About TheBizBook

We only invite TheBizBook members to leave reviews for businesses for a few reasons. Firstly, members will have their name and image associated with their review, so we hope this encourages them to be more mindful, responsible and accountable for what they write, regardless of it being positive or negative.

Secondly, it helps ensure the reviews are authentic – reviews must be based on real engagements and experiences with businesses. If a business is concerned that someone has left a review that wasn’t based on a real experience, we have the ability to trace the author and try and fix the issue.

And finally, websites that allow any visitor to leave reviews encourages spam messages to be left in review sections. We want to ensure that TheBizBook is a credible, top-notch and reliable resource. We exist to connect Artists with great businesses. We do this by providing as much trustworthy information as we can. If consumers don’t trust our content, people will stop using TheBizBook and everyone loses; Artists won’t have a resource they can trust to make important career decisions and Businesses will have potential customers stop visiting them.

If you’re an Artist also offering a business, service or resource to Artists, you need to set up two separate accounts. Artist and Business memberships offer different features and unlock specific areas pertaining to the membership. You are welcome to have two separate accounts but be mindful you cannot leave reviews for your own business. Check out the reviews policy here.

It took a team over 18 months to build, and there will always be on-going expenses to cover staff/admin, private servers, security, writers, site upkeep….the list really does go on! It’s our priority to ALWAYS be offering the best resource to you, and we endeavor to continue evolving by working on new features and updates all the time. Check out our reviews on Facebook and you will quickly see that Artists are finding incredible value for the low membership fee. Our priority is keeping you rapt that you found us, and more importantly, excited to stay.

We have a strict policy for leaving reviews, which you can read here. A review may be taken down if someone has flagged it as inappropriate and TheBizBook Admin team agrees. If a review contains inappropriate, derogatory or abusive language or it is suspected that the review is not based on a genuine engagement or experience with that business, TheBizBook will investigate and remove it. A review will not be removed simply because it is negative if it adheres to the review policy.

We are an ever-evolving directory and want to ensure we have all the valuable resources Artists needs listed here in TheBizBook! Please get in touch with us and we can discuss your business and creating a listing for you – contact us here.

Let’s face it. In this digital age, online business reviews are everywhere. If someone wants to say something publicly about your business, it can be done at the click of the button and sometimes in places without you even knowing about it.

A whopping 8 in 10 consumers conduct online research about products or services they are interested in before committing to purchase. So, when a potential customer goes online to look up your business, hopefully they find something good.

But naturally, any smart business person’s first reaction is to wonder ‘What if I get a negative review?’ Here you can learn how having reviews (yes, even a negative one) in a dedicated site can actually be positive for your business.

1. Reviews are a powerful form of marketing. Each review posted online by a customer is a form of advertising for your business. Your name and product in a directory targeted to your core customers increases their awareness of who you are and what you do.

2. 70% of people trust the opinions of other consumers posted online. Before eating out at a restaurant or calling a plumber or booking a hotel, now more than ever, people are turning to online reviews to make decisions about which businesses are going to get their money. Research shows that consumers generally trust peer recommendations more than they trust advertising. Many consumers consider online sources to be credible. For example, a Nielsen survey of 25,000 internet consumers from 50 countries found that 90% of respondents trusted recommendations from people they knew, while 70% trusted consumer opinions posted online. Every online review that recommends your business is a powerful form of promotion.

3. Even a negative review can be positive for your business. Hopefully getting a negative review isn’t something you have to worry about, and here at the Biz Book we have some very clear terms and conditions for members on how they leave reviews on this site. You can see them here.
 However, some online reviews may raise concerns or suggest improvements related to your business. This can be a good opportunity to resolve a customer's problem and/or improve business practices. After all, many of the customers who raise concerns in online reviews would still complain about your business to other people, even if they didn't post a review. At least if the complaint is published, you can see it. Even more, you can respond publicly to these negative reviews and make things right with your customers. This shows that you care about customer service. Many customers also have good suggestions about better ways to do things, or new products that you could offer, so review sites can be a free source of great business ideas. So, utilize the bad reviews as a learning experience, a chance to make improvements and prevent negative reviews from popping up in the future. And don’t worry! More good news is coming up in #4 about those negative reviews.

4. 68% of consumers trust reviews more when they see both good and bad scores.

   Consumers might get a little suspicious if your reviews are all 5 stars. So, if there are a few negative ones in there, consumers are actually more likely to trust all of them, including the positive ones. As long as the good outweighs the bad overall, your online image will be fine.

5. A closer relationship with customers

6. The average consumer consults 11 online reviews before making a purchasing decision. Even if you’ve got a couple bad reviews, it’s alright! Consumers don’t stop reading reviews only after the first few. If you’ve got honest reviews from loyal customers, curious consumers will likely keep you in mind as an option

7. A high product rating will increase the likelihood of completing a purchase for 55% of consumers. This one seems obvious, but it just goes to show that if a consumer is on the fence about your product or service, good reviews and ratings can bring them over to your side. (Source: socialbarrel.com)

8. Consumer reviews are 12 times more trusted than product descriptions. No matter how much work you put into perfecting that product or service description in a website, consumers are going to trust the opinions of others consumers 12 times more. Your customers can be your best salespeople. Give them good experiences with your services or products, ask them to write about those good experiences, and you’ll be able to win more consumers over.

*Sources: www.accc.gov.au & tmprod.com