The review request message that gets a five star rating

What a good review request has to do

The message that asks for a review has one job: make leaving a review feel quick, personal and worth the customer's thirty seconds. Most requests fail because they are none of those things. They are generic, they arrive at the wrong time, or they dump a long link on the customer with no context.

A strong request has a short list of ingredients, and every one of them matters:

• The customer's name. "Hi Sarah" reads like a person wrote it. "Dear valued customer" reads like a machine, and gets ignored.
• Your business name. The customer dealt with a few businesses today. Remind them which one you are.
• A specific reference, where you can. "your service today" is fine, "the fence repair today" is better, because it shows you remember the actual job.
• A genuine thank you. You are asking a favour. Start by being grateful, not demanding.
• One clear action. A single tracked link straight to the review box. Not two links, not a choice, one tap.
• A working opt-out. Every message, including this one, carries STOP.

Keep it short. A review request that runs to four sentences of preamble buries the ask. Two or three tight lines is the target.

Templates you can adapt

Here are requests that work, once a customer has already indicated they were happy. For why you sort customers by their experience before sending this, see turning happy customers into reviews.

For a trade or home service:

Hi Dan, thanks again for having us out to fix the hot water today. If you were happy with the job, a quick Google review would mean a lot to a small local business: [link]. No worries if not. Reply STOP to opt out.

For a salon, clinic or appointment business:

Hi Mel, lovely to see you at Folia today, hope you're happy with the colour. If you've got 30 seconds, a Google review really helps us: [link]. Thank you! Reply STOP to opt out.

For retail or hospitality:

Hi Sam, thanks for shopping with Harbour Provisions today. If we got it right, we'd love a quick Google review: [link]. It helps other locals find us. Reply STOP to opt out.

Notice what each one avoids. None of them asks for "a five star review" or "a 5". You cannot ask for a specific rating, and you should not, because it pressures the customer and it looks bad. You ask for an honest review from someone who has already told you they were happy. The five stars follow from the good experience, not from the wording of your request.

Timing is half the result

The best-written request sent three days too late will underperform a plain one sent at the right moment. Send while the good feeling is fresh and the experience is easy to recall.

What "fresh" means depends on the business. A cafe or shop can send an hour or two after the visit. A tradie is best sending that evening, once the job is finished and signed off. A clinic or salon can send later the same day. The principle is the same everywhere: tie the request to the completion of the job so it goes out reliably, rather than trying to remember to send it days later when the moment has passed.

If you are running appointments, this slots naturally after the visit is marked complete, in the same rhythm as your reminders. Sending it promptly and consistently matters far more than picking the perfect hour.

Small things that lift the response

A few refinements make a measurable difference once the basics are right.

Use a tracked link rather than a raw Google URL. It is shorter and tidier in the message, and a tracked-link click count shows you how many people clicked through. That will not tell you who left a review, but it tells you whether your wording and timing are working, so you can adjust. If one template gets more clicks than another, keep the winner.

Personalise more than the name where you can. If your system knows the job or the service, put it in. "the fence repair" beats "your recent service" every time, because specificity signals that a real person is writing to a real customer.

Send it once. A single well-timed request is an invitation. A second and third become nagging, and nagging earns opt-outs, not reviews. If they did not act on a good-natured ask, let it go.

And stay on the right side of the rules, which are not optional. No incentives, no rewards, no "leave a review and go in the draw", because incentivised reviews breach Google policy and can mislead consumers under the Australian Consumer Law. No writing reviews yourself. Just an honest, friendly ask to a happy customer. The full picture of doing this compliantly is in how to get more Google reviews by text.

Get the ingredients right, send at the right moment, keep it to one honest ask, and the review request quietly becomes one of the most valuable texts you send. To see how it fits alongside reminders, follow-ups and the rest, have a look at our use cases.