How to build brand trust using customer reviews

Reviews can benefit or damage your business’s reputation. From spreading the word to social proof, here is why reviews matter and what you can do to manage your customer reviews to improve your brand’s reputation.

In business, standing out isn’t just about offering great products, something original or a great price point – it’s also about earning the trust of your customers. This is applicable to all industries including the print sector: customers want reassurance before choosing a supplier, and they often rely on online reviews. 

Surveys demonstrate how important this can be. Research by PwC found that customer experience is a crucial purchasing factor for 73% of consumers, while brightlocal found that the majority (40%) of customers check at least two review sites before making purchasing decisions. The experience customers have is therefore not just determined by what you deliver, but also by what others say about your business. Customer reviews can significantly enhance your credibility and visibility – but they can also damage them. How can you use them to build trust, build your reputation and build your business?

The main review sites customers use

Whether you’re a local print shop or a growing online web-to-print service, the three main platforms where your customers are likely to leave reviews are:

• Google Customer Reviews – Highly visible in search results and maps, these reviews can directly influence footfall and online traffic.

• Trustpilot – Widely used across the UK and often associated with e-commerce businesses, including online print shops.

• Facebook – Particularly useful for community-driven businesses and those with an active social media presence.

Each platform has its own value and, ideally, you should be collecting reviews across all three. This helps broaden your reach and ensure you’re covered wherever a potential customer might be searching. However, it’s also important to be aware of fluctuations in issues like trust. Google reviews are widely trusted, while Facebook reviews are seen as less reliable. That trust can erode when there are high-profile stories about fact-checking or the proliferation of fake reviews.

That’s one of the reasons people are also looking to find reviews from other sources too, whether that’s from bloggers, YouTube, Glassdoor, TikTok or Instagram. It’s worth monitoring your reputation across everything, while focusing your time on the core review sites.

Why reviews matter for printers 

Unlike big retail brands, SME print businesses do not often benefit from widespread brand recognition. This means first impressions are crucial. A review can provide social proof, where seeing others vouch for your services reassures potential clients. It also demonstrates your authenticity, showing your business as legitimate and operational. When your last review is a few years old, potential customers might wonder if you’re still a going concern. Equally, your very presence on third-party review platforms boosts your trust, as they’re largely seen as trustworthy sources. 

There are also practical marketing reasons for reviews. Google reviews in particular help with your search visibility, improving local SEO and your chances of appearing in relevant searches. You can also reuse online reviews in your marketing work – don’t just let them sit passively on the internet. It is also beneficial to add quotes to your website, brochures, flyers or packaging, share them on social media, and create some case studies. These factors can all help grow confidence in your service.

There’s also another reason to consider being active about your reviews: If you don’t set up and manage your review profiles, someone else could. In worst-case scenarios, unscrupulous actors or rivals might even list your business fraudulently. 

Building a customer review policy

Every print business should have a clear customer review policy. This outlines how and when you’ll ask for reviews, how you respond to them (whether good or bad), where you encourage reviews to be left and how you monitor and manage review platforms.

This doesn’t need to be complex, but it ensures consistency and shows that you take feedback seriously. You also don’t need to ask for five stars, but you can encourage your customers at the right time – perhaps after they’ve expressed their satisfaction, or after you’ve successfully delivered an order or resolved a problem.

Decide whether you want to do this with email follow-ups, thank-you cards in delivery packaging or even on QR codes printed on receipts or dispatch notes. It is, however, important to avoid incentives or rewards that could be seen as ‘buying’ reviews. Platforms such as Google explicitly prohibit this.

How to handle customer concerns – and praise

Naturally, most businesses strive for five-star ratings – and most of your happy customers will gladly give them. But the occasional negative review isn’t the end of the world. In fact, having one or two imperfect ratings can actually increase credibility – a business with only perfect reviews may raise suspicions about authenticity.

When you receive positive reviews, it’s a good idea to respond quickly, thanking the customer by name if possible. Let them know you appreciate their feedback. You need to be equally prompt when faced with negative reviews – show that you care while remaining professional. Don’t let things degenerate into a public argument that might sit on the internet forever. Where possible, take the discussion offline and work towards a resolution. 

Unfortunately, you may encounter spam or reviews that appear to come from someone who was never a customer. While platforms like Google will only remove content that violates specific policies (such as hate speech or impersonation), it’s still worth flagging anything clearly inappropriate.

Reviews are a long-term issue. You don’t need hundreds overnight – a steady flow of genuine reviews over time is better than a sudden influx. Potential customers will see a living, breathing business with ongoing happy customers – exactly the kind of partner they want for their printing needs.