Reviews are among the most powerful signals in Local Services Ads (LSAs). That power creates a temptation: if reviews help so much, why not steer the process so only your happiest customers ever get asked? The answer is that this practice — called review gating — is exactly what the Federal Trade Commission's rule on fake and deceptive reviews is designed to catch. Since that rule took effect in October 2024 (16 CFR Part 465), the compliant, and frankly smarter, approach is simple: ask every customer.
What review gating is
Review gating is any process that selectively solicits reviews to manufacture a rosier picture than reality. It shows up in a few forms:
- Asking only customers you expect to be happy — cherry-picking who gets the review request based on how the job seemed to go.
- Pre-screening sentiment first — sending a "how did we do?" survey, then only routing the satisfied respondents to the public review page while quietly diverting the unhappy ones to a private complaint form.
- Suppressing or discouraging negative reviews — making it hard for dissatisfied customers to leave public feedback.
All of these engineer an artificially positive rating. The FTC's rule targets fake, deceptive, and manipulated reviews, and a gating funnel that systematically hides dissatisfaction is squarely the kind of manipulation regulators are concerned with.
Why gating is a bad bet even setting law aside
Compliance is reason enough to stop gating, but the business case against it is just as strong:
- A suspiciously perfect rating reads as fake. Modern consumers are skeptical of a spotless five-star wall with no dissent. A 4.7 with a few thoughtful, well-handled criticisms is more believable than a flawless 5.0.
- Negative reviews you handle well build trust. Prospects read how you respond to problems. A calm, accountable reply to a complaint can persuade a reader more than another rave.
- Gating hides the feedback you most need. The unhappy customers you route away from the public form are telling you exactly what to fix. Silencing them protects your ego and starves your operations.
- It is fragile. A funnel built to look perfect collapses the moment one gated customer figures out what happened and says so publicly.
The compliant way: ask everyone, honestly
The rule is not hard to follow. Request an honest review from every customer, through the same Google Business Profile link, regardless of how you think the job went. Let the results be the results.
| Practice | Gating (risky) | Compliant (ask everyone) |
|---|---|---|
| Who gets asked | Only likely-happy customers | All customers |
| Sentiment pre-screen | Yes, to filter | No filtering — direct link for all |
| Negative feedback | Diverted, suppressed | Welcomed publicly, answered well |
| Resulting rating | Artificially perfect, fragile | Honest, credible, durable |
How to make "ask everyone" produce great reviews anyway
Owners sometimes fear that asking everyone will tank their rating. In practice, if you do good work, a universal ask produces a strong and credible profile — because most satisfied customers simply need to be invited. The levers are operational, not selective:
- Do the work well. The most reliable way to earn good reviews is to deserve them. Reviews are a mirror; fix what the mirror shows.
- Ask at the moment of satisfaction. Right after a job goes well is when a genuinely happy customer is most willing — and you are asking all of them, so timing lifts the honest average naturally.
- Make it one tap. Friction suppresses reviews from happy and unhappy customers alike; removing it lets your true quality show.
- Respond to everything. Reply to praise and to criticism. Handling the occasional negative gracefully is part of what makes the whole profile trustworthy.
What about incentives and edited reviews?
Two related traps are worth naming. First, offering payment, discounts, or gifts in exchange for reviews — especially in exchange for positive ones — is exactly the kind of practice the FTC rule scrutinizes; a review bought with a reward is not the honest, independent feedback the system is supposed to reflect. Second, pressuring a customer to change or delete an unflattering review crosses the same line. The safe posture is clean: ask everyone, offer nothing for it, edit nothing after the fact, and let your work earn the rating. If a review is factually false or violates platform policy, use the proper reporting channel rather than trying to manage it out of existence.
A note on how reviews flow now
Because LSA reviews are managed through Google Business Profile, the ask and the public review live in the same place, which makes the compliant pattern the natural one: a single honest link sent to every customer. There is no legitimate reason to build a sentiment-sorting funnel in front of it — and every reason not to.
The takeaway
The instinct to protect your rating by only asking happy customers is understandable and wrong — wrong under the FTC's fake-review rule, and wrong as strategy. Ask every customer, honestly, through the same link, and answer every review you get. You will end up with a rating that is a little less than perfect and a great deal more persuasive — and you will stay on the right side of a rule that is not going away.
Frequently asked questions
What is review gating and why is it risky?
Review gating is selectively asking only customers you expect to be happy, or steering unhappy customers away from leaving public feedback. Under the FTC's fake-review rule (16 CFR Part 465, effective October 2024), that kind of manipulation of the public record carries real compliance risk.
Should I ask every customer for a review even if a job went poorly?
Yes. The compliant approach is to send every customer the same honest review request through the same Google Business Profile link, regardless of how you think the job went, and to respond to whatever comes in.
Can I offer a discount or gift in exchange for a review?
Offering rewards conditioned on leaving a positive review is exactly the kind of practice the FTC rule scrutinizes. The safe posture is to ask everyone, offer nothing for it, and never pressure a customer to change or delete a review.