How to earn your stars on Google?

andrew • April 5, 2017

So have you earned your stars on Google if you’re a business?

Five gold stars on a white background, arranged in a scattered pattern

This is quite brief as it’s really simple and yet really impactful.
So I’m going to show you an example, I’m going to use our old friends “Plumbers Bolton” because it’s a really good example to show you. I’ve Googled Plumbers Bolton and Google runs off and does its stuff and it firstly brings up the ads, and that’s fine. It then brings up what we term “The 3 Pack” which is the “Google My Business” Pages for businesses.

Google Maps results for plumbing services in Bolton, with one 5.0-rated listing circled in red.

Now, the great news is that these are free and as you can see here, it only shows three businesses now, it used to show seven but now it shows just three.
These businesses here have all got (you would have thought) an equal chance of getting some sort of click, but of course one business, as you can see here, Adams Plumbing, is standing out like a sore thumb because it’s got the stars.
Adams Plumbing has earned its stars.
How did they do that?
Adams Plumbing is probably going to get 70% of the clicks over Bolton Plumbing and KJS Plumbing? They have been smart and they’ve gone out and they’ve asked their customers to review them on Google. I don’t know whether they have got a system in place or not, I have no association with Adams at all, I just like what they do.
Now, the threshold to get stars and stand out like a star, if you like, on the page is five.
As soon you hit five, Google will give you the stars.
Adams in total have got 18 reviews, you can see it in the brackets there, where you’ll see Bolton Plumbing have got two; it shows that they have got two reviews but it doesn’t give them the stars. So if you want to earn your stars, very simply, go out and tell your customers to give you reviews on Google, and you will stand out like a sore thumb.
It is a really easy fix to getting more business than your competitors.
Businesses spend a fortune on marketing. What a simple, quick, easy, free fix.


Google search results for “plumbers bolton,” showing local plumber listings with ratings and website links
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