A major update to Google reviews now prompts customers to select which positive or negative attributes apply to your towing company. The way these attributes show up, they can impact towing leads.
While selecting attributes is not mandatory, it provides an easy way for customers to leave feedback other than strictly a star rating—giving towing leads more context and content from which to select a towing service. Was your company professional? Was your driver on time? Without typing, customers can quickly indicate these qualities with the touch of a thumb or click of a mouse.
Below is a quick overview of how it works as well as pointers on how to take advantage of this new review format to convert more towing leads.
Overview of Google Review Attributes
When a customer leaves you a review, they are offered different attributes depending on if they had a positive or negative experience. If they choose 4 or 5 stars, they are presented with: “What do you like about this business?” They can then choose from: Good quality, Good value, Professional, On time.
If they select 1 or 2 stars, they are prompted with: “What do you not like about this business?” They can then choose from: Poor quality, Poor value, Not professional, Not on time.
Once the review is submitted, these attributes are displayed at the top of that review as either Positive or Critical for towing leads to consider.
Classic & Professional Clients
For Lift Marketing Group Classic & Professional clients, these Positive or Critical Attributes are also displayed within the Customer Activity portion of the Reputable Reviews Dashboard.
You can also filter all reviews by either Positive or Critical Attributes. To do so, from the Customer Activity page:
- Select “Filter”
- Under “Rating Type,” scroll down to find “Google Attributes: Positive” and “Google Attributes: Critical”
- Choose your preferred filter and select “Apply”
Taking Advantage of Review Attributes to Attract More Towing Leads – Listen, Learn & Respond
Towing advertising calls for strong review signals such as quantity, velocity, ratings, responses, and now attributes. It is important to use review attributes to your advantage as you continue to grow and improve your towing company.
Towing business owners know a one-star rating is bad, yet stranded motorists have typically tolerated a few of these. Now a one-star rating plus the Critical Attributes tags of “Not professional” and “Not on time” gives towing leads insight into the reason for the low-star rating and could seriously impact your towing lead’s decision as to whether or not to call on your tow trucks to solve their problem.
On the plus side, high-star ratings and reviews plus Positive Attributes encourages towing leads to pick your company for their roadside rescue.
Be sure to monitor new reviews and take note of which attributes, whether positive or critical, show up frequently. Then, respond to your team accordingly.
Are you consistently labeled as “Professional?” Congratulate your team at the next meeting and encourage them to keep up the great work. Are you seeing too many “Not on time” attributes? Remind your team how important timeliness is to customers. It can also be worth seeing which drivers are consistently getting the critical or positive remarks. If there’s a trend, it might be time for a one-on-one conversation to call out and correct or celebrate a specific behavior.
Words Are Still Important
While it’s nice your customer thought your tow company was professional or provided good quality, it’s also helpful for towing leads to know why. What is it that led them to choose those specific attributes?
Continue having drivers ask for reviews that contain a sentence or two. This will give you more insight into that specific job, allowing you to congratulate or correct your team with more knowledge of the situation and allowing towing leads to confidently choose you.
Also important, the default display of your Google reviews is by “most relevant,” which displays those reviews with words included first. So, one five-star review that contains a sentence or two is more valuable than 10 five-star reviews without any content.
More Reviews Resources
Collecting positive reviews is becoming more and more essential in the battle to drive online cash call towing leads. If you’re towing company is just getting started in the pursuit of 5-star reviews, or if you’d like more helpful resources regarding reviews, request our free online analysis or check out a few of our other reviews-related blog posts:
Increasing Online Towing Reviews
Responding To Negative Towing Company Reviews
Highlight Your 5-Star Reviews Using Video
August 14 Update
We’ve seen new Google review features for towing companies (& other service area businesses). When a user clicks “Write a Review,” Google presents an options to answer “Did you use this business?” If you select “Yes,” you are presented with “What services did they perform?” Once a star-rating is selected, the review attributed drop in as well. It’s unclear if the feature will persist. We suspect Google is measuring to see if the additional interactivity results in more or fewer review words.
August 24 Update
We’ve seen Google incorporate services in the results for towing companies (& other service area businesses). After the star rating and the review itself is viewable, “Service:” is present when the reviewer selected a service as part of their review submission.
September 13 Update
The attribute concept is spreading, as we’ve noticed Yelp has incorporated similar questions into their review template. This data collection trend could result in search results like “250 people said this towing company responds quickly.”
