Facebook is the social media platform with the most structured business review feature. Here’s how it works, with tips on how you can use recommendations to boost your reputation and grow your business. 

Business and product reviews are some of the most popular content for internet shoppers. Product reviews on Amazon have a huge impact on sales; studies show a product with just one review is 65% more likely to be purchased than a product with no reviews.  

And on Facebook, the most influential content on a business page usually isn’t the latest post featuring an inspirational quote or cat meme. It’s customer reviews.   

If your business has a Facebook business page (and it should), it’s essential to activate the reviews feature and encourage customers to recommend you.  

Recommendations and reviews on Facebook are straightforward, making it easy for customers to leave them.  Here are some important considerations and tips. 

No-star ratings 

In 2018 Facebook modified the review platform by removing the 1-5 star rating.  They replaced it with just a yes/no recommendation:

The reason Facebook made this change reveals an important consideration with reviews.

In short, Facebook concluded that a 5-star, 1-star or any star in-between review with (at best) a vague text comment wasn’t creating the most authentic or useful content.

With the yes/no recommendation, they felt people would include more content to justify their opinion, including a detailed text review or images.

They also added tags so you can easily comment on certain aspects of the service:

They still do give businesses an overall rating (out of 5), which also takes into account older star reviews:

With the recommendations feature, it’s likely Facebook will phase out or replace this, although they’ll probably have some type of score that gives people a quick snapshot of the business’s reputation without having to sift through all the reviews.

Facebook is also seeking to get review content to show in newsfeeds so if people are asking for recommendations review content will appear:

As with all reviews, the best way to get positive reviews on Facebook is to earn them. The quality of your service is the overriding factor.

If you are having a problem with the authenticity of your reviews, you can send a report via the app.

Keep an eye on your reviews and respond to ones that are really good or that require your intervention. Use the report feature if you get unfair or inappropriate reviews.

Originally published on 5/28/19