How to Ask Customers for Reviews (FTC-Safe Scripts)
Ask every customer, not just the happy ones, within 24 hours of finishing the job, with one text that links straight to your review page. Never screen for sentiment first and never trade anything for a positive review: both break the FTC's 2024 review rule. Done for you: review generation at $197 a month.
About 480 people a month search how to ask customers for reviews (our September 2026 pull), which means most local businesses know the ask is the whole game and are stuck on the wording. The wording is below: a text, an email and a spoken script, plus the timing that decides whether any of them work, and the two rules that keep the whole thing legal after the FTC's 2024 rule on consumer reviews took effect.
How do you ask a customer for a review?
Ask in person first, then send one text within 24 hours with a link that opens the review box in one tap. The spoken ask is what makes the text land, and the text is what makes it happen, because nobody types your business name into Google later.
Send the same message to every customer, in the same order, with no screening step in front of it.
The three failures that kill a review program are all boring: asking only when you remember, asking days later when the feeling has faded, and sending a link that lands on your homepage instead of the review box. Fix those three and volume follows without any clever copy.
What should the text, email and in-person ask say?
Short, specific, and sentiment-neutral. Notice that none of these scripts ask for a good review, a five-star review, or a positive experience. That word choice is not squeamishness, it is the line the FTC drew. Adapt the brackets and keep the structure.
- Text, sent within 24 hours. "Hi [first name], it is [name] from [business]. Thanks for having us out today. Would you leave us an honest review? It takes about 30 seconds: [link]. If anything was not right, reply to this text and I will take care of it."
- Email, for slower-cycle work. Subject: "A quick favour, [first name]." Body: "Thanks for choosing [business] for [service]. Reviews are how people in [city] decide who to call, so an honest review of how it went would help us a lot. Here is the link: [link]. It takes under a minute, and whatever you write is fine by us."
- In person, said out loud before you leave. "Before I go: we are a small business and most of our work comes from Google. If you have a minute later, I am going to text you a link. An honest review, good or bad, is genuinely useful to us."
- The reminder, three days later. "Hi [first name], just following up with that review link in case it got buried: [link]. No pressure either way, and thanks again." One reminder, then stop.
When is the right moment to ask?
Ask at the moment of relief, which is different in every trade. For emergency work it is the second the problem stops; for cosmetic or planned work it is a few days later when the result has settled in. Get the timing right and the same script converts far better than a well-written ask sent a week late.
| Business | Ask at this moment | Best channel |
|---|---|---|
| Dental practice | At checkout, while they are still at the desk, then a text the same afternoon | In person, then text |
| HVAC or plumbing | The moment the system runs again, before the technician packs up | In person, then text from the van |
| Roofing or construction | At the final walkthrough, once the site is clean | In person, then text |
| Med spa | Two to three days after the appointment, once the result has settled | Text |
| Law firm | At case close, in the wrap-up call or letter | |
| Real estate | At closing, keys in hand | Text |
| Veterinary | The evening of the visit, or the day after a procedure | Text |
Reply to every Google review in ten minutes a week
Eight pages: the weekly routine, five copy-paste AI prompts by star rating that we tested against ChatGPT and Gemini, and the line a reply can never cross.
Read the guideWhat does the FTC rule say about review incentives?
The FTC's rule on the use of consumer reviews and testimonials, 16 CFR Part 465, took effect on 21 October 2024 and made several long-standing bad practices formally illegal, with civil penalties attached. It bans fake reviews and reviews from people who never had the experience, including AI-generated reviews presented as real. It bans buying reviews, meaning any compensation or incentive conditioned on the review expressing a particular sentiment. It bans undisclosed insider reviews from employees and their families, and it bans suppressing negative reviews.
There is a second rule on top of the federal one. Google's own review policies prohibit offering incentives for reviews at all, sentiment-neutral or not, so a business asking for Google reviews should not be handing out discounts, gift cards or prize draws in exchange for them.
The practical version for a local business: ask everyone, offer nothing, and never mention stars.
| The ask | Allowed | Why |
|---|---|---|
| "Would you leave us an honest review?" | Yes | Sentiment-neutral, no incentive, offered to everyone |
| "Leave us a 5-star review and get $10 off" | No | Compensation conditioned on sentiment, and Google prohibits incentives outright |
| "Everyone who reviews us is entered in a draw" | No for Google reviews | Sentiment-neutral, so not the FTC's core problem, but Google's review policies prohibit incentives |
| Survey first, review link only to the happy ones | No | That is gating: a deception risk with the FTC and a direct violation of Google policy |
| Staff and family reviews of their own employer | No | Undisclosed insider reviews, plus a conflict of interest under Google policy |
| "If anything was wrong, reply and I will fix it" sent with the link | Yes | Everyone still gets the link unconditionally, so nothing is withheld |
Want the asking to happen without anyone remembering?
Ziwi wires review requests into your job flow, asks every customer the same FTC-safe way, and answers every review that comes back. $197 a month per location.
Is review gating allowed?
No. Gating means surveying customers first and sending the review link only to the ones who answered positively.
The FTC's 2024 rule does not ban gating outright, but the FTC has brought deception cases over it, because selectively routing only the happy customers to a public profile misrepresents what your customers actually think. It is also a straightforward violation of Google's review policies. It is also the default setting inside several popular review tools, which means a business can be gating without ever deciding to.
If you use a review platform, open the settings and confirm every customer gets the same link.
The legitimate version of the same instinct is service recovery running alongside the ask, not in front of it. Everyone receives the review link. The message also offers a private reply channel for anyone with a problem. Nothing is withheld, unhappy customers still get a fast route to a human, and you find out about the problem the same day rather than reading about it in public a week later.
How many asks does it take to build a review profile?
Plan on one review per three to five asks and adjust once you have your own number. At three customers a day, asking every single one, that is roughly 20 to 30 asks a week and a review profile that grows every month without a single incentive.
The target total is set against your competitors, not against a round number, and that method is in how many Google reviews you need. When a bad one lands, and it will, the reply matters more than the star: see how to respond to a bad Google review.
The reason most businesses never build the habit is that the ask depends on a busy person remembering it at the end of a hard day.
Ziwi's reviews and reputation service removes the remembering: $197 a month per location for review requests triggered by your job or visit flow, never gated and never incentivised, every review answered in your voice with a person approving each reply, profile cleanup, and a monthly report on rating trend and what the profile is doing to your calls.
Prices are published on the reputation management cost page, month to month.