You do great work. Your clients are happy. You’ve been in business for years, and your phone rings mostly from referrals. So why does the landscaping company two towns over — the one you know cuts corners — keep showing up above you in Google?
More often than not, the answer is reviews.
Online reviews have become the single most visible trust signal for local service businesses. Before a homeowner calls you, before they visit your website, before they even look at your portfolio — they’re reading what other people say about you. And if your review count is thin or your last review is from 2022, that’s often the end of the conversation.
The good news: getting more Google reviews isn’t complicated. It doesn’t require a big marketing budget or a dedicated team. What it does require is a consistent process — and that’s exactly what this guide is going to walk you through.
Let’s start with the business case, because this isn’t just about vanity metrics or star ratings. Reviews directly affect your bottom line in three very concrete ways.
When someone searches “landscaping company near me” or “lawn care in [your city],” Google decides who shows up in the local map pack — those top three listings with the phone number and star rating. Reviews are one of the most significant factors in that decision. Review signals, including volume, recency, and sentiment, account for a meaningful portion of how Google ranks local businesses. More reviews, higher rankings. Higher rankings, more inbound calls.
And it compounds. More calls mean more jobs, more jobs mean more satisfied clients, more satisfied clients mean more reviews. The landscaping companies ignoring this are essentially letting competitors build an insurmountable lead over time.
Here’s something that surprises most business owners: a landscaper with 60 reviews at a 4.7-star average will almost always outperform one with 12 reviews at 5.0 stars — both in Google rankings and in the eyes of prospective clients. A perfect score with almost no reviews looks suspicious. A high-volume profile with a few imperfect reviews looks real and trustworthy.
The goal when you’re trying to get more 5-star reviews isn’t perfection. It’s consistency and volume.
85% of consumers consider reviews older than three months to be essentially irrelevant. That burst of glowing reviews you got back in 2021? Largely dead weight at this point. Getting more online reviews isn’t a project you complete once — it’s an ongoing operational habit.
86% of people now trust an online review as much as a personal recommendation from a friend or family member. Referrals still matter, but the neighbor’s recommendation increasingly leads to a Google search, not a direct call. If your review profile doesn’t hold up under that scrutiny, you’re losing jobs you technically should have won.
Not all review platforms carry equal weight for landscaping companies. Here’s how to prioritize.
Google hosts nearly 60% of all online business reviews, and your Google Business Profile is typically the first thing a prospect sees. If there’s one platform to focus your energy on — especially when you’re just starting to generate Google reviews — it’s this one. Getting more Google reviews for your business has a direct, measurable impact on both visibility and conversion.
Make sure your profile is complete: accurate service area, updated photos, correct business hours, and a description that reflects what you actually do. A complete profile amplifies the value of every review you collect.
Once your Google presence is solid, there are secondary platforms worth attention depending on your market and client mix:
That said, don’t spread yourself thin. Concentrate the majority of your effort on Google reviews and pick one secondary platform that aligns with your primary client profile. Trying to get more Yelp reviews, more Houzz reviews, and more Google reviews simultaneously often results in doing none of them well.
This is where most landscaping companies fall short — not because they don’t want more reviews, but because they’ve never built a reliable system for asking. Here’s how to fix that.
The best time to ask for a review is immediately after project completion, when the client is standing there looking at the finished result and their satisfaction is at its peak. Don’t wait until the invoice is paid or the follow-up visit is done. Ask in the moment.
For recurring maintenance accounts — weekly mowing, seasonal cleanups, irrigation management — the optimal window is right after a visible seasonal milestone. Spring cleanup, fall leaf removal, a major pruning job. Whenever the client is most likely to look at their property and feel good about what they’re paying for, that’s when you ask.
If you want to know the best way to get Google reviews in the landscaping business, it’s this: ask in person, face to face, at the end of the job.
Most customers who are happy with your work are genuinely glad to help you out — they just need to be asked, and they need it to be easy. The crew lead or account manager who’s been on-site for two days has far more relational capital than any follow-up email. Use it.
Weak: “If you ever get a chance, feel free to leave us a review somewhere.” Strong: “We’re really glad you’re happy with how this turned out. Would you mind leaving us a quick Google review? I can send you a direct link right now so it only takes a minute.”
It feels awkward at first. It stops feeling awkward after the third or fourth time you watch a five-star review show up an hour later.
For customers who didn’t get a direct link at the job site, a follow-up text within 24 hours is the most effective way to get customers to leave Google reviews. Nearly all text messages are read within minutes, compared to email open rates that tend to hover around 20-30%. Keep it short:
“Hi [Name] — thanks again for letting us work on your property. We’d really appreciate it if you could leave us a Google review. Here’s a direct link: [URL]. Takes about 60 seconds. Thanks so much!”
For commercial clients and landscape architecture projects where the relationship is more formal, a follow-up email is appropriate. The key is personalization — reference the specific project, not a generic ask. Generic blasts asking clients to leave a Google review for your business perform poorly. A personal note referencing the specific project performs significantly better.
A simple QR code that links directly to your Google review form is an underused tool for landscaping companies. Put it on:
It’s a low-pressure, self-service way for clients to get to your Google review page without needing to search for you.
One-off review requests get one-off results. What you’re building here is a process that runs whether or not you personally remember to ask. Here’s how to operationalize it.
Google Business Profile gives you a direct link to your review form. Shorten it with a link shortener or create a memorable redirect (e.g., yourcompanyname.com/review). This link should live in your team’s phones, your email signature, your invoice templates, and anywhere else you communicate with clients.
If you’re running a field service platform — Jobber, ServiceTitan, Aspire, or similar — most of them support automated review requests triggered by job completion. Set it up once, and the system sends a text or email with a direct link every time a job is marked complete. This is the most reliable way to get more customer reviews at scale without adding any manual workload.
Review management tools like Birdeye, Podium, and others are also worth considering if you’re managing a multi-location operation or want more control over the request workflow.
A consistent trickle of reviews outperforms a campaign-driven burst, both in how Google interprets the signal and how prospects read it. Getting 40 reviews in a week after a push campaign can actually trigger Google’s spam filters. Getting 3-5 new reviews every month signals an active, trusted business. Build the habit into your job close process and let it compound.
The owner can’t be the only person asking for reviews. Train crew leads, account managers, and anyone who has direct client contact to make the ask as part of their job close. It doesn’t need to be scripted — it just needs to happen. Some companies add it to their job completion checklist: take a before/after photo, confirm the scope was completed, ask for a Google review, send the link.
A few well-intentioned moves can actually hurt you. Avoid these.
Never incentivize reviews directly. Offering a discount or gift card in exchange for a Google review violates Google’s terms of service and can result in your profile being suspended or reviews being removed. A referral program — rewarding clients for sending you new business — is a legitimate alternative. A review incentive is not.
Don’t buy reviews or use review farms. Fake reviews are increasingly detectable by platform algorithms and can result in serious penalties. The short-term bump isn’t worth the long-term risk.
Don’t batch-request old customer lists. Blasting a three-year-old customer database with review requests tends to produce low response rates, off-topic reviews, or reports. Work from recent completed jobs where the relationship is fresh.
Never ask only for ‘positive’ reviews. Platform policies prohibit directing customers to leave only positive feedback. You can ask them to share their experience — that’s it. In practice, clients who’ve had a good experience will leave good reviews without being directed to do so.
Negative reviews are going to happen. Even excellent landscaping companies get them — a misunderstood scope, a communication gap, an unrealistic expectation, occasionally just a difficult person. What separates the best operators isn’t a review profile with no negatives; it’s how they respond when negatives appear.
Respond to negative reviews within 24 to 48 hours. Speed signals attentiveness. A review that sits unanswered for two weeks communicates that you either didn’t see it or didn’t care. Both hurt you.
Your response to a negative review is being read by every prospective client who encounters that profile. A measured, professional response to a critical review often builds more trust than a wall of unresponded five-star ratings. Thank the reviewer for their feedback, acknowledge their concern, and offer a path to resolution. Never argue publicly, never get defensive, and never name-call.
“Thank you for taking the time to share your experience. This doesn’t reflect the standard we hold ourselves to, and we’d like to make it right. Please reach out to us directly at [phone/email] so we can address this personally.”
For anything involving a specific complaint or dispute, provide a direct contact and move the conversation off the public thread. This isn’t about avoiding accountability — it’s about giving the actual situation the attention it deserves without performing it for an audience.
When a negative review reveals a real operational issue — a communication gap, a crew behavior problem, an unclear scope process — discuss it with your team and use it to improve. Reviews that reflect a genuine failure are some of the most valuable feedback you’ll receive. Don’t waste them.
Generating reviews is step one. Deploying them is where most landscaping companies leave money on the table.
Feature reviews prominently on a dedicated testimonials page with links back to the full review profiles so prospects can verify they’re real. Pull specific quotes into project case studies and service pages. A review that describes a specific outcome — “They solved a drainage problem that three other companies told us was unfixable” — is worth far more on your services page than a generic five-star line.
For mid-sized to larger commercial jobs or landscape architecture projects, print and include a curated review sheet in your proposal package. Three or four detailed, job-specific reviews from comparable clients carry significant weight in a competitive bid. This is particularly effective for landscape architects presenting to commercial property managers or HOA boards — third-party client validation provides credibility that no amount of self-promotion can match.
Screenshot and share strong reviews on social, particularly those that describe specific outcomes, seasonal results, or a challenging project solved. Don’t just post “We got another 5-star review!” — give the review context. What did you do for this client? What problem did you solve? This turns a review into a mini case study with essentially zero content production cost.
If you send any kind of newsletter or seasonal service reminder to your client list, include a curated review in each one. It reinforces quality to existing clients (reducing churn) while also nudging anyone on the fence about booking additional services.
Reviews are not a marketing tactic you run for a quarter and then forget. They’re a compounding operational asset — one that gets more valuable the longer and more consistently you build it. The landscaping companies that invest in this process early develop a competitive position that is genuinely difficult for competitors to close quickly.
The barrier isn’t customer willingness. The barrier is almost always the company’s own process — or the absence of one. Most satisfied clients would leave a review in 60 seconds if asked at the right moment and given a direct link. Build the ask into your job close. Train your team. Automate the follow-up. Respond to everything.
Do those four things consistently, and the review profile takes care of itself.
The Landscape Marketing Group helps landscaping companies grow through strategic digital marketing, SEO, and reputation management built specifically for the green industry.