Every Tuesday at 1PM Central Time, Portage Cartage moderates a Twitter-based "movechat" for movers and consumers looking for information on moving. For today's chat, the topic was customer reviews & how to generate positive buzz about your company online. Below is the abridged transcript of the questions and the responses.
Q1 - How web-savvy is your customer base? Do they mention you online?
GoodStuffMoving Q1 - Our FB gets more notice than our Twitter account, but in general...clients don't appear to be. Or care at least...
ezmovers we have to get the customers while they are hot! send them emails right away, after closing the job!
RELORoundtable I suspect that depends on the type of customer you're talking about.
PortageCartage @movinggal No worries, we'll give you a mention when the transcript is up. RELORoundtable Most individuals initially can't remember the name of the company that handled their move the last time they relocated.
PortageCartage @RELORoundtable For the purpose of this chat, we'll keep it focused on typical residential moves.
HolmanMoving Our customers are not really on our social networks yet, but they are definitely using the search engines to find us.
GoodStuffMoving @RELORoundtable yeah we've noticed that as well...it's like "use service, move on, forget"...
PortageCartage @RELORoundtable We find a lot of times that they remember the name of the van line, but not necessarily the booking agent.
RELORoundtable Account customers trade names inside internal professional communities like Linkedin or trade association intranets but not online
PortageCartage In our experience, most people who hire pro movers are boomers, and there's not a lot of SM power users in that demographic.
HolmanMoving @PortageCartage Agreed. It seems the main reason to have soc med outposts up and running are for search engines (at the moment).
seamlessmoves @GoodStuffMoving @PortageCartage Respectfully disagree. Most of our clients are boomers and they use computers/social media A LOT.
GoodStuffMoving @seamlessmoves - Wouldn't say they don't use computers and some SM, but not for finding or networking businesses like us.
PortageCartage @seamlessmoves Do you think the high-tech industry in your region has anything to do with that?
seamlessmoves @PortageCartage @seamlessmoves Yes, I think Puget Sound area has more computer-SM-savvy clients.
xpressmovers @PortageCartage @seamlessmoves Hi-tech region helps a lot. I can say that 100% for Boston.
ezmovers social platforms are great tool unfortunately many customers are not really into connecting w/ their moving company!
RELORoundtable The expanded use of url shorteners in SM makes it difficult to cull stats on brand name usage
Q2 - Do you get many reviews on 3rd party sites like @Yelp or @GooglePlaces?
HolmanMoving No. We haven't gotten many at all. RT @PortageCartage: Do you get many reviews on 3rd party sites like @Yelp or @GooglePlaces?
GoodStuffMoving Q2 - Not a whole lot, no...but we're discovering ways of ramping this up, it's just slow going...
PortageCartage I wonder if @FlatRate_Moving can speak to Q2... you out there Itamar?
FlatRate_Moving @PortageCartage I am here right now - what's the topic, or Q?
PortageCartage @FlatRate_Moving Topic is online reviews, generating positive buzz from happy customers, etc. Do you get 3rd party reviews?
FlatRate_Moving Our survey is detailed but not overwhelming - we let people write what they would normally write on a site like Yelp.
HolmanMoving We have gotten reviews on Movingscam.com. And one on another site. Some days I think it's a good thing, others not so much. :-)
xpressmovers Q2: Sometimes we do get reviews here and there. Most of our customers find us online, but rarely to leave a review on a site.
Q3 - So who has the magic answer? What can a company do to encourage positive online reviews?
RELORoundtable Companies who've incorporated R&R metrics inside their CRM, sales and operational processes do better w/ user generated feedback
PortageCartage @Yelp has blogged about this - http://bit.ly/j8K7H2 - they don't recommend asking for reviews.
HolmanMoving @PortageCartage Not sure there is an easy answer. We flat out ask for them, for good or for bad.
RELORoundtable @PortageCartage @HolmanMoving That's part of the problem. Companies ONLY want to see positive reviews online.
PortageCartage @Yelp also had an interesting blog post - only 1% of their visitors are there to leave a review. http://bit.ly/jmRokX
PortageCartage And customers want 2 C all. RT @RELORoundtable: Thats part of the problem. Companies ONLY want to see positive reviews online.
HolmanMoving @RELORoundtable @PortageCartage @HolmanMoving Sometimes bad reviews lend a platform for self-promotion! Lemonade outta lemons!
HolmanMoving @PortageCartage @Yelp Wow, that's interesting!
PortageCartage A follow-up question then: do the online reviews you've received match up with your internal quality survey metrics?
HolmanMoving @PortageCartage We have so few online reviews. I'd say overall our internal quality scores are WAY higher than online consensus.
HolmanMoving On the flip side, there are mediocre movers out there with great online reviews. Of course, only those in industry know better.
RELORoundtable Do you think SE's would use internal company performance metrics in their page rank algorithms if they were open to the public.
HolmanMoving @RELORoundtable That's a good question!
PortageCartage @RELORoundtable Yes, but only if the questions were developed with SEO in mind.
seamlessmoves Our internal survey results match the online reviews.
HolmanMoving I think it's a very interesting concept for SE's to use industry standard scores. Perhaps they would, if there were a standard!
RELORoundtable I will gladly post the internal quality performance scores on any company whose brave enough share their info w the general public
HolmanMoving @RELORoundtable You know our scores and you know we would be happy to! Can't though. Hands are tied.
RELORoundtable Most movers know how measure internal industry quality; most shippers DON'T. As an industry, we're failed to educate them. :(
Q4 - What are the pros & cons for having reviews of your business online?
RELORoundtable Pro: 85% of consumers start their relocation shopping on the web Con: Everyone is searches for 5 stars. 3 is what they find.
GoodStuffMoving Q4 - Reviews due matter to certain segments of our clients. Helps to have a variety of opinions, good and bad.
GoodStuffMoving Is there such a thing as a 5 star anything on the Internet when peer reviewed?
seamlessmoves Q4 - Some co's think that only dissatisfied customers are motivated to leave reviews online. (I've personally done both.)
HolmanMoving @seamlessmoves It's definitely not 50/50 though. More people use review systems to vent than to praise.
PortageCartage @seamlessmoves Does your company do anything to encourage customers to do Yelp reviews? I see you've got 98, + 4.5 stars.
PortageCartage @seamlessmoves Whoa... I stand corrected. That was a Yelp ad for a different co with 98 reviews, visible on your Yelp profile.
PortageCartage @seamlessmoves I think I just found a con. :)
seamlessmoves @PortageCartage Yup, definitely a con of not being a paid @Yelp advertiser is having other companies featured on our page. :(
Q5 - If you post customer testimonials, do you ever quote from negative ones?
seamlessmoves Q5 - We have "testimonials" on our website from folks who did not hire us saying they wished they had.
RELORoundtable Powerful tool to quote a neg review. Explain how you resolved it with the shipper; then fixed the problem for future shippers.
PortageCartage We frequently post photos or screengrabs of customer comments, and do include less-than-perfect ones. http://on.fb.me/lGtEhx
seamlessmoves Yes! RT @RELORoundtable: Powerful tool to quote a neg review. Explain how you resolved it and fixed the problem for future.
PortageCartage There's something exhilarating about opening up reviews to the public. Risky, but potentially very rewarding.
PortageCartage Consumers are demanding transparency, and are finding it online despite some companies' best efforts to hide.
RELORoundtable The public has more confidence in R&Rs from "people like me" a whole lot more than they trust traditional advertising.
PortageCartage @RELORoundtable Exactly! It's about trust, more than ever. People can't be fooled as easily today (that's a good thing).
HolmanMoving @RELORoundtable So very true! And I think it's a good thing. I don't trust much advertising myself.
RELORoundtable @Portage Cartage @HolmanMoving Too bad the folks in the front office don't recognize it! They like hiding behind their facade.
MovePoint RT @RELORoundtable: The public has more confidence in R&Rs from "people like me" a whole lot more than traditional advertising.
Next week's topic will be "Turning Customers Away" (idea courtesy of @ReloRoundtable)
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