I just spent some quality Halloween time with my family. We visited friends for dinner and then commenced the usual door knocking in search of a sugar rush.  Halloween is an unusual holiday, isn’t it?  Kids are allowed to beg for candy from complete strangers, with the threat of repercussions if the request is refused. Trick or treat?  Can you imagine the response you would get if you went trick-or-treating two weeks after Halloween day?  You would be laughed at, have a door slammed in your face, or worse.  Halloween is definitely a limited time offer!

Candy is Dandy

Many business owners second guess registering their businesses with customer feedback websites like Yelp because they see them as trick-or-treat type offers.  Sure, you may get some candy in the form of five-star Colorado Springs reviews.  But the threat of receiving that insidious “trick” of a one-star review from an unsatisfied customer is enough to scare many business owners.

A common misconception is that customers are more inclined to give you a bad review rather than a good one.  This is not true.  Although some vindictive types in the world will complain about everything and may write negative reviews, most customers choose to write positive Colorado Springs reviews. They choose to thank business owners who have treated them well, and they find value in recommending businesses that they like to the community.  Just as most folks are happy to give candy to kids on Halloween, most customers prefer the treat to the trick.

This is a Limited Time Offer!

Trick-or-treating is best done on Halloween night from the late afternoon to mid-evening.  Knock on a door too early, and they might not have candy ready for you.  Knock on a door too late, and you might hear some screaming and ghoulishness that you did not expect.  Knock on the door three weeks later, and you might be invited inside for turkey dinner. You need to strike while the iron is hot.

In the same way, now is the right time to register your business with online reputation websites. When we began working with customer feedback a couple of years ago, it was much easier to add your business to these websites than it is now.  Almost all of them were free, and few strings were attached.

Now, you are almost guaranteed to get a sales call or some other marketing materials if you sign up with one of these websites. Some of them make it very difficult to sign up: hiding sign-up links in hard-to-find locations, forcing you to go through multiple hoops and verifications, or allowing only a basic listing unless you sign up with them for a premium service. Some websites previously allowed manual business submissions, but now they won’t give you a listing at all unless you pay them.

You can expect customer feedback websites to become more restrictive and more commercialized as time goes on and as they become more popular.  Now is the time to sign up for these websites while they are still free. Just like Halloween, this is a limited time offer. Do not delay!

What Can Kropmark Design Do For Me?

If you are a do-it-yourself business owner and would like to sign up for free profiles on the major customer feedback websites, we recommend that you download our free step-by-step guide to customer-feedback websites. Our guide has links to most of the major customer feedback websites like Google, Colorado Springs Yelp, Yahoo Local, Superpages and many more.  This is a great option for technically savvy business owners who are able to invest some time into the process.

For those who don’t have the time or the technical know-how, let Kropmark Design help you with this process.  We would be happy to register you with the most important websites for a small monthly fee.  Your listings would include photos, vital business information and even online coupons in some cases.  This service will also include reputation monitoring for your business, to make sure you know about any positive or negative Colorado Springs reviews it receives.  We will advise you in best practices for addressing negative reviews and, if desired, we can send emails to unhappy customers on your behalf.

If you want to get started on the road to a healthy online presence and a top-notch business reputation, give Kropmark Design a call at (719) 465-4599.  Let us “treat” you to a great experience without any “tricks.”

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles / FreeDigitalPhotos.net