UENI’s Reputation Plan allows you an unprecedented amount of control over how your business appears on the web. In 2021, just having a website for your local business is not enough – if you’re not appearing on Google My Business, in the right directories, or are paying attention to what your competitors are doing, you’re a step behind when it comes to business success.
Our Reputation Plan helps to solve this problem in three different ways:
- The Listings Manager
- Reviews Management & The Review Booster
- Competitor Tracking
We’ll go through how to set up and use all three of these in this guide to help you get the most out of your plan. But first, let’s make sure you’ve got everything set up correctly.
As a Premium customer, you can also sign up for a launch call with one of our team members through your Hub, where we will go through your website with you and help you with many of the things listed in this article.
Even if you decide the call isn’t something you’re interested in, you can follow this guide to help maximise your UENI page and amplify your business.
First: Double-Check Your Basic Information
First thing’s first: let’s make sure all the key information about your business is correct on the page. Making sure search engines and customers are seeing the correct details about your business is essential to your business’s success.
When you signed up with us, you filled out the information that we used to create your website. Now it’s time to double-check and make sure that all of your information is properly displayed on your page. Having the correct information on your page, as well as good photos and descriptions, can be the difference between booking a customer and not.
So, what information should you double-check?
Your Header
Your website header is the first thing customers see when they land on your site, so it’s important to give it a good look once your UENI website is live. Remember, first impressions count!
Make sure that the header image is to your liking, and make sure that the business name, your logo, and title are correct. You’ll also want to go over any contact information (like your WhatsApp number or email).
Take a moment to look over this part of your page and make sure all of it is to your liking – you can edit all of these elements on the Sections > Header page in the Editor.
Opening Hours
No matter what sort of business you run, it’s important to make sure that your opening hours accurately reflect when your shop or company is open – yes, even if you’re an online shop. This info is displayed on your business page and is also displayed on your Google My Business account, which helps local people find your business.
The opening hours are also used to power our Booking Tool, so if you have no opening hours displayed your customers will not be able to book time with you.
How do I check and change my Opening Hours?
If you wish to edit the opening hours displayed on your site, log into your Business Hub and click on My Website (this will take you to your website editor).
Click Sections and scroll down to Opening Hours.
You can use this section to edit or remove your opening hours. You can also list your business as open or closed on certain days using the blue checkbox icon.
If you prefer to see a video, check out our how-to guide here.
Is Your Address Correct?
For storefront businesses, the importance of a correct address is clear: if you’re relying on customers to visit you in person, they need to be going to the right place!
Even if you don’t have a storefront that people want to visit, making sure that you’ve correctly listed the areas that you cover is essential to helping people know if your services or products are available to them.
Is Your Online Presence Represented?
In 2020, it’s rare to find a business that only has one method of representation on the internet. From social media like Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram to other websites, your customers want to get an idea of what your business is about from multiple outlets – so if you’ve got a really great IG presence or have a bunch of great Etsy reviews, link them on your website! It’ll help Search Engines and customers get a better understanding of your business.
Have A Promotion? Use the Promotions Tool!
One of the best things about a UENI page is the ability to display any current promotions prominently in a banner below your header. When you signed up with us, we asked you for any promotions you may have been running – but it’s possible that you weren’t sure how it would be used, or maybe you simply didn’t have a promotion when you signed up.
To use the promotion Tool, simply Click Sections and scroll down to Promotions.
Using the Reputation Plan to Get an Edge
At UENI, we see hundreds of small business websites every day, and we’ve figured out the best way to make your website stand out against the competition. Our top-performing businesses have a few things in common, but one thing in particular really makes these websites pop – great photos, detailed service descriptions, and great information about the business.
We built your website to the highest standard we could, but the truth is that we’re website builders, not mind readers. When you receive your website from us, you’re looking at a good representation of your business, but only you can make it a great one.
1. Get A New Logo Using Our Logo Designer
Your company’s logo is nothing less than the face of your business. That’s why an attractive, recognisable logo is key to really establishing your brand – no matter what else you put on your website, your logo is essential to explaining your customers to what your business is all about.
One of the perks from our Premium Plans is access to a free logo for your business. To get started, log in to your Hub and head to the Pro Features tab.
Once you’re in your Pro Features, Follow these steps:
1. Click the Create a Logo option.
Press the Get Started button and you’ll be brought to BuildMyLogo’s website.
Enter your business name and click on Build My Logo.
2. Find The Design You Like
Scroll down, and you’ll be able to see all sorts of great options for you to choose from to find the best fit for your brand.
Use the menu to the left to input your details and adjust the font size & spacing as you see fit, then click the Web Only Free Order.
3. Finish, Check Out, And Get Your Logo!
Once you’ve finished in the Checkout, push Complete Order and enter in your payment & billing details – don’t worry, you’ll get a 100% discount, so the logo will be entirely free.
Once you’ve completed those steps, head back to the Pro Features tab and you’ll see that the Build My Logo Button you clicked on to start has a Download button you can use to access your new logo!
Forgot how to upload your logo? Give yourself a refresher with our help article here.
2. Choosing a Custom Domain and a Professional Email
A custom domain name is your website’s individual address on the web. It helps people find you online, makes your website look more reputable, and professional to the world. You can put it on business cards, documents, marketing materials – anywhere people can see it.
No matter what industry you’re based in, online competition is fierce. Everyone and their grandmother has a website so it is essential to distinguish yourself if you are to have a long line of customers knocking at your door.
You want to be at the front of potential customers minds when they search for services/products like yours. To do this, it is essential to have a memorable domain name. Make it too complicated and users will just go somewhere else.
In other words, it’s the difference between barrythebarber.ueniweb.com and barrythebarber.com
The same goes for emails. When someone books an appointment with you, are they going to be more impressed by coolbusiness123@free-email.com or CEO@your-business.com ?
The answer is obvious.
How To Choose a Custom Domain
When you log into your UENI Hub, you’ll see a big purple Choose Domain button under your Pro Features Page (it also appears in the hub).
Once you click Chose Your Free Domain, a search bar will pop up that you can use to search for the domain name you want (e.g. yourbusinessname.com). This will check if the URL you want is available:
Here you’ll be able to see whether the domain name you’ve selected is available, as well as our recommended options. Make sure you double check your spelling and choose your domain carefully, because changing it later will not be free.
Not happy with the results? Just hit Search Again to see some different options.
When you’ve made up your mind, just click Confirm Selection to finish up.
All done! Keep in mind, it can take up to 72 hours for your new domain to point to your UENI website.
How To Choose A Custom Email
Once your domain name is live, it’s time to set up your professional email. Just like the Domain, this is available under the Pro Features section:
All you have to do is fill in your desired email name and a password, then click Submit.
See the example below on how to pick an email handle (e.g. ‘info’). In this instance, we’ve selected info@choose-your-domain.com.
Once your email address has been successfully setup, you’ll see a confirmation in the hub as shown in the example below.
To access your new email account, use the Go to my Email button on your Hub, or click here to access the UENIMail login page.
Use the email address and the password you selected to login to your new email account.
3. Setting Up Your Shopping Cart and Adding Prices
One of the major perks of the Premium plans is our Shopping Cart feature – which allows people to directly buy products or book services on your website.
How To Sell Products
1. Setting Up Paypal
First, you need to go back to the first page of the editor, and then click on “Settings”.
Then, click in the blue button that says “Connect with PayPal”.
Follow the steps to create an account or login with an existing one, then the page will ask you if you wish to connect your account to UENI’s Payment Checker.
Simply click on “Accept and Continue”. a page will load, do not leave or close the page.
When you return to the editor, you should see a message that tells you that your PayPal email is now connected.
2. Adding Products
You will need to go back to the “Services & Products” section of the Editor. If you haven’t created a group for your products yet, you’ll need to Click Add New Group.
Now click on “Add a new product or service”.
Then fill out the item’s description, including the name, an image, and a price.
Then tick the box “is it a product?” This will let Google know what it is, and so Google will display the product information directly in search in a nice and easy to understand way.
The information that appears on Google might be slightly different from that on your UENI page. We have no power over that, we give the information to Google, but it’s Google who ultimately decides how it’s displaying that information.
NOTE: if you select this option, it will disable the “Book” button, as products can only be bought.
3. Setting Up Your Shopping Cart
Once your Paypal is enabled and your products are live on your page, you can set up a shopping cart, rather than a buy now button.
If you created a PayPal account, or already had one live, there are only two steps you need to follow:
1. From the main page in the editor click on “Settings”.
2. Next, click on “Shopping cart”.
NOTE: To be able to use shopping carts you have to use the Modern, Classic and Natural theme.
How to Sell Services
1. Adding Services
Just like with Products, you’ll want to go into the Services & Products section of the Editor. If you haven’t created a group for your service yet, you’ll need to click on Add New Group.
Now click on “Add a new product or service,” just like with products
Then, give your Service a name, and you’ll want to add an image, a description and a price. We’ll give you some tips on Prices and Services below.
Note: Here, you will want to keep the Product button unclicked, because services are not eligible for the Google Carousel.
2. Tip: Adding Prices
Why add prices? It’s simple – a service without a price attached is going to make your business look less professional. For bookable services, competitive prices are an essential part of success. For established businesses, this is easy: you already know what you want to charge for a given service.
If you’re a new business, you’ll want to keep an eye on what similar shops are using as their pricing structure– if you’re a barber or a hairdresser, for example, take a look at the typical going rate for your service in your area.
3. Tip: Adding Descriptions
Which sounds better to you? “We offer a variety of haircuts in many styles” or “From classic buzzes and fades to wild new looks, we can give you exactly the cut you want, no matter what it is! No matter what you go for, you’ll always leave our hair salon looking your best.”
That’s the power of a good description. Make sure you’re giving your business a leg up on the competition by spending time crafting the best one you can.
4. Themes!
For our Premium Customers, we have three additional themes available for your business so you can find the one that works best for you. All three can be found in the Editor under Theme.
1. The Classic Theme
The Classic Theme is great for businesses that want to highlight their team, or those that want to focus on educational or otherwise written content. It also works well for businesses that want to update the page frequently with new information.
Examples of The Classic Theme:
2. The Modern Theme
The Modern Theme is perfect for businesses that crave a structured, clean design, and have high-quality images that really leave an impression. Have a sharp logo, a snappy business name and a great cover image? Try out the Modern Theme.
Examples of The Modern Theme:
3. The Natural Theme
The Natural Theme is perfect for visually-oriented businesses, or anyone who wants to highlight good quality images. The portfolio-style gallery makes it ideal for Artists, Photographers, or Restaurants.
Examples of the Natural Theme:
5. Your Google My Business Listing & Google Reviews
Once all of your details are in order, it’s time to check in your Google My Business listing.
Thanks to UENI’s special partnership with Google, we are able to make sure your business stands out from the competition.
This is made possible by making you appear as a verified business on Google Search, Google Maps, and Google My Business.
This means that customers will see you as a trusted and reliable professional, and will be more likely to check out your services and products. A verified company with more reviews on Google will be more likely to appear in locally-based searches (including Google Maps) as well as searches that are relevant to your industry.
A live Google My Business account will also allow you to utilise Google Reviews, a powerful tool for SEO and establishing your business as a good company to work with or visit.
If you have your own GMB listing already, you can read about how to connect it to your UENI page here.
Google My Business Statuses
Your GMB Needs Verification
In most cases, we can automatically create and verify your Google My Business listing, but there are some business categories where manual verification is required. If you see this status, you can log into your UENI Hub to follow the steps for verification. We have more details below.
Google My Business Not Built
If your Google My Business has not been built, this is most likely due to an incomplete address – make sure you’ve double-checked your information if you haven’t.
If the information is accurate and your Google My Business listing has still not been built, please send us an email at vip@ueni.com and we’ll get you sorted.
How is my Google My Business listing verified and made public?
All UENI plans include free Google My Business listing set-up. Thanks to our partnership with Google, we can verify many businesses on GMB automatically. This means that most of our customers will receive their website and Google listing at the same time.
However, some business types still require manual verification, and Google will not display listings on Google Maps they are completely verified. If this is the case, you’ll need to take additional steps to verify it and get it published.
1. Double-check your Business Address
In order to manually verify a Google listing, we’ll need a complete and accurate business address. It doesn’t need to show up on your page, but we cannot build your GMB without it. Even though Google offers a few other verification methods – a phone call, text, email and Google Search Console – the only method that’s available to all users is a verification postcard from Google. While you may not conduct your business at a physical location, Google requires a full address to send your postcard, and won’t accept PO boxes or remote mailboxes in this field.
2. Choose your Verification Method
Next, you’ll need to pick a verification method. To see the verification options available to you, simply login to your UENI Hub here.
You’ll see the following screen:
If the business address method is your only available option, you’ll have to request your postcard by clicking the Send PIN button. Depending on your location, it may take up to two weeks to arrive at your address of choice.
Once you have received the PIN through your preferred verification method, enter it in your UENI Hub. Google will then review your business listing and publish it within 24 hours.
Methods like a phone call or text will be faster, as you’ll receive your PIN instantly, but keep in mind that the review process still applies before your listing is published.
Please note: At the time of writing, GMB is advising that postcards may take longer to arrive due to COVID-19. For the same reason, reviews may take up to 3 days.
Sharing Your Google Reviews link
If your Google My Business Account is active, you can find a link to your Google Reviews at the bottom of the My Hub Page, where you can copy your Google Review link to share with your customers or share it directly through Facebook, Twitter and WhatsApp.
When people are looking for anything, from products to services to shops, 60% of them are going to use Google to search for reviews. This means that if your Google reviews aren’t linked with or listed on your website, you’re not giving yourself the best chance to succeed.
Adding Existing Google Reviews to Your Page.
If you’ve already got existing Google Reviews that you want to add to your page, or you want Google Reviews to automatically be synced to your page, you can set this up.
1. Head over to the Editor and click on Sections
2. Scroll down the list and select Google Reviews.
3. To enable your reviews, make sure the Google Reviews option is switched on and set to green.
4. To complete your changes, just hit Save.
Ta-da! Your Google reviews will now be visible on your website’s Testimonials section.
6. Listings Management
One of the key features of our Premium Plans is our Listings Management feature – this is an easy way to get your business onto some of the most trusted directories around, like Uber, Apple Maps, and Facebook. We can help you build your business profile for all of these and get listed in a few days, which means more time for you to do what you really love to do.
To get started, head to the Reputation tab in your hub.
If your Google My Business listing is not live and verified, you will get an error saying that there is an issue with your listing, and you will have to email vip@ueni.com to get it fixed.
If it works, you’ll see an image like this below:
From there, you’ll want to go into the Listings Tab on the menu to the left. Review Management and Review Requests are for our Reputation plan customers – we’ll get into those a little later.
Once you’re here, you can check over your company details, as well as add some directory-specific ones, including special opening hours for certain days, images you want to be hosted directly on these directories, and any specific services or brands you may offer. There’s also an option to add specific attributes about your business, like whether you offer contact-free services or outdoor seating – important in the COVID-19 world we find ourselves in.
Once your details are finished to your liking, you’ll want to check out the Channels tab, which will show you the status of your listing, whether you have to take more actions to connect, and how to view your listing when it’s live.
If you have more questions about the listings tool, please check out these articles in our Help Center:
- Can I change my listing information?
- What is the Findability Score?
- What do the different sync statuses on my Listings mean?
- How to connect your Facebook Business account with Listings
- How to review the Listings status links
- Our Listing FAQ
Listings
Listings enable shops, restaurants, doctors, and every other local business to automatically optimize their online presence for local searches. Using Listings, you ensure that your business will be found as quickly and frequently as possible when users search for directions, opening hours, reviews, recommendations or events.
With Listings, your company information is synchronized daily and protected against manipulation by third parties. Therefore, the location information is consistent everywhere and the listing is always up to date, so no one is going to get incorrect or old information about your business.
How do Listings Work?
Your location data is stored in your Reputations dashboard in the Listings manager, and managed in the cloud. Using this dashboard, you can simply add, edit or remove data relating to your physical location. Just save your data, and we’ll automatically update your business information and share it across all (online) platforms. Since Listings is cloud-based, the data is always up-to-date and accessible anywhere, anytime. That’s how simple Listings is to use!
Listings allows you to update and manage all your important business info from a central platform. Using this plan, you’ll appear on all the channels relevant to you and your customers. All this in considerably less time and effort compared to manually entering the data for each location and platform.
How To Enable Listings
To Enable Listings for your Reputation Plan, log in to your UENI Hub and head to the Reputation Tab.
Once you’re here, click on the Listings Button and follow the steps on the screen, at the end you’ll be presented with A Listings View like this one:
Where you can complete your Location Details (under Location Details), see what Channels your Business is appearing in, and use the Results Tab to track how well your page is doing on each of the Listings provided.
What to do if you see “It looks like your Google My Business is not properly connected to your UENI page.”
Many aspects of the Reputation Plan are tailored around your Google My Business presence, so if this is not properly configured you will be unable to access many features of the Reputation Plan.
If you already have an existing Google My Business Listing
If you already have an existing Google My Business listing, you can follow these steps to link your listing with your UENI Business website.
If You Don’t Have A Google My Business
If we haven’t been able to create a Google My Business listing for your company, there are a couple of likely culprits.
1. Check your eligibility
Please take into account that some business types are not eligible for GMB according to Google’s guidelines:
- Rental or for-sale properties, such as holiday homes, show homes or vacant apartments. Sales or leasing offices, however, are eligible for verification.
- An ongoing service, class or meeting at a location that you don’t own or have the authority to represent.
- If your business falls into one of these cases, unfortunately, we won’t be able to create a GMB listing for it.
Keep in mind that we’re only able to build GMB listings for our supported countries. Not in our supported country list? Click here to build your own GMB, and then connect it to your UENI page!
2. Complete your business information
If we weren’t able to build your GMB listing, don’t worry! We have identified a number of reasons that can disrupt the process and compiled a list with the steps you can take to help us fix each error.
First of all, login to your UENI Hub. Once you’re in, here are the things you need to check:
- Your Business Name
- Your Business Address
- Your Areas Covered
- Your Phone Number
For additional troubleshooting, please use this Help Desk article to learn more.
Location Details
The Basic Information for your Location Details are imported from the information that you gave us when we created your UENI Page, but there’s plenty more to do within your Listings to ensure all your information is up to date as well as optimising your page for Google and other Search Engines.
Make Sure To Fill Out The Additional Information Section!
The Additional Information Section is the real gem here. You can:
Add in Special Hours
If your Business keeps special hours for holidays like Christmas, Easter, or National Holidays, you can list them here and all of your Listings will automatically reflect this information on these days – particularly helpful on Google Maps.
Use Your Company Description:
To give a quick, detailed overview of your business, and you can add in Keywords
Adjust your Map Location
To get it exactly where you want it to appear when people search for your Location
Link Your existing Social Accounts
So you can connect all of your other accounts for websites like Facebook, Instagram, Yelp, Youtube, and Twitter to your Listings and manage them all from one place.
Highlight Specific Services and Brands
“Do you serve Pepsi or Coke?” Use this section to highlight specific Services you offer or brands that you use: by giving more detailed information, you’ll be able to help people who are looking for specific offerings.
Choose your Attributes.
These let customers see what your business has to offer, such as whether a restaurant offers Wi-Fi or outdoor seating, or if your business is women-led. Adding relevant, accurate attributes to your Business Profile helps you stand out to your customers that find your business on Google.
Payment Options
Does your shop take Apple Pay? Can you deal with Mastercard? You can alleviate client concerns by adding all the payment options your business offers here.
Images
Directly upload photos to all of your Listings from one place, so you don’t need to log in to each of your accounts
Additional Categories:
This is most useful if your business provides more than one service and you want to appear in Multiple Searches.
Connect Channels:
This allows you to connect any existing channels you have to your UENI listings page.
Channels
This section of Listings will tell you the channels that you have selected for your business, as well as their status.
You’ll find a list of all your Listing platforms. To view your Listing status, check out the option on the final column on the right side of your screen.
For instance, below you can see that Facebook is ‘Not Connected’ and Google is ticked ‘Connected’:
What do my Channel statuses mean?
There are three different statuses to look out for.
Ready (green): The channel is okay and ready to use
Pending (orange): The data is going to be retrieved from the channel
Unknown (blue): Status unknown
Error (red): The data is not available for the specified channel or it was not possible to process the channel after three hours of adding or changing it
If an error has occurred, the wrong platform URL has probably been used. Please contact us to correct this.
What happens to my Listings if I decide to cancel my account?
If you’re on a Plus or Reputation plan and decide to cancel or downgrade your account, your listings services will be discontinued at the end of the subscription period.
Your business listings will continue to be live, but you will not be able to modify them by accessing your Listings dashboard.
As your profiles will no longer be checked and updated daily, third parties can potentially modify your location data. This means that over time, the data on these listings may become incorrect or out of date.
Please note that due to the stopping of active sync, cancelling your account may cause your business’s search engine rankings to decline over time.
Reviews Management
To access your reviews Management & Review Request campaigns, you’ll want to log in to your Hub and head to the Reputation Tab of the navigation bar. Once you’re in here, you’ll want to head to the Reviews Management Section, as we’ve shown below:
How To Use Your Review Tools
1. Reviews Management
The Reviews Management Dashboard is a powerful tool for evaluating your new reviews all in one place. By Clicking on Reviews Management, you’ll be able to track new reviews, the content of the reviews – including any keywords – as well as any reviews that you need to reply to.
In other words, you should use your Review Manager to get an easy overview of your customer feedback and reply to reviews in a few quick steps.
To See Your Reviews over time, look at the Reviews & Posts section of your Reviews Management tab. You’ll be able to see the number of new reviews, and by clicking on “Go To Review” you’ll be able to reply to it, as we’ve shown in the image above.
2. Review Requests
Reviews Requests are a way for you to easily ask for business reviews from your customers via email. Remember, most people are less likely leave a positive review compared to a negative one, so it’s important to capture as much positive energy from your customer base as possible – not only do search engines love positive reviews when it comes to rankings, potential customers are also going to check up on your business online.
How to Start A New Review Request Campaign:
- Tap Create A Campaign
- Select Your Business from the Select Your Location screen and push Next
- Select the Review platforms
This is where you decide where you will receive your positive reviews, as well as deciding what you want to do with negative feedback:
- Preview the email
This is what will be sent to your customers. You can change the background image if you like, as well. When you’re happy, push Next.
- Select Import Your Own Email Addresses
You can Import the list of emails in two ways – either by uploading an Excel or CSV file or by copying and pasting them with the Direct Input Button. Once you have the email list finished, choose the language you wish to send the email, then Push Next.
- Give The Summary Page A Good Once-Over
Make sure you’re happy with your campaign, and press either “Start Now” to kickstart your campaign immediately, or “Start Later” if you want it to begin sending Emails at a later date.
3. The Review Booster
Most business owners struggle with keeping their reviews on par and spend a lot of time on them. Did you know that as much as 69% of consumers don’t trust online reviews older than 3 months?
Our Reviews Booster automates the process of getting new 5-star reviews, by sending an email to your visitors a day after they have booked your location. They are then asked to rate your service. Don’t worry, less-positive reviews are kept private so you can handle any complaints or issues discreetly.
How Does It Work?
Our Review Booster is a feature where UENI will help you follow up with your customers that have made a booking request or sent a message to you via your website.
Typically, these follow up emails are sent one day after the booking was due to take place, or 1 day after the message was sent, depending on whether they booked or emailed.
If there is no date attached, the review email will occur after three days.
We will not send Review Booster emails to your clients if:
You have sent a manual email from your Hub, or if your Google My Business Profile is not fully connected & verified.
Competitor Tracking
Keep an eye on your competitors by receiving real-time data on the positive and negative reviews of their business. Easily evaluate your performance to see where you underachieve or outperform.
Benchmark your competitor’s results against your own performance. Compare all scores, rankings, and reviews from their guests to your own standards for service, pricing or quality.
Using your Reviews Manager, you can connect up to three of your main competitors in order to compare performance and discover trends before anyone else. And great news – you can edit these whenever you like, to keep up with your business growth and changes to the market.
Selecting your top 3 competitors is easy and fast. And even better, it’ll help you see how you stack up against the competition, and where there’s room for your business to grow.
To set yours up, you should think about those businesses that you admire in social media, their brand and their customer service.
It is very important to consider businesses that provide the ‘same’ service that you give.
How To Enable Competitor Tracking
Click on Review Manager in your Reputation menu shown below.
Now, click on Competitors to access your competitor menu.
Next, hit Settings to access your competitor list.
Click the Add more button to begin your search.
Now, type in your desired competitor or search by your town/city to find a new competitor.
When you’re finished, hit Submit.
Your competitors will appear immediately:
To make any changes to your list, just click the Remove button.
Congrats – your competitors are now set up!
