Google reviews are a way for potential customers to learn about a company through the eyes of their peers. When you read Google reviews you get to learn what it is like to work with a company before you hire them. It is a way to vet a company, and do your due diligence as a consumer.
When you have a contractor coming to your home to do a project you are putting your complete trust in them.
This company will be coming in and out of your property for days or weeks at a time, and will be around your pets, children and personal property.
When you hire a company to complete a job at your home you are spending your hard-earned money and relying on that company to not only get the job done, but to do so within budget, be able to handle any problems that arise, and have the scope of work turn out how you envisioned it.
Who you hire is going to determine how those problems get dealt with and how smooth your project goes. If your contractor is knowledgeable and able to problem solve the issue due to their experience and expertise, you are going to have a lot less headaches throughout the build.
As well, one thing we hear time and time again is customers thinking their bill is going to be one amount and then having to pay more at the end of the project.
While things can arise with any project that may change the price of a job, a reliable trustworthy company is going to be upfront about it, and give you the option to continue with the build or not.
All of these things can be avoided if you truly know who you are hiring to do your project.
Google reviews can allow you to get an inside glimpse on if that company is respectful of their customers property, or if they continuously price their jobs too low and charge more money at the end of their projects.
While we think more about being compatible when it comes to dating, at a certain point a customer needs to be compatible with the person who is doing their project.
If it is important as a homeowner that your driveway stays clean during a project and you hire someone who leaves your site messy each day, you will be frustrated every single day, regardless if the project turns out great. Or maybe you are expecting the contractor to work eight-hour days but they do not have a set schedule. Each time they show up “late” you are thinking to yourself, “Why did I hire this person?”
Things like these can make the homeowner resent the contractor, and leave a bad taste in their mouth.
Google reviews may be able to tell you what hours the contractors truly work, if they keep the sight clean, and if the things that are important to you are important to that company as well.
The most important part of a build is the outcome, or finished product of the build. Was the customer happy with the end result of the build? Are their things that they wish the contractor would have done differently? Most importantly, would they hire the contractor again to do this job?
If a company has consistent 5-star reviews, showing that their customers have taken the time to leave a review, then it is probably safe to say that the companies finished projects are up to par.
If a Google review shows that the customers would hire the company again you can feel good about hiring that company due to other people recommendations.
Surprisingly, when looking at companies google reviews, you may not always be seeing true reviews from “real” customers. While Google does a really good job of preventing false reviews, we have seen a company that had over 100 reviews on their business page, and each review was written the exact same way. No one writes the same way when leaving a review, so that was the first red flag that these reviews were fake.
Secondly, the reviewer’s pictures were always a stock photo. Most customers have photos of themselves in their profile that are taken from a random picture, not a professional head shot.
If it seems like a company that you are looking to hire has a massive number of Google reviews that all have the same look and feel to them, then they are most likely fake.
Nowadays companies are aware that consumers are looking more and more at websites, company’s social media platforms and Google reviews to see what it is like to work with them.
If a company is unable to find customers that are willing to give reviews, or if the reviews are 1 star and the customer has negative things to say about the company, they will remove those negative reviews and replace them with “positive” false reviews.
It is important to us that our potential customers know who we are, what it’s like to work with us, and how we can provide a great service for them, just like the customers they are reading about.
Each google review speaks about something different that our customers liked about their time working with us, and gives us a perspective into what our customers like about us. This helps us grow as a business.
Some landscaping and construction projects can be gruelling depending on how hard the site is to work on or how the weather is. When we read how happy our customers are with our work it makes those hard-working days’ worth it!
Google reviews are a great way to social proof a company and see if you want to work with them in the future. Always, always read a company’s Google reviews before hiring them, you will be glad you did!