The Review Request
The customer who was glad to have you is the one who never says so.
She loved the work. She told two neighbors. She sent you one of them.
She has never left you a review, and she never will.
Not because she wouldn’t. Because it doesn’t occur to her. Nobody finishes a good job and thinks about Google on the way home.
So the asking is yours to do. And asking feels like fishing for a compliment from someone who already paid you.
That’s the part that keeps it undone. Not the writing. The deciding — whether this particular customer is one you can ask, whether it’s too soon, whether it’ll seem like you’re angling. You make that call fresh every time, and most times you make it tomorrow.
A review request isn’t a favor you’re begging for. It’s the last small step of the job.
You give this instrument the basic facts — what the job was, when it finished, who they are, and how you normally talk to them. It writes the message, in your voice, ready to send.
One thing it won’t do: write you a version that only goes to the customers you expect to be pleased. Google’s review policy doesn’t allow that.
It doesn’t work on the people reading, either. A page of nothing but perfect reviews is the kind strangers scroll past to find the middling ones.
Every customer gets the same message. That’s the honest version, and it’s also the one that holds up.
The instrument
Writing it the way you would
Your message
Questions owners ask before they run this
How do I ask for a Google review?
Ask once, plainly, a couple of days after the job is finished, and give them the link.
Say what it helps with in your own words: it’s how people who have never met you decide whether to call. Don’t tell them what to write, and make it easy to say no.
The ask itself is short. It’s the waiting that makes it feel awkward, because a request you’ve been meaning to send for three weeks arrives carrying all that hesitation with it.
When is the best time to ask for a review?
About two days after the job closes.
Soon enough that the customer still remembers the detail they’d mention, late enough that it doesn’t arrive while you’re still packing up the truck.
The exact day matters far less than having a day at all. A request that goes out because the calendar says so is easy to send. The one that waits for you to feel like asking is the one that never goes.
Can I only ask happy customers for reviews?
No. Google’s review policy doesn’t allow a business to selectively solicit positive reviews.
In practice that covers the two versions people think are clever: asking how the job went first and only sending the link to the ones who say something good, and routing unhappy customers to a private feedback form instead.
Ask every customer the same way. This instrument writes one message and won’t write a version that screens people first.
There’s a practical reason underneath the rule. A page of reviews that are all perfect reads as bought, and customers have learned to scroll to the middling ones first.
That’s how the policy reads to me, not legal advice — Google publishes its own review policies and they’re short enough to read.
Where do I find my Google review link?
In your Google Business Profile. It has an option to ask for reviews that hands you a short link you can copy into a message.
If you don’t have it to hand, run the instrument anyway. It leaves the link on its own line at the end so you can paste over it.
Should I offer a discount in exchange for a review?
No. Offering anything in exchange is against Google’s policy, and customers can tell.
The honest version works better anyway. The review worth having is the one a real customer wrote for their own reasons.
Is this review request generator free?
Yes. It doesn’t ask for your email and stores nothing.
You give it the customer’s name, what the job was, when it finished, how you reach them, and how you normally talk to them. It returns one message in your voice, plus a short note on when to send it and what to adjust if a line doesn’t sound quite right.
Nothing you type is stored or sent anywhere except to generate your message.
This instrument has a home of its own now. The same tool, same message, lives at dayfifteen.com — a sister company of mine — alongside a paid version that writes the request after every job you close and sends it to you in a morning email, ready to paste into your own. The free tool is free and stays free either way.
The next part is the remembering. One request after every job you close, in your voice, with your say-so before anything goes out. That’s the kind of small system I build for people. If you’d want yours run, leave an email and I’ll write back myself.
Got it. I’ll write back myself, usually within a day.
An instrument from Clickbridge — built to be borrowed.