Review gating · explained
What is review gating, and why does Google ban it?
Review gating is asking customers how their visit went, then sending only the happy ones to leave a Google review. It is the most common design in review tools, and it breaks Google's policy.
What review gating looks like
Written out step by step, it is easy to recognise:
- The customer is asked a question first — “How was your visit?”, a star rating, or a happy and a sad face.
- The tool reads the answer and decides what to show next.
- Happy customers are sent to the Google review page.
- Unhappy customers are sent to a private feedback form that only the business reads.
The shop's public rating goes up, because the unhappy half of its customers never reached Google. That is the entire point of the design, and it is why it is not allowed.
What Google's policy says
Google's rules for reviews on Maps and Business Profiles say a business must not “discourage or prohibit negative reviews, or selectively solicit positive reviews from customers.”
Gating does both halves of that sentence at once. It discourages negative reviews by diverting unhappy customers somewhere else, and it selectively solicits positive ones by showing the link only to people who said they were pleased.
We are not your lawyers, and this is not legal advice. This is Google's published policy as we read it; check it yourself before you take our word for it.
How to spot gating in a review tool
Before you pay for any review tool, ask it three questions:
- Does the customer answer anything before seeing the Google link? A rating, a smiley, a “would you recommend us?” — if the answer changes what happens next, that is gating.
- Is there a “private feedback” or “negative review shield” feature? That is where the unhappy customers are sent.
- Does it promise more 5-star reviews? Nobody honest can promise a rating. What your customers write is theirs.
What to do instead
Ask everyone, the same way, and make it easy. Most customers who had an ordinary good visit never think to leave a review, and the few who try often give up at the empty box. Making it easier for all of them is the honest way to get more reviews.
That is what AskRevu is built for. A printed card opens the same screen for every customer: a short draft about their visit that they edit and post themselves. There is no question at the start, so there is nothing to filter. See the whole path, step by step, or compare it with NFC cards and standees.
Questions
- Is review gating allowed on Google?
- No. Google's policy for reviews says a business must not "discourage or prohibit negative reviews, or selectively solicit positive reviews from customers." Asking first and sending only the happy customers onward does both.
- Is it gating to ask for feedback at all?
- No. Asking customers what they thought is fine. It becomes gating when their answer decides whether they are shown the Google review link.
- What happens to reviews collected by gating?
- Google removes content that breaks its policy. A gating tool's output is exactly that content, so the reviews it collected are the ones at risk of disappearing.
- Does AskRevu gate reviews?
- No. It never asks how the visit went. Every customer who scans gets the same screen and the same Google link, and there is no private feedback form to send anyone to.
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