What Are Review Site Aggregators?

When in business, you need to keep an eye on what your clients are saying about your company. Online reviews are responsible for a large portion of your brand’s perception. This means you need to manage them as closely as you can.

What Is a Review Aggregator?

This is a system that gets reviews of services and products in one place. Common examples include sites for car reviews or book reviews. Some of the most popular review aggregator websites include TripAdvisor and Yelp.

A review aggregator is where a site collects large amounts of reviews on a business, product, or service. It then creates an average or ‘aggregates’ them to get an average score. Clients use this score to decide whether they want to risk spending money on your products, businesses, or services. This can affect their purchasing, which is why you will find it important.

In this article, you will learn:

• What review aggregators are
• Why you need to care
• Important factors review aggregators focus on
• How to manage reviews and review aggregators

What Are Some Well-Known Review Aggregators?

There are many review aggregators out there for you to utilize. Some aren’t worthy of your time as a business, while others can help you avoid poor business interaction and ensure you attract customers. The most important ones are gathered here to give you an idea of which to consider. We’ll look at some of them in more detail than others.

Yelp Business Reviews

Yelp is a crowd-sourced social media and local business review site that allows a business to create their own listing. Then, customers leave reviews for that business. It can be an important resource for potential customers to get information about your business.

As a business, it is important to claim your business on this platform. You should also make sure to respond to any user reviews that are negative or need a response. This will help keep your business’s reputation well-managed.

Google Play Store

This Google platform is the app store for Android items. With this platform, Android users can shop for many different apps. The platform works as a review aggregator, hosting many reviews for the apps. Each app already has an aggregated score consumers use when deciding whether or not to purchase the app. In addition to the apps, there are TV series, books, films, and music available.

Mobile apps need to focus on their reviews. Respond to both criticism and good reviews so that your customers see you are engaged with them.

Other Common Examples

There are dozens more review aggregators available to help clients find stores they are comfortable with. While many are actual websites, there are several review aggregators that are software apps. The following are some of the others that you should keep in mind:

• Amazon for products sold on the website
• Angie’s List (Angi) for local contractors
• Apple App Store for iPhone apps
• Better Business Bureau for nearly all companies
• Capterra for B2B software
• Foursquare for restaurants, entertainment, stores, and more
• G2 for software
• Glassdoor for reviews of employers
• GoodFirms for B2B service providers and software
• Google My Business for companies’ overall reputations
• Google Play Store for apps
• iTunes for podcasts and music
• Mac App Store for applications on Macs
• Metacritic reviews video games
• Rotten Tomatoes for TV series/movies/films
• TripAdvisor for travel
• Trustpilot for nearly any business
• Yahoo! Local Listings for local businesses

Why Care About a Review Aggregator–Benefits of Showing Up on Review Aggregator Sites

A review aggregator can be important to your sales and, therefore, should be a tool in your arsenal. Consumers use these platforms when deciding who to do business with. They will compare the scores of different companies and decide what is the best option for them in the marketplace.

For instance, people may avoid seeing movies that score poorly on Rotten Tomatoes, causing them to lose money in the long run. Additionally, consumers may not purchase a video game if it doesn’t do well on Metacritic.

It is important when running a business to keep a close eye on the review aggregator platforms that your services or products may be highlighted on. These are great indicators of what you offer and where they stand with the competition. It can also help you ascertain where you need to improve.

Why Online Reviews Are Critical for Small Businesses

Online reviews are an important way for your business to stand out from the crowd and attract customers. Nearly every single person that considers your business will take the time to look at reviews. And how you perform on reviews will determine whether they choose you or a competitor.

The following figures give you an idea of just how important online reviews are for small businesses:

• 93% of people say that online reviews influence their buying decisions
• 87% of people read local business reviews
• Customers trust brands that have online reviews 63% more than those without

Those figures prove that reviews are critical for your business, but they don’t necessarily explain why. There are a few reasons that reviews are so important.

They Build Trust

Reviews are a simple yet effective way to build trust in your brand. Most people put as much faith in reviews as they do in personal recommendations. With that in mind, you can think of reviews as personal recommendations that scale up by being available to everyone.

The more positive reviews potential customers see, the more likely they are to trust that they can count on your brand to deliver good customer service along with high-quality products or services.

They Provide Social Proof

Reviews are also a great form of social proof. Social proof ties into trust, as it builds on the fact that people trust what the community has to say about your business more than what your business has to say about yourself. Think of social proof as a way for customers to show each other that they can trust your brand.

They Expand Your Reach

As mentioned, online reviews will reach a much wider audience than personal recommendations. As such, they dramatically expand your reach, helping you bring in new customers.

Other Ways Reviews Can Help

Online reviews can also:

• Confirm your authority and expertise
• Influence purchase decisions
• Boost your online visibility
• Expand conversations about you
• Give you feedback from customers
• Improve your SEO, especially locally

Manage All of Your Reviews in One Place with Podium

The best way to manage your reputation on review aggregators is to have a solid review strategy overall. Podium lets you easily manage all of your reviews in one place. By managing all review sites in one place, you don’t have to handle any review aggregator individually either.

Podium assists with all aspects of reputation management, with a focus on getting more reviews. For example, Podium can automate messages asking customers to write reviews. But Podium also lets you analyze reviews and easily respond to them to maintain your competitiveness among local businesses. Remember that you don’t just want a high rating; you also need to collect reviews to get the best results.