How to get more reviews ethically, within the FTC's 2024 rule

Why reviews matter, and why the rules tightened

For a plumber, dentist, roofer or family law firm, online reviews are often the first thing a prospect checks. A steady flow of recent, genuine reviews signals that the business is active and trusted. That pressure also created a market for fake reviews, review brokers and tactics that filter out unhappy customers.

In August 2024 the Federal Trade Commission announced a final rule on the use of consumer reviews and testimonials, which took effect on October 21, 2024. It allows the FTC to seek civil penalties against knowing violators, which raises the stakes for businesses and for the agencies and reputation firms they hire. This guide summarizes the main points for a service business. It is not legal advice; check specific situations with counsel.

What the FTC rule prohibits

Based on the FTC's announcement and its staff Q&A, the rule targets several practices. The full text is in the Federal Register, and the FTC's business guidance answers many common questions.

• Fake or false reviews and testimonials, including AI-generated reviews and reviews by people who had no real experience with the business; businesses may not write, buy or sell them
• Incentives conditioned on sentiment: compensation or other incentives that expressly or implicitly require a positive (or negative) review
• Undisclosed insider reviews: reviews by officers, managers, employees or agents without a clear and conspicuous disclosure of the relationship, with specific rules when managers solicit reviews from employees or relatives
• Company-controlled review sites that misrepresent themselves as independent
• Review suppression through unfounded legal threats, physical threats, intimidation or certain false public accusations, and misrepresenting that the reviews shown on your site are all or most of those submitted when negative ones were suppressed
• Buying or selling fake social media indicators such as bot followers or views

Review gating: asking only happy customers

Review gating means screening customers first, for example with a 'how did we do?' survey, and sending only the satisfied ones to Google or Yelp while routing unhappy ones to a private feedback form. Many review tools used to offer this by default.

The FTC staff Q&A says the rule itself does not specifically prohibit asking only customers you think are happy, but that the practice could violate the FTC Act, pointing to the Endorsement Guides. Google's policy is more direct: its Maps user-generated content policy says merchants may not discourage or prohibit negative reviews, or selectively solicit positive reviews from customers. Reviews obtained this way can be removed and the profile can face restrictions.

The practical answer is simple. Send the same review request to every customer who completed a job or visit. You can still ask for private feedback, as long as it does not determine who gets the public review link.

Incentives, staff and family

The FTC rule does not ban incentives for reviews outright, as long as there is no express or implied requirement that the review be positive. The FTC gives examples of implied conditions, such as asking customers to tell you how much they loved their visit in exchange for a coupon. Failing to disclose an incentive could also violate the FTC Act.

Google goes further: its policy says merchants may not offer incentives such as payment, discounts or free services in exchange for posting any review. For most service businesses whose reviews live on Google, the safe rule is no incentives for reviews at all.

On insiders, the FTC says a small business owner can ask family to review if they clearly disclose the relationship. Google, however, treats reviews based on a conflict of interest, including current or former employment and family relationships, as rating manipulation that it removes. In practice, keep staff and family off your public review profiles. Google's policy also discourages requiring reviews on the premises, setting staff quotas for review requests, or asking customers to name a specific employee in the review.

A review request process that works

Within those limits, the main lever is consistency. Most businesses get few reviews simply because they rarely ask. Build the request into the end of every job or visit, so it does not depend on a technician or receptionist remembering.

Timing matters. Ask when the work is fresh and complete: after the technician closes the job, after the final appointment in a treatment plan, after a matter closes or a return is filed. Many field service, practice management and review platforms (for example Jobber, Housecall Pro, ServiceTitan, Podium, Birdeye, NiceJob or Weave) can send an automated request after a job status change. If you use one, check that any gating or filtering feature is turned off.

• Trigger the request automatically from job or visit completion, for every customer
• Send a short, neutral message with a direct review link
• Send at most one reminder a few days later
• Do not offer anything in return, and do not suggest what to write
• Exclude staff and their families from the send list

Responding to negative reviews

Negative reviews will come. The rule allows you to respond publicly and to contact customers to resolve problems; the FTC Q&A also says simply asking satisfied customers to update a review is not prohibited. What you cannot do is use unfounded legal threats, intimidation or knowingly false accusations to get a review removed. Paying customers to take down truthful negative reviews may violate the FTC Act.

A good response is short, calm and specific. Thank the person, acknowledge the issue without arguing details in public, and offer a direct contact to resolve it. Prospects read responses as much as reviews. For healthcare providers, be careful not to confirm that the reviewer is a patient or disclose any health information, which can create HIPAA problems.

Using AI and agencies carefully

AI can draft polite responses to reviews for a person to edit, summarize review themes for operations meetings and personalize request messages. It must never write reviews. AI-generated reviews are explicitly within the FTC rule's prohibition on fake reviews.

If you hire a marketing agency or reputation management firm, ask exactly how they generate reviews, whether they use gating and whether they offer incentives. Agencies can be liable under the rule, and so can the businesses that hire them if they knew or should have known. Track review volume, average rating and response time to reviews, and compare against your own history rather than a competitor's numbers. InTheory would treat review requests as a simple, consistent automation, never as a growth hack.