How to ask customers for reviews the right way

If you do good work, your happy customers are your best advertising. The trouble is that happy people rarely think to write a review, and unhappy people often do. So asking makes sense. It's how you get a fair picture out there.

How you ask matters, though, and the rules got sharper recently. In August 2024 the Federal Trade Commission finalized a rule on consumer reviews and testimonials. It took effect October 21, 2024, and it lets the FTC seek civil penalties against businesses that knowingly break it. Here's what that means for a small local business, in plain terms.

Start with the platform's rules

The FTC's guide for businesses makes a point people skip: before you ask anyone for a review, know the rules of the site where the review will appear.

• Some platforms ban reviews from people with a personal or financial connection to you, or from anyone who got an incentive, even if the reviewer discloses it.
• Others allow incentivized reviews as long as they're properly disclosed.

Breaking a platform's rules can get reviews removed or your listing penalized, separate from anything the FTC does.

The FTC's rules of thumb for asking

Even where a platform has no special rules, the FTC suggests:

• Only ask people who actually used your service. No reviews from people who never hired you.
• Don't ask staff to review you unless they disclose that you employ them and asked them to write it.
• Don't cherry-pick. Don't ask only the customers you think will be positive.
• Don't ask friends and family unless they disclose the personal connection in the review.
• Never tie an incentive to a positive review. If you offer anything for a review, it can't be conditioned, openly or by implication, on the review being good. And the review should still disclose the incentive.

The simplest approach is also the safest: ask every customer the same way, after every job, with no strings attached.

What the 2024 rule prohibits

The FTC's rule spells out several practices that are now clearly off-limits:

• Fake or false reviews and testimonials, including ones from people who don't exist (the FTC specifically mentions AI-generated reviews), people who never used your business, or ones that misrepresent someone's experience. That covers writing them, buying them, and in many cases sharing testimonials you knew or should have known were fake.
• Paying for reviews with a particular sentiment, positive about you or negative about a competitor.
• Undisclosed insider reviews by owners, officers or managers, and certain reviews from employees or their immediate relatives without clear disclosure.
• Company-controlled "independent" review sites that pretend to be neutral while promoting your own services.
• Review suppression, meaning groundless legal threats, physical threats or intimidation used to remove a negative review, or showing only good reviews while implying they're all you got.
• Buying fake followers or views to look more influential for business purposes.

The FTC's material also warns about hired help. Some SEO and reputation companies promise better ratings without saying how. If they're writing fake reviews for you, or fake negative ones about competitors, you can be held responsible for what they do on your behalf, and platforms can suspend your listings.

Don't try to contract your way out of bad reviews

The Consumer Review Fairness Act makes it illegal to use standard contract terms, including online terms and conditions, that:

1. restrict a customer's ability to review your business,
2. charge a penalty or fee for posting a review, or
3. claim the rights to what the customer wrote.

The FTC recommends reviewing your form contracts and removing any clause like that, even if you never planned to enforce it.

The law does let you prohibit or remove reviews that contain confidential or private information, that are abusive, harassing or obscene, that have nothing to do with your business, or that are clearly false or misleading. The FTC adds a caution: a review you simply disagree with is unlikely to meet the "clearly false or misleading" standard.

A simple, compliant way to ask

1. Finish the job well. Reviews follow good work, not clever requests.
2. Ask everyone. A short text or email after every completed job, the same message for every customer.
3. Make it easy. Include a direct link to your Google Business Profile or wherever you collect reviews.
4. Keep it neutral. "Would you share how it went?" rather than "Please leave us five stars."
5. No conditional perks. If you offer anything at all, check the platform's rules first, make it available regardless of what the customer writes, and make sure the incentive is disclosed.
6. Reply to reviews. Thank people, and answer complaints calmly with an offer to make it right.

Handling a bad review

It stings. Take a day before you respond. Then:

• Reply publicly, briefly and politely. Acknowledge the problem and invite the customer to contact you directly.
• Fix what you can. A resolved complaint often reads better to future customers than a perfect score.
• If a review is truly fake, abusive or about a different business, use the platform's reporting tool. The FTC cautions against misusing those tools to get rid of honest negative reviews.
• Don't threaten legal action over an honest opinion. Under the 2024 rule, groundless legal threats to suppress reviews are prohibited.

Frequently asked questions

Can I give customers a small discount for leaving a review?

It depends on the platform's rules, and some ban it outright. If allowed, the discount can't depend on the review being positive, and the review should disclose it.

Can my spouse or employees review my business?

Not without clearly disclosing the relationship, and some platforms forbid it entirely. The FTC's rule specifically addresses insider reviews and reviews solicited from immediate relatives.

Can I show only my best reviews on my own website?

You can feature testimonials, but you can't misrepresent that the reviews you display are all or most of what you received when you've filtered out negative ones based on their rating.

What are the penalties?

The rule allows the FTC to seek civil penalties against knowing violators. The FTC noted in the rule's preamble that the maximum civil penalty at the time was more than $50,000 per violation, adjusted for inflation, though courts weigh several factors in setting amounts.

This guide is general information, not legal advice. For specific questions, talk with a lawyer or read the FTC's guidance at ftc.gov.