Customer feedback and reviews
Customer feedback is what people tell a business about a visit, privately through a rating or comment, and reviews are the public version posted on sites like Google.
Also called: post-visit rating, online reviews, customer satisfaction
Feedback and reviews are related but different. Feedback is private and aimed at the owner: it tells you the wait felt long or the fade was uneven. A review is public and aimed at future customers: it is the star count and comment they see on a map listing.
Asking right after the visit works best, while the memory is fresh and the customer is still holding their phone. A short rating with an optional comment costs them ten seconds. Chasing a review a week later usually gets nothing.
Fairness matters. Steering only happy customers to a public site while hiding unhappy ones distorts the picture and breaks the rules of major review platforms. The cleaner practice is to give everyone the same invitation.
How NextUp Walk-in handles it
After a visit is marked done, the customer page asks for a private 1 to 5 star rating and an optional comment. Everyone who rates then gets a link to leave a Google review, with no star gating.
Questions
When is the best time to ask for a review?
Right after the visit, when the experience is fresh. A short private rating first, then an invitation to post publicly, is easy for the customer.
What is review gating?
Review gating means sending only happy customers to a public review site and keeping unhappy ones private. It skews ratings, so the better practice is to invite everyone equally.