Home / Local marketing / KA-021

Draft replies to Google reviews for a local business

Draft calm, specific replies to new Google reviews that thank real details, handle complaints without private details, and wait for owner approval.

Who it suits

Small business owner, freelance local SEO, small agency account manager

Time saved

About 30 to 60 minutes per week for a business with 10 to 20 new reviews (estimate)

Level

Easy

Updated

Oct 13, 2026

Why this task

Owners often leave reviews unanswered, or reply to a complaint in a rush and regret it. Copy and paste thank you notes read as if nobody looked at the review. An agent can draft a reply to each review that mentions what the customer actually said. It can also flag the hard ones for the owner, who approves every reply before it goes out.

You draft replies to Google reviews for [BUSINESS NAME], a [BUSINESS TYPE] in [TOWN].

Reply policy:
- Voice: [TONE, e.g. warm, plain, brief].
- Sign off as: [SIGN OFF NAME AND ROLE].
- Offline contact for problems: [PHONE OR EMAIL FOR COMPLAINTS].
- Never discuss in public: [TOPICS, e.g. refunds in progress, health details, staff discipline].

Reviews (first name as shown, star rating, date, text):
[PASTE REVIEWS]

For each review:
1. Write a reply of 30 to 80 words.
2. Thank the reviewer for one or two specific things they mentioned. Use their words where it reads naturally.
3. For a complaint, acknowledge the experience calmly and say sorry that it fell short. Do not admit fault on facts you cannot check. Invite them to contact [CONTACT METHOD] to sort it out.
4. Never confirm that the person is a customer beyond what they wrote. Never add order numbers, dates, prices, diagnoses, addresses or any detail from outside the review.
5. Never argue, blame the customer, offer a discount in public, or ask them to change their review.
6. Vary the wording. No two replies in the batch should open with the same sentence.

Add a Flag column. Set it to OWNER MUST REVIEW when a review mentions a legal threat, injury or safety issue. Do the same when it names staff in a complaint, looks fake, or seems to be about another business. Explain the flag in one short line.

Return a table: reviewer, stars, draft reply, word count, flag, flag reason. Do not post anything.

Replace each highlighted placeholder with your own details before you run it.

Steps

1. Agree a short reply policy with the owner. Cover tone, sign off name, how to invite unhappy customers to get in touch, and topics never discussed in public.
2. Each week, copy new reviews into a spreadsheet: reviewer first name as shown, star rating, date and review text.
3. Remove anything you do not want sent to an AI tool, such as phone numbers or order details a reviewer posted.
4. Run the prompt below on the batch. Ask for one draft per review and a flag column.
5. Read every draft. Check that the thanks match what the reviewer wrote, and that no reply confirms private facts such as appointments, orders or health details.
6. Send flagged reviews to the owner first. Flags cover legal threats, safety claims, staff named in a complaint, and reviews that may be fake or from a competitor.
7. Have the owner approve, edit or reject each reply in the sheet. Post only approved replies, from the owner's own account.
8. Log the issues raised in negative reviews each month. Share recurring themes with the owner so the business can fix the cause.

What you get

A table with one calm, specific draft per review, each under 80 words and ready for the owner to approve. Hard reviews carry an OWNER MUST REVIEW flag with a one line reason. No reply reveals anything the reviewer did not already say in public.

What can go wrong, and the check for each

Related playbooks