Check out this article about a sting conducted by the New York Attorney Generals office. They set up a fake frozen yogurt shop in Brooklyn, NY and solicited help from firms that promise to boost online visibility.They caught 19 companies assessed $350,000 in penalties.
Here’s the article: http://in.reuters.com/article/2013/09/23/net-us-fake-reviewers-snared-in-ny-attor-idINBRE98M0Z020130923
Online reviews are very helpful to your business, but the costs of posting fake reviews far outweigh the benefits. Even if you never get caught, fake reviews are dishonest and they misrepresent your company. It’s just not good business!
But it is recommended to monitor popular review sights so you can respond to customers that post negative reviews. You can often turn a negative situation into a positive one, by responding to negative comments appropriately.
Here are a couple of good articles about dealing with negative reviews:
- https://biz.yelp.com/support/responding_to_reviews
- http://smallbiztrends.com/2013/08/how-to-handle-bad-online-review.html
Here are some of the top review sites you should be familiar with:
- Yelp
- Google Local
- CitySearch.com
- UrbanSpoon
FroCup.com