Can I Choose Which Customers Receive My Google Review Link?

Yes, you can control exactly who receives your Google review request by sending individual invitations, uploading custom contact lists, or setting specific automation rules in your CRM. However, you must comply with Google review policies, which strictly forbid "review gating"—the practice of screening customers first and only sending Google review links to those who report a positive experience. As long as your selection process is based on standard business operations (such as job completion status or customer type) rather than feedback filtering, choosing who gets a request is completely compliant.

Google’s Policy: Selection vs. Review Gating

Before choosing which customers receive review links, it is critical to understand the line between smart list management and policy violations.

Google’s guidelines state that business owners cannot "discourage or prohibit negative reviews or selectively solicit positive reviews from customers." This rule specifically targets two practices:

Review Gating: Sending an email or SMS asking, "How did we do?" with thumbs up/down icons, where a "thumbs up" redirects to Google and a "thumbs down" opens a private feedback form.
Sentiment Filtering: Calling or surveying a customer first to confirm they are happy, and only sending a Google review link if they verbally give a 5-star answer.

Google penalizes accounts that engage in review gating. Penalties range from removing affected reviews to completely suspending the Google Business Profile.

What Google Does Allow

You are allowed to decide which business segments or workflows trigger a review request. For example, you can choose to:

Send review requests only to residential homeowners, excluding commercial sub-contractors.
Send requests only after a job invoice is marked as paid in full.
Exclude specific clients who have ongoing billing disputes or open scope-of-work issues.

SoTrustworthy is built to be 100% compliant with Google's guidelines. We do not use review gating or sentiment forms. Every review request sent through our SMS-first workflow directs the customer straight to your Google Business Profile.

How to Control Who Receives Links in SoTrustworthy

SoTrustworthy gives local businesses total flexibility over who receives review requests. Depending on your business model, you can choose between manual selection, bulk list uploads, or automated CRM workflows.

1. Manual One-Off Requests

If you run a high-ticket or lower-volume business (like a kitchen remodeling company or specialized dental practice), you may prefer to send review requests manually after confirming a project is finished.

Navigate to your SoTrustworthy dashboard.
Click Send Request.
Enter the customer's first name, phone number, and optional email address.
Click Send.

The customer receives a personalized, SMS-first review request immediately. This approach gives you 100% manual control over every single recipient.

2. Targeted CSV Uploads

If you perform dozens of jobs a week and want to review your list before sending, you can upload a CSV file of selected contacts.

Export your completed jobs from your billing or dispatch software at the end of the day or week.
Remove any contacts you do not want to survey (e.g., internal staff, warranty callbacks, or commercial accounts).
Upload the clean file into SoTrustworthy.

This method allows you to batch your outreach while maintaining full control over the recipient list.

3. CRM Integration Triggers (Jobber & HubSpot)

For busy home-service businesses—like plumbers, HVAC technicians, and house cleaners—manual data entry takes up valuable time. SoTrustworthy integrates directly with platforms like Jobber and HubSpot to automate requests based on rules you define.

You can set up specific logic inside your software so that only qualified jobs trigger a request:

Jobber Rules: Set SoTrustworthy to trigger an SMS request automatically when a job status moves to "Closed" or when an invoice is "Paid." You can create a job tag in Jobber called No-Review and instruct SoTrustworthy to skip any job carrying that tag.
HubSpot Rules: Create a workflow where a review request is sent only when a deal reaches the "Closed Won" stage and the field "Customer Type" equals "Residential."

Automating through CRM triggers ensures that review requests go out consistently without requiring daily admin work, while still honoring your business rules.

Safe Ways to Filter Requests Without Violating Policies

To protect your brand and stay inside Google’s terms of service, implement operational criteria to filter your recipient lists. Here are standard, policy-compliant ways to filter who receives review links:

Exclude Commercial vs. Residential Accounts

Many contractors perform work for both individual homeowners and commercial property managers. Commercial jobs often involve multiple managers, invoice delays, and corporate policies prohibiting employees from leaving public reviews. Filtering your automation to target only residential line-items is a clean, compliant strategy.

Filter by Job Status or Tags

Instruct your field technicians to tag jobs in your field software based on operational outcome.

Good tags to include: Job Complete, Invoice Paid, Installation Finished.
Tags to exclude: Warranty Call, Return Visit Required, Billing Dispute, Do Not Solicit.

Because these tags describe the status of the job—not a pre-screened review score—excluding them from your review engine is completely acceptable.

Use Built-in Request Throttling

Repeatedly texting the same customer every time you service their property will annoy them and increase opt-out rates. SoTrustworthy includes an automatic review-request throttling feature across all plans (Starter, Growth, and Pro).

If a plumber visits the same home three times in two weeks to fix separate minor issues, SoTrustworthy’s throttling engine automatically blocks duplicate review requests from going to that number within a set time frame (e.g., 60 or 90 days). You do not need to manually check if a repeat customer received a link last week; our platform manages that safety barrier for you.

SMS Opt-Outs and Legal Compliance

When choosing who receives review links via text message, federal laws and carrier rules must be respected. In the United States, SMS communication is regulated under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) and A2P 10DLC carrier registration standards.

SoTrustworthy handles SMS compliance automatically:

Opt-Out Processing: Every text request includes clear opt-out instructions (e.g., "Reply STOP to unsubscribe").
Automatic Blacklisting: If a customer replies STOP, SoTrustworthy immediately flags that phone number across your account. Future review requests—whether triggered manually, via CSV, or through Jobber/HubSpot—will be blocked automatically.
Time-of-Day Restrictions: Requests are queued to send only during legal, local business hours so customers aren't awakened by late-night texts.

Summary: Best Practices for Selecting Recipients

To maintain a steady flow of high-quality Google reviews without risking your profile:

Avoid sentiment pre-screening: Never ask customers how many stars they would give you before deciding whether to send them a Google link.
Use operational tags: Filter contacts in your CRM based on job completion, account type, or open issues.
Send promptly: Request reviews within 24 to 48 hours of service completion while the positive experience is fresh.
Rely on throttling: Let SoTrustworthy prevent over-messaging repeat clients.

If you are currently on our 14-day trial or managing your Growth or Pro plan, you can adjust your CRM filtering rules and throttling limits directly in your SoTrustworthy account settings at any time.

Next Steps

Set up CRM exclusion tags: Learn how to create custom tags in Jobber or HubSpot to automatically bypass specific contacts.
Configure throttling rules: Adjust the default waiting period between review requests for repeat customers in your SoTrustworthy dashboard.
Review Google's guidelines: Read our complete breakdown of Google review policies to ensure your customer communication remains 100% compliant.

Ask every customer for a review—without review gating.

SoTrustworthy sends a compliant, perfectly-timed review request to every customer after the job — no filtering, no gating, just more honest 5-star reviews on Google.

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