Build trust on your site
Reviews are one of several things that make a site look credible. Here is the whole list, honestly, and where reviews fit.
Collect customer reviews
Ask at the moment someone is already pleased with you, on the page they are already on, instead of hoping they remember later.
Why satisfied customers don’t leave reviews
It is almost never because they were unhappy. It is because leaving a review means remembering to, finding the right page, signing into an account and writing something — four steps between goodwill and a published review, taken hours after the goodwill has faded.
Unhappy customers clear those four steps easily, because annoyance is a stronger motivator than satisfaction. That asymmetry is why a business can be genuinely good and still carry a rating that does not show it.
Ask where they already are
The fix is timing and proximity, not persuasion. Ask while the person is on your site, just after the thing that pleased them — an order confirmed, a booking made, a question answered — and ask in a place where answering costs one click rather than four.
A Write a Review button in the widget opens a short form: stars, a few words, a name. The review lands in your widget straight away and you moderate afterwards. Nobody leaves the page, nobody signs into anything.
Three ways to take the review
You choose what the button does, and the right answer depends on what you need the reviews for.
| Setting | What happens | Use it when |
|---|---|---|
| Form in the widget | The review is written and published on your own site | You want testimonials on your pages and control over what shows |
| Review platforms only | The visitor is sent to Google or another connected platform | You need your Google rating and review count to grow |
| Both (recommended) | The visitor picks | Most cases — you get the testimonial either way |
Reviews left through the form appear immediately and are moderated after the fact; there is no hold-for-approval step. Worth knowing before you put the button somewhere high-traffic.
Where to put the ask
Order confirmation and thank-you pages are the obvious ones, and the Review Request layout exists for exactly that — a heading, your current rating, your reviewers’ photos and the button, in one block.
After that: a booking confirmation, a support conversation that ended well, a delivery-tracking page, the account area of anyone who has been a customer for a while. Anywhere the person has just had a good experience and has not yet closed the tab.
What each platform allows
Rules differ by platform and getting this wrong is how businesses lose the reviews they worked for.
| Platform | Asking for reviews | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Allowed | Google prefers you ask all customers rather than only the satisfied ones | |
| Yelp | Not allowed | Yelp asks businesses not to solicit reviews at all |
| Tripadvisor | Allowed | Review-collection tools and materials are supported |
| Amazon, app stores | Restricted | Each has its own policy on contacting buyers |
How to ask customers for reviews goes through the wording, the timing and what to avoid.
For the part that happens off your site
Some of the asking happens away from your website — on a receipt, on a counter, in an email after the job is done. Three free tools cover it, no signup: a Google review link generator, a QR code generator for printing, and review request templates for email and SMS.
Questions
Other things reviews solve
Turn visitors into buyers
Reviews next to the decision change completion rates. Here is where to put them and how to find out whether it worked.
Get star ratings in Google results
Star ratings in search results come from Product schema. What that means for an ecommerce store, and what it means for everyone else.
Every platform in one place
Reviews on four platforms and none of them on your site. One widget, up to 100 sources, one line of code.