Your star rating will not show on GMB unless you have 5 reviews

Google has changed the way that they show reviews in the search results. The recent update changes how reviews are shown to searchers. In the past, the star rating of a business was shown to searchers no matter if the company had 1 or 100 reviews in the search view. However now, unless you have more than 5 reviews your stars will not display.

See the example below:

This also happens when searching for businesses in the map vi

As you can see, the business with less than five reviews and the one that has no reviews do not show the star rating.

What this means

This update again proves the validity of having multiple reviews for your business online. It also shows that Google favors local businesses that have lots of reviews.

If you have fewer then 5 reviews then expect your click-through rate to be much lower than that of your competitors who have more than five reviews. The reality is that no matter how good your company actual is reviews are going to dictate whether or not a potential customer is going to call you or a competitor.

What to do

Google is always going to be changing and updating their ranking and display systems. If you are going to advertise online you need to get used to this. What works one day may not work the next.

The best way to respond to this is to continue to get reviews for your business. The days of waiting and hoping for a person to leave you a review online are over.

Unless you have a strategy of getting real reviews online then your competitors are going to eat your lunch. We have written at length on the best way to get Google reviews.