Do you have a 5 Star Rating?

The most important review site on the web? The one that the last Bad review was left on! That statement puts value in EVERY review site on the web. The most powerful review sites would be the ones served on Google’s Maps Page for you business.

With Google rolling out new algorithms for serving up business review sites, I looked at about 50 dealers Google Maps Pages across the US to see who they were serving up. This was not scientific, I did not keep count. BUT these review sites seem to appear on Googles Business Maps Pages in this order of frequency:

Google Local Business Listings

DealerRater

Insider Pages

Citysearch

Edmunds

Yelp!

Yahoo! Local Listings

Judys Book

yellowbot.com

dexknows.com

cardealercheck.com

Other reviews sites I am aware of that show up in search on dealers name are:

PrestoReviews

MerchantCircle

MyDalerreport.com

Autotropolis

BBB.Org

YellowPages

It appears in Canada they are NOT serving reviews yet.

So my questions are;

1. Are there any other big players out there?

2. Anyone know the terms of agreement of these sites?

3. Which sites ALLOW multiple reviews from an IP Address? So We CAN walk the customer to a dealership computer to leave a review for the business?

4. Anybody out there have customers leave a reviews from the showroom? If so what sites do yopu use?

I am in no way looking to work around the terms of agreements of any review site. If they allow you to do in-house reviews, EVERY store should have 20 positives reviews on that site in 1 week easy/peasy.

What are your thoughts? Best practices?

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Comment by Ralph Paglia on December 20, 2010 at 1:48pm: I explore this topic a lot further in regards to which sites work the best for dealers, and inserted a clip from Checkered Flag Automotive at http://www.automotivedigitalmarketing.com/profiles/blogs/dealership... . I also want to say that I like Merchant Circle and Insider Pages as well, but from what I have seen, neither has had the impact, nor provided dealers with the tools, credibility and SEO benefits that the ten I listed seem to have.

Comment by Lindsay Lavery on December 20, 2010 at 1:39pm: Thanks Ralph for the info! Good to know about Yelp. I knew of Presto Reviews but wasn't sure who/if anyone else in the dealership.

Comment by Ralph Paglia on December 20, 2010 at 11:41am: Lindsay - The only provider that allows dealership reviews to be executed by consumers while they are at the dealership (that I know of) is Presto Reviews. They have built their entire model around dealers encouraging customers to post reviews while at the dealership and providing them with work stations to do so... The other nine sites that i listed each forbid reviews from being posted at the place of business. Yelp goes so far as to recommend that dealers DO NOT ask customers to post reviews and even when a customer posts the review on a mobile device, will not let that review go live until the customer has resubmitted their review from a PC located at work or home...

Comment by Lindsay Lavery on December 20, 2010 at 11:26am: Very interesting post. Started researching myself about the agreements of the site. I think it would be beneficial for us to find out which allow for in-house reviews and which will quickly flag and encourage from different IP addresses. Let me know ASAP!!

Right now in our market as a midwest dealer 1) DealerRater is coming up strong and then it is a toss up between serving up reviews of Google, InsiderPages, Judy'sbook and Edmunds.

With the integration of hotpot I think reviews are going to be even more popular in early 2011 as the whole ecommerce is changing.

Comment by Ralph Paglia on December 20, 2010 at 10:55am: Tim, here are my Top Ten favorite dealership review and rating sites listed in order of what I personally consider to be their desirability to have positive dealer reviews on them:

1. Google Places

2. Yelp

3. DealerRater

4. Edmunds

5. Presto Reviews

6. CarDealerCheck.com

7. MyDealerReport.com

8. CarDealerReviews.org

9. Yahoo! Local Business

10. Dealership Ratings

Comment by Tim Jennings on December 20, 2010 at 10:40am: Just found another review site being served up by Google on dealer Maps pages:

ViewPoints.com

Comment by Tim Jennings on December 20, 2010 at 9:43am: Are there any other reviews sites out there worth mentioning? If so why?

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