Tag Archives: google reviews

Google recently made changes to its review interface to put less of a focus on the Zagat review system. The new interface allows review authors to choose words or phrases like “Excellent,” “Very Good,” “Good,” and “Poor-Fair” rather than Zagat’s 0-3 number system.

Zagat’s 0-3 numbering system may have been too confusing to users because it is a unique, unusual system compared to what many people are used to. Many ratings are based on a 1-5 scale, with 3 being the rating for an “okay” or “so-so” experience. However, on Zagat’s rating scale, 3 is the highest score you can give. Google has done away with this Zagat scale. The reviews interface now looks like this:

googlesreviewinterface

Google is still displaying the overall Zagat score on each business’s Google+ Local page. This score is a number between 0-30. However, the fact that Google has done away with the initial 0-3 Zagat scoring scale may show that it’s taking steps towards completely eliminating the Zagat scoring system. What do you think? Do you like Google’s Zagat scoring system or should Google do away with it?

newreviewinterface

5reviews1According to a recent study about local ranking factors by Bizible.com, having five or more Google reviews was associated with a 1.85 improvement in rank in pure local results. Bizible also discovered that not having any Google reviews on your Places page or having an average review score of one hurt rankings.

The fifth Google review helped rankings significantly, however incremental reviews between one and four and above five had very little effect on rankings. After the fifth review, it is likely that you would have to get 100+ reviews to make another significant impact on your ranking. However, this study goes to show how important it is to encourage your customers to leave positive reviews on your Google Places page.

Need help getting customers to review your business?  Check out Get Business Reviews, a section of our Local Splash website dedicated to educating business owners about the importance of business reviews, how to get reviews and how to deal with negative reviews.