Matt Paulson breaks down where to focus your review efforts: Google, Facebook, Yelp, or the BBB. Older customers trust the BBB more, younger ones check Google and Yelp. BBB costs $500+ yearly but gives you a trust seal for your site.
Hey guys, Matt Paulson here. I wanted to record a quick video about the Better Business Bureau and different kind of review places where customers can leave feedback, reviews, whatever about your business. So obviously there's Google reviews, there's Facebook reviews, there's Yelp reviews, and then there's the Better Business Bureau as well. And apparently the Better Business Bureau has been doing some kind of big campaign because several people have posted on the entrepreneurs of Sioux Falls Facebook group saying, hey, I got this phone call from the bbb. Is it worth it for my business? Should I make this investment? That's a great question. And honestly, it's not an easy yes or an easy no. Just so you guys are aware, what the Better Business Bureau does is that they are a review and accreditation service for businesses. And kind of before the Internet was a thing, the Better Business Bureau is really the only place to kind of get third party reviews and information about a business. But now, of course, we can get reviews of a business pretty much anywhere. Facebook, Google, Instagram, maybe not that so much, but Yelp as well. So really the types of businesses that benefit from Better Business Bureau reviews are those that have maybe an older audience, that have familiarity with the Better Business Bureau name and kind of reputation, or they've used that service before the Internet was a thing. So at MarketBeat, our business, our age range is kind of 45 to 85. You know, it's an older audience and that group of people definitely has more familiarity with the Better Business Bureau. So we pay the fee. I think their lowest package is maybe $500 a year. We pay a little bit more than that because we're a bigger company and we're okay with that. But it really does a couple of things for us as a business. First, we can use their banner on our website. I'm a big fan of social proof. One of the things way to do that is called a trust seal. So that's a banner that you can put from the accreditor. In this case it's the Better Business Bureau on your website saying that yes, we are BBB accredited. And then that will give some kind of third party validation or trust on our business because we've been endorsed by this third party. Because whenever you say nice stuff about yourself, it doesn't really mean anything. But if you can get other people to say nice stuff about you, that's helpful. And the BBB CEO on your website is one way to do this. Of course there's different cos that you can put on your website. You can do safe site Certified. That's my friends Chuck business. My friends Chuck's business that he runs that has trust SEOs. So if you go to MarketBeat and you go to the payment page, you'll see all kinds of icons on the bottom that kind of add some trust or weight to our business. And the BBB is one of them. So, you know, in the case that your audience is a little bit older, they have some familiarity with the bbb, they're in the habit of checking the bbb. Probably a good thing to do. If your audience is younger, under 40, I would have a hard time saying that's a great idea to be BBB accredited because people that have kind of grown up since the dawn of the Internet or started buying products and services certainly in the last 20 years, their first place to check reviews is not going to be the bbb. It's going to be Facebook reviews, it's going to be Yelp reviews, and it's going to be Google reviews. So my friend Alyssa asked this question. She's a photographer. And she said, hey, I got this call too. And I said no. And I said, you know, you're probably right to do that because if people are going to look for a photographer, you know, they're going to ask their friends and they're going to look on Facebook and maybe they'll look on Google. They're probably not going to go to the bbb. Really, if you have that younger audience, you know, maybe just kind of pass on it for now. But if you have an older audience, the BBB is definitely worth it. My friend Karine also had some great comments on her Facebook group. She had, you know, they got BBB accredited and you know, they said they don't get a lot of leads from it, but you know, they don't really care because it is, you know, they get that trust seal and then they can put that on their website in their proposals and kind of use it as a business development tool as that kind of third party social proof. So for them, you know, it's not a lead source. Like people aren't ever going to come to your website through the bbb. But when people are kind of checking you out, seeing what kind of work you do, some projects you've worked on, if they see that BBBB logo there for Karina's business, that is helpful to them. So it's not really clear. There's no hard yes or no answer whether or not it's kind of worth it. 500 bucks a year is for some people, not a lot of money for other people. It's a big investment. And really, maybe just talk to your customers and say, hey, do you ever check the BBB for ratings about businesses? Or how do you find reviews about businesses? And if they say Facebook and if they say Google, great. That's where, you know, that's where your focus should be. You should be focused on collecting reviews on those places. But if your audience says, you know, I'd like to check out companies on the BBB's website, you know, that could tell you, maybe you should try to get some of your customers to put reviews on the BBB website. So hopefully this is kind of helpful to you guys to think about this and help you kind of work through whether or not this is right for your business or not. I'll see you guys in the next video. If you like these, they're on YouTube. Just look for Matthew Paulsen, my name. Feel free to like this video, subscribe, tell your friends, do whatever. I'd love to build an audience for these videos. So if you like it, tell somebody about it, subscribe to it. I'll see you guys later.
