To get your first ten Google reviews, verify your Business Profile, copy your review link, and ask every customer for a rating within a day of their visit. There is no trick that skips the asking. A new business has no reviews because nobody has been asked yet, so the whole job is building a habit that asks everyone, every time.
Most guides agree on the order of operations. Follow it in sequence and you avoid the usual stalls.
Step 1: verify the profile first
You cannot collect Google reviews until your business has an active, verified Google Business Profile. Fill in the hours, categories, photos and address before you ask anyone to review it. A complete profile gives a reviewer confidence that they are rating the right place, and it gives you a listing worth landing on. Our Google Business Profile checklist covers what to fill in.
Step 2: get your direct link
Inside your profile manager, use the "Ask for reviews" option and copy the link it generates. That link opens the review form directly, with no searching and no extra taps. Test it on your phone before you print or send it anywhere. A dead link on your first printed batch costs you weeks.
Step 3: ask every customer, and ask soon
Guides on this topic point the same way: ask while the visit is fresh, ideally within 24 hours, using a direct link by text or a QR code. For walk-in businesses, a face-to-face ask from the person who served the customer works best, with the code or link ready so the customer can act on the spot.
Early on, volume of asks matters more than polish. Conversion from request to review is low for every business, so ten reviews means asking many more than ten people. If you ask five customers a week, your first ten reviews will take months.
Wording and timing both matter, and we cover them in how to ask customers for reviews. If your staff are the ones asking, train them to ask with a simple script instead of leaving it to mood.
Step 4: put the link where customers already are
Pick two or three places and make them automatic:
- A QR code at the counter or on the receipt
- A follow-up text or email after the visit
- Your email signature and website footer
- A thank-you message after an appointment or job
A counter code is the easiest to run on autopilot. A QR rating flow lets the customer tap their stars first and then choose where the feedback goes, so a customer who had a rough visit can tell you privately instead of having no option except a public post.
Step 5: pace them, and reply
Ten reviews that arrive across three months look healthier than ten posted on one afternoon, and they are more believable to the people reading them. Do not batch. Ask continuously and let the reviews land as customers get around to them.
Reply to each review, including the good ones. It shows a new profile has a person behind it. Our guide to responding to positive reviews has short examples you can adapt.
What not to do
New businesses are the most tempted to take shortcuts, and the shortcuts are the fastest way to lose the profile.
- Do not pay or discount for reviews. Google prohibits incentivised reviews, and incentives can lead to removed reviews or a suspended profile.
- Do not ask only the customers you expect to be happy. Google treats selective soliciting as review gating. Give every customer the same prompt.
- Do not ask friends and family to post five-star reviews. Some guides suggest it. It conflicts with Google's policy on fake engagement, and it reads as thin to real readers.
The clean version is simple: the same ask for everyone, and the customer decides what to write and where. The line is spelled out in Google review gating, explained.
A realistic first month
Week one is profile and link. Weeks two to four are asking every customer, tracking asks against reviews, and replying to each one. Starboard attributes every rating to the staff member who earned it, which makes the asking habit easier to keep. Whatever you use, count your asks. If the asks happen, the reviews follow.
Ten reviews is a milestone, not a finish line. It is the point where the next customer has something to read.