise a problem alongside the review link. Anyone with a concern can use it, and you find out about the late arrival or the pricing confusion early.

Handle the reviews you get

• Reply to every review, good and bad, within a few days.
• On a bad one, acknowledge the specific issue, say what you have changed, and move it to a phone call.
• Never pay someone to take a review down. If a review demands payment, that is extortion. Report it.

Automate the asking

The reason this does not happen is not that customers say no. It is that you are on the tools all day. A rule that fires the request automatically after each paid invoice, within your quiet hours, means the asking happens whether or not you remember.