Google review link generator

A Place ID is Google’s permanent handle for one listing — usually 27 characters starting with ChIJ. It is not in your Maps share link, which is the thing most people try first: a share URL carries coordinates and a name, and no ID at all.

• Open the Place ID Finder, which is a page in Google’s own Maps documentation.
• Type your business name and address into its search box, and pick your listing.
• Copy the ID from the marker’s label, and paste it above.

You can paste the whole place_id=… line if that is what you have — the field pulls the ID out of it. What comes back is your ID on the end of one fixed address, which is the entire trick and the reason no lookup is needed:

https://search.google.com/local/writereview?placeid=YOUR_PLACE_ID

One caveat worth knowing before you engrave it on anything: Google documents that a Place ID can change if a listing is edited or merged, so re-test the link when you reprint, not just when you first make it. And test it while logged in as yourself — the page it opens should name your business, which is the only check that catches an ID copied off the wrong marker.

The link’s job is removing steps. A customer who has to search your name, pick you out of the results, scroll past the map and find the review button will do it if they are annoyed and not if they are merely pleased — which skews everything you collect. One tap into the review box is the whole intervention.

Put the link in your email signature, the last line of an invoice, and the thank-you page after a booking. The QR belongs where a phone is already out and your hands are not: the counter, the receipt, the back of a card, the van. Print it at least 2 cm across, leave the white border alone — that quiet zone is what a scanner uses to find the code — and never put it somewhere a customer would have to be driving to scan it.

Timing beats placement, either way. How to ask for a testimonial is about the moment, and it applies to a review the same way: ask when the job just went well, not on the first of the month.

It stays on Google. You cannot put it on your homepage, style it, quote the best line of it above your pricing, or keep it if the listing is ever suspended. Reviews and testimonials are different assets that people ask for in the same breath — testimonials vs reviews is the long version of that distinction, and the short version is that one builds a profile you rent and the other builds a page you own.

Testymo does not import Google reviews, and this tool does not change that — it is here because the ask is the same ask, and it is worth doing well. If you want the same customer’s words on your own site, the honest route is to collect them directly: the request generator writes the message, a Testymo form takes the answer with permission attached, and the HTML generator or an embed puts it on the page. Ask for both in one message and most people do both.

Is this an official Google tool?

No. This page is not made by, endorsed by, or affiliated with Google. It assembles a documented URL from an ID you paste, and draws a QR code of it. The lookup itself happens on Google’s own Place ID Finder, which is why that is a link rather than a box on this page.

Does my Place ID get sent anywhere?

No. The link is assembled and the QR drawn in your browser. There is no API key on this page and no request to look anything up — that is the trade that keeps the tool free and keeps your data yours.

What about the short g.page link Google gave me?

Use it if you have it. Google generates those from inside your Business Profile, and they are built on a different identifier than the Place ID — so no tool can derive one from the other, this one included. Both open the same review box.

Will the QR code stop working?

The code itself never expires; it is just a printed URL. What can change underneath it is the Place ID, if Google merges or reworks your listing. Scan your own printed code once or twice a year.

Can I offer a discount for leaving a review?

Don’t. Paying for reviews violates Google’s policies and gets listings penalised, and an incentivised review is worth less than none for the reason it was supposed to be worth something. Ask well and ask at the right moment instead.