Section 1
The artifact: the 30-day review-migration plan
Here is the whole plan on one page. The rest of the article explains each move and gives you the scripts. Work it in order. Each phase feeds the next.
Section 2
Why this works: three ways to look at the problem
This plan is built on three simple models of what a review actually is. Seeing all three keeps you from making the common mistake of treating reviews as data to be copied. A review is portable proof, not portable data. The star rating locked in Checkatrade's database cannot leave. But the fact that a real customer praised a real job is yours to retell, as long as you attribute it honestly. Proof migrates by being re-presented. Data does not migrate at all. A review is a trust signal that has to sit where buyers look. A five-star history is only worth something at the moment a buyer checks it. Post-purchase, most home-service buyers check Google and your own site. Moving equity means getting fresh signal onto the surfaces buyers actually look at when they are deciding, which for an owned strategy means your Google Business Profile first. A review is a relationship you can reactivate. Every review was written by a customer who once liked you enough to say so. That person is reachable. The fastest way to rebuild owned equity is not to chase strangers, it is to go back to people who already vouched for you and ask them to vouch again somewhere you keep. Hold those three together and the plan writes itself: catalogue the proof, stand up the owned surfaces, re-present what you can, and re-ask the people who already said yes.
Section 3
Phase 1: Inventory (days 1 to 3)
Open every platform you are on and build one simple list. For each review capture: the customer's name (or first name and initial), the date, the job type, the star rating, and the text. A spreadsheet is fine. The last column is the important one. Reviews from the last 12 to 24 months are your re-solicitation gold, because those customers remember you and probably still have your number in their phone. Flag every one where you still have a contact detail.
Section 4
Phase 2: Stand up owned destinations (days 1 to 5)
You need two places you control for reviews to land. Your Google Business Profile. This is the priority. It is free, you own it, and it shows in local search and maps where buyers look. Claim and verify it if you have not. Make sure the categories, service area, phone, and hours are correct, because a half-finished profile converts a review-checker into a bounce. Get your unique "leave a review" short link ready to paste into messages. A testimonials page on your own site. A simple page you control, where customer praise lives on your domain and helps you in search. This is where mirrored proof and future quotes go. A note on Google reviews and honesty: Google's policies prohibit fake or incentivised reviews. Everything in this playbook is about asking real customers for genuine reviews of real work. Do not offer payment or discounts for reviews, and do not copy a customer's Angi review into Google as if they wrote it there. Mirroring (phase 3) belongs on your own site with clear attribution. Fresh Google reviews (phase 4) must be written by the customer.
Section 5
Phase 3: Mirror existing proof onto your site (days 3 to 10)
You can legitimately republish praise on your own testimonials page as long as you attribute it truthfully. The clean way to say it: "Review originally left on Checkatrade, April 2025." That is honest, it is not passing a platform review off as a native one, and it puts the track record on a surface you own. Prioritise your best and most specific reviews, the ones that name the job, the outcome, and something human. Ten specific, attributed testimonials on your own page outperform fifty vague stars you do not control. If you want extra strength, message the customer first: "Hi Jane, you left us a lovely review on Checkatrade last year. We are featuring customer stories on our own website now. Are you happy for us to include your words there?" A yes turns a mirrored quote into a named, permission-backed testimonial, and it warms the customer up for phase 4.
Section 6
Phase 4: Re-solicit recent customers (days 7 to 25)
This is the engine of the whole migration. Go back to every reachable customer from the last 12 to 24 months and ask for a fresh review on Google and, if they are willing, your site. These people already like you. The ask is small and the yield is high. Keep it personal, short, and easy. Send the direct review link so they do not have to hunt for it. Text / WhatsApp script (UK and US): Hi Jane, it's [Name] from [Firm]. We're building up our reviews on Google now, and yours would mean a lot given the boiler job we did last spring. It takes about a minute here: [Google review link]. Thank you either way. Email script: Subject: A quick favour, Jane Hi Jane, [Name] here from [Firm]. You were kind enough to give us great feedback after we replaced your boiler last year. We're now gathering our reviews on Google, where new customers tend to look first. If you have a spare minute, here's the direct link: [Google review link]. No pressure at all, and thank you for trusting us with the work. [Name], [Firm], [Phone] Rules that lift response: send within business hours, send individually not as a visible group blast, always include the direct link, and never offer anything in exchange. If someone does not respond, one gentle reminder after a week is fine. Two is pestering. Pace yourself. A sudden flood of reviews on a brand-new profile can look unnatural. Spreading requests across two to three weeks reads as organic, which it is.
Section 7
Phase 5: Build the standing engine (days 20 to 30)
The migration fails if you rebuild your equity once and then let it stagnate while the platform's number keeps climbing. The fix is to make a review request a fixed step of every completed job, forever. Install one simple trigger: when a job is marked complete, the customer gets a thank-you and the review link, ideally within a day while the good work is fresh. It can be a manual text from the office, a step in your CRM, or a line on the invoice. The mechanism matters less than the consistency. A firm that asks every happy customer, every time, will out-accumulate the platform on channels it owns within a year.
Section 8
What this costs you, honestly
Two things. Time, mostly in phases 1 and 4, realistically several hours of focused outreach. And a temporary gap, because for a while your owned review count will be smaller than the platform history you spent years building. That gap is the real cost of platform dependence finally showing up on the bill. It shrinks every week you run the engine, and unlike the platform's number, everything you build here follows you if you ever move, rebrand, or fire the platform for good. There is one thing this playbook cannot do: it cannot recover the compounding you would already have if you had been collecting owned reviews from day one. That head start is gone. The second-best time to start owning your reputation is now.
Section 9
Fitness test
You are ready to migrate your review equity if you have your Google Business Profile verified, a testimonials page you control, and a list of reachable recent customers to re-ask. You are not ready to quit the platform yet if your entire five-star history lives inside its product and you have not moved a single review onto ground you own. Do not cancel the account first. Move the equity first, then leave. The reviews were never really the platform's leverage. Your failure to build the same proof somewhere you own was.