An owner looking for a new IT company does the same thing a homeowner looking for a roofer does. They read the reviews. They look at how many, how recent, and whether the company replied. Then they call the one that feels safest.
Most IT companies have a handful of reviews from years ago. Not because clients are unhappy. Business clients do not think to review their IT company the way they review a restaurant. Nobody asked at the right moment, and there is no walkthrough in the driveway to make the moment obvious. So you have to create it.
The four moments to ask
- The end of onboarding. You have moved them over, the email works, the backups are running, and the owner is relieved. That is the best moment you will ever get. Ask that day.
- After a save. You recovered a server, caught a phishing email, or got them back online during an outage. Relief is the feeling that writes reviews.
- The quarterly review meeting. If you meet clients on a schedule, end the meeting with the ask. It takes thirty seconds.
- A closed ticket with a thank-you. When a user writes “thanks, you saved me,” your tech replies with the link. Not every ticket. The ones with a thank-you in them.
Make the link one tap
Go into your Google Business Profile and copy the “ask for reviews” link. Put it in a saved reply in your ticket system. Put it in the email signature of whoever runs onboarding. The fewer steps between “sure” and the review box, the more reviews you get.
Ask the right person
The office manager who calls you every week is the one who will write the review. Not the owner who signed the contract. The office manager has the stories. “Our old company took two days to call back. These guys fixed our email in twenty minutes.” That is the sentence a new client wants to read.
Ask them to say what and where
A review that says “great company” helps a little. A review that says “they manage IT for our dental office in Brandon and moved us to Microsoft 365 without a single day of downtime” helps a lot, because Google reads the words. You do not write it for them. You just say: “If you can mention what we do for you and where you are, it really helps.” Most people are glad to.
Reply to every one
Two sentences under each review, with the client's company name and what you do for them, shows a real person is running the shop. It also ties more IT words to your listing, which is what the map box runs on.
How many do you need?
More than the companies next to you on the map, and newer. Open the map for “IT support” in your city and look at the three listings that show. Count their reviews and check the date of the most recent one. That is your target. A steady one or two a month, for a year, beats a burst of twenty in one week, because Google can tell the difference and so can a buyer.
The bad review
You will get one. Usually from a client who left, or from a user who was locked out and blamed you. Reply the same day, calmly, with facts and an offer to make it right. Never argue. Prospects reading it are not judging the complaint. They are judging how you handled it. An IT company with sixty reviews and two calm replies to bad ones looks safer than one with twelve perfect ones.
Put them on your website too
Pull your best reviews onto your site, next to the service they talk about. Managed services reviews on the managed services page. “Saved us during an outage” on the support page. Reviews from a law firm on the law firm industry page. It is the easiest content you will ever add, and owners read it more than anything you write yourself.
Want this done for you?
This routine is what I set up for every IT client, and it is the biggest lever in the map box. If you want to see where your listing stands, the audit is free.