For years, Lowry Doors struggled to get its clients to write online reviews. So the commercial and residential garage door company in Orem, Utah, hatched a plan.
They paid their techs $5 for every review they received.
“We were like, ‘That's a good amount of money, but we don't get (many) reviews,’' said Jennifer Alonso, the director of administration at Lowry. “So it wasn't a big deal.”
Lowry even tried a local marketing company to boost reviews, but it wasn’t successful. Ready to try something else, Alonso turned to ServiceTitan’s Marketing Pro. Her team had already been using ServiceTitan for a couple of years, and trusted the field service software.
But they didn’t expect immediate results.
That’s why Alonso was shocked when, after one week of using Marketing Pro, Lowry had doubled its number of online reviews.
With Marketing Pro’s reputation feature, Lowry’s customers are automatically sent a text message after their appointment, prompting them to leave a review on sites like Facebook, Google or CitySearch. These reviews are consolidated into one feed in ServiceTitan, which Alonso can read at a glance.
“(Marketing Pro) is worth its weight, just for the reviews,” she said.
But the influx of reviews hasn’t stopped Alonso’s team from responding to each one.
“We answer all of our reviews,” she said. “The good and the bad, so we don't look like that weird company that just answers bad reviews.”
Addressing all those reviews isn’t a big lift for her team, because Lowry’s reps can use ServiceTitan’s AI tools to help write responses.
Easy-peasy: Powerful software doesn’t have to be dull to use. Recently, Alonso hired a new customer service rep. She didn’t have experience with Marketing Pro, but quickly got the hang of it.
With the support of AI, Alonso can now assign any rep to draft replies—even those who say they’re not great with spelling or grammar.
The #1 newsletter for the trades.
“It takes away the scary (feeling of) ‘I'm going to answer a review and have it posted on Google for the world to see,’” Alonso said. “Now it's fast, it's easy. Normally, we're responding to reviews in less than 24 hours.”
As for the $5 for every review reward? It’s still a thing at Lowry. And it’s getting expensive—in a good way.
“At every company meeting now, we spend about $500 a month,” Alonso said with a laugh. “We're (handing out $5 bills like,) ‘Here, here, here.’”
