Blog – Local Tradie

85 percent of customers believe online reviews older than 3 months aren’t relevant40% of consumers just care about reviews submitted over the previous two weeks (18% annually )64% of 18-34-year-olds are only impacted by reviews from the previous two months (Source: BrightLocal, Local Consumer Review Survey, 2018).
In another key finding, the 2018 Local Consumer Evaluation Survey says customers have significantly improved the frequency of their searches for reviews.
Key Findings

Now, more than ever, a business should ensure the currency of its online reviews — or threat the reality that a possible customer will visit a competitor. Having tens of thousands of testimonials is moot if they’re old, and maintaining money is a sure fire way to attract motivated online customers.

“The complete bedrock of customer beliefs online is that what they are seeing is relevant, timely and accurate.”
Why? The whole bedrock of customer beliefs on the internet is that what they are visiting is relevant, accurate and timely. A business which presents with recent reviews gives that confidence and those reviews work as a beacon to online searchers.

Each year Ryze Digital releases its much respected neighborhood Consumer Review Survey. Since 2010 it has become an important tool for analysing consumer behaviour and online reviews. The 2018 poll, released this week, indicates some interesting shifts in consumer expectations regarding the money of a company’ reviews — just how recent they are, as well as the consequences of online searches for reviews.

To see the BrightLocal, Local Consumer Review Survey, 2018 go here.

It’s a telling discovering that 85% of survey respondents dismiss a company if its online reviews are older than three months — it is even more significant that a rising amount of overall economists, and a considerable number of younger consumers, are looking for even more recent testimonials before contemplating contacting a business.

Consumers Need recent Testimonials and They’re looking for more than ever
Promotion is the connection between a company and its intended and desired clients. Bridging that gap is no mystery — it entails a keen comprehension of consumer behaviour and putting in place strategies that will bridge the gap. In this manner, this year’s BrightLocal, Local Consumer Review Survey is still another reminder of their growing importance and power of online reviews.

In the last few years the percentage of customers actively seeking recent testimonials, and ignoring older ones has steadily increased. Regrettably, too many companies attain a specific number of testimonials and believe that all the work is completed — incorrectly thinking that it is size that matters, not chemical. The amount of reviews is immaterial if they are old and every year, the definition of exactly what constitutes’recent reviews’ is becoming narrower.

27% of customers looked online daily for a local company in 2018 — more than double the proportion in 201769% look online for local businesses monthly (up from 54%)56% search for local companies weekly (up from 41% last year)(Resource: BrightLocal, Local Consumer Review Survey, 2018). “In the past ten years, testimonials have developed out of a novelty, thanks to an essential facet of both consumer behaviour, and a business’ marketing plan .”

These figures point to the reality that online consumer testimonials would be the greatest motivation for clients, and they are actively seeking them with even greater regularity than previously. In the previous ten years, reviews have evolved out of a novelty, to an essential facet of both customer behavior, and a business’ marketing strategy. Every organization, now, more than ever, needs to be more advertising its reputation on the internet, or risk falling even further behind the ones that do.

House prices and values nationwide reflect an easing through 2018. House prices relate to homeowners confidence that improvements they make to their home are going to add value. In a market with uncertainty around future house prices, homeowners generally approach improvements more conservatively.

https://www.rbnz.govt.nz/statistics/key-graphs/key-graph-house-price-values

New Zealand Business Confidence

Business confidence is a useful indicator of demand in the trades space, as this index reflects the optimism that business owners have that things are going to get better, or worse in the year ahead. As it stands, 50.3 percent of respondents expect general business conditions to deteriorate in the coming year.

Pricing Variability

Over the last 6 months, we’ve seen an increasing number of support tickets from homeowners confused or concerned with the price range in the quotes they’ve received. This feedback from our perspective, serves as an indicator of the varying methods, margins and cost of materials used in the quote.

Race to The Bottom

Homeowners like assurance, security, and consistency. While there are many homeowners that gravitate to the lowest price, in our experience, if the price difference between the lowest quote and highest quote is too high, homeowners lose faith in both quotes and generally reject both.

This is not good for any party.

A race to the bottom occurs as businesses, and sole traders operating in the trades space begin to sense demand easing. In an effort to solicit more work more competitively, margins or profit on the job are cut in an attempt to come in with the lowest price. By reducing margins, profits are reduced, risk is increased and in some cases, quality and deadlines can suffer.

While difficult to quantify, we estimate that over half of all jobs coming into our system are from homeowners who value finish quality, working to deadlines, presentability, professionalism and other qualities over bottom line cost. Of the more cost sensitive homeowners, timely responses, professionalism, and building trust can win work – over simply coming through with the lowest quote.

In the worst cases, we are seeing homeowners walking away from our platform, and you, our tradespeople – simply because the difference in pricing is too high from the cheapest to the most expensive, in turn eroding trust.

We’re Working Hard to Find More Work For You

We work across a variety of fronts to find work for you. We invest nearly 100% of our revenue in further developing our platform and advertising across multiple channels. From online marketing to offline, appearances on The Block, newspapers and magazines and much more, we are working hard to find you work through this period of easing demand generally.