ReviewHeroWhere to Find Your Google Review Link, and Where to Send It
Your review link isn't your website or your Business Profile page. Here's exactly where to get it, and the three places that actually work to send it.
The short version
- Your review link isn't your website URL or your Business Profile URL — it's a specific link Google generates that drops a customer straight into the star box.
- Google's own help pages recommend sharing it through receipts, thank-you emails, chat sign-offs, or a printed QR code — not through a generic social post.
- 83% of customers who are asked for a review actually leave one, per BrightLocal's 2026 survey of 1,002 US adults — the ask matters more than the platform.
The link you're sending probably isn't the right one
A lot of small businesses ask for reviews by pasting their website into a text or sending a link to their Google Business Profile page. Both work, technically — a customer can eventually find the "Write a review" button from either one. But "eventually" is doing a lot of work in that sentence, and every extra tap is a chance for someone to close the tab.
The fix isn't a better message. It's the right link — one that drops a customer straight into the star-rating box, no searching required. Google generates this for you for free, and most business owners have never found the page that makes it.
Where the link actually lives
The correct page is Google's own Create a Google link or QR code to request reviews help article. The steps, straight from Google:
- Sign in to your Business Profile at business.google.com.
- Select Read reviews, then Get more reviews.
- Copy the review link with the copy icon, or download the QR code.
That's the whole process. No plugin, no third-party generator, no fee. The same page notes one limitation worth knowing before you plan around it: QR codes can only be generated on a computer browser, not on a phone, so if you manage your profile entirely from a mobile app, you'll need to sit down at a laptop once to grab the code.
This is a different link from the one in your browser's address bar when you search your own business name, and different again from the "share" link on your Google Maps listing. Those links land on your profile page — reviews are visible there, but the customer still has to find and tap "Write a review" themselves. The one from the help page above skips that step entirely.
Test it before you send it to a single customer
Two things are worth checking the first time you generate the link, both covered in Google's own managing customer reviews documentation.
First, reviews are "available only in certain countries or regions and for certain business categories," in Google's own words. If your profile is brand new, unverified, or in a category Google restricts, the "Get more reviews" option may not appear yet, or the link it generates may not work the way you expect. Verify your Business Profile first if you haven't already — that's a separate, one-time step from generating the link itself.
Second, open the link yourself in a private or incognito browser window before you send it anywhere. You're looking for one specific thing: does it drop you straight onto a screen asking you to pick a star rating, or does it land you on your general profile page with a "Write a review" button still one click away? If it's the second one, you copied the wrong link. Thirty seconds of checking here saves you from finding out later, from a customer, that half your messages led to a dead end.
The three places that actually work
Google's own guidance doesn't leave this vague. Across its review-link help page and its tips for getting more reviews, Google names a short, specific list of where businesses should put the link: receipts, thank-you emails, "end of chat interactions," a printed QR code in-store, and — for online sharing — email, WhatsApp, or a Facebook post.
Collapsed into practice, that list covers three real situations:
| Situation | Where the link goes | Source |
|---|---|---|
| You already email or text a receipt, invoice, or job confirmation | Add the link to that same message | Google: thank-you emails |
| Customers pay or check out in person | Printed QR code at the counter, on the receipt, or on an invoice | Google: receipts, printed QR codes |
| A staff member already has a 1:1 conversation with the customer | End of a support chat, or a line in the email a team member is already sending | Google: "end of chat interactions" |
Notice what's missing: a general post to your whole follower list asking everyone to "leave us a review." Google's own advice leans the other way — its guidance on getting more reviews frames this as personal outreach to customers you've actually served, not a mass broadcast. The businesses getting the most mileage out of the link aren't the ones posting it publicly; they're the ones attaching it to a message that was already going out to one specific customer, right after that customer had a reason to think well of them.
A note on the WhatsApp and Facebook options
Google's help page lists sharing the link via WhatsApp or a Facebook post alongside receipts and thank-you emails, so it isn't off the table. But there's a real difference between sending your link to one customer in a WhatsApp message — the digital equivalent of a thank-you email — and posting it publicly on your business's Facebook page asking your whole audience to review you. Google's own framing favors the former: a specific ask to a specific customer who actually bought something, not a broadcast to everyone who happens to follow you, most of whom never did.
If you don't have a storefront or a chat widget
Trades, mobile services, consultants, and B2B vendors don't have a counter to put a QR code on, and most don't run a live chat. None of the three situations above require one. The link still goes in the invoice you already email, or the job-completion message you already send. The mechanism is identical — one existing message, one link, one ask — it's just that "the message you already send" is an emailed invoice instead of a printed receipt. Nothing about the link itself changes based on whether the business has a physical location.
Why the timing and the ask matter more than the channel
BrightLocal's Local Consumer Review Survey 2026, based on a representative panel of 1,002 US adults, found that 83% of consumers who are asked to leave a review actually write one. Separately, 28% said they will "always" leave a review when asked — up from 16% the year before. And 78% of consumers said they'd been asked for feedback by a business at all in the past 12 months.
Read those together and the gap isn't mysterious: most of the reviews a business never gets aren't lost to bad service. They're lost because nobody sent a link, or the link that got sent required three extra clicks. Fixing the link is a five-minute task with a real, measured payoff attached to the "ask" half of it.
The link is only one half of that ask, though. If the message carrying it never reaches an inbox, or reads like something to skip past, the correct link doesn't help you. Those are the other two failure points, and they're covered separately: Writing Review-Request Emails People Actually Answer for what to actually write, and Email Deliverability for Review Requests for making sure the email lands at all instead of quietly bouncing.
What not to do with the link
Two rules apply regardless of where you put it, and both come from the same Google help pages linked above, not from general caution:
- Never attach an incentive. Google's own policy states plainly: "Offering incentives, like free or discounted goods or services, to customers in exchange for reviews is considered fake engagement and is strictly prohibited." A discount code next to the link, a raffle entry for reviewers, a "leave a review for 10% off" sign at the register — all of it violates Google's terms, and separately risks the FTC's Trade Regulation Rule on the Use of Consumer Reviews and Testimonials (16 CFR Part 465), which took effect October 21, 2024, and specifically bars compensation conditioned on a review expressing a particular sentiment.
- Never route it only to customers you think are happy. Sending the link to a hand-picked list while quietly skipping anyone who complained is review gating, and it's a separate problem with its own rules — covered in Review Gating and the FTC Rule. Every customer who gets asked should get the same link.
And don't send it to Yelp, even by accident when copying a link from a review aggregator page. Yelp's policy on solicitation is stricter than Google's — see Why You Must Never Ask for a Yelp Review if you're not sure why that one's different.
What to do next
- Go to business.google.com, open Read reviews → Get more reviews, and copy your link right now. It takes under two minutes.
- Pick the one channel that matches how you already talk to customers: the receipt or confirmation email you send, a printed QR code at the point of sale, or the sign-off on a support chat. Don't try to run all three at once — one consistent channel beats three half-used ones.
- Send the link while the job or purchase is still fresh, to every customer, not a filtered list. A tool like ReviewHero exists mainly to automate that one step — sending the same link, from email, right after a job is marked done — but the link itself is free and the manual version works too.
- Never pair the link with a discount, a raffle, or a "only if you loved it" qualifier. Keep the ask the same for every customer, every time.
Put this on autopilot
ReviewHero asks every customer once, follows up politely, and stops the moment they open the review link. Free to download, and you can set it up from your phone.
