Review gating (and why it's banned)
Asking how someone feels before deciding whether to ask for a review. It is prohibited, and the reason is worth understanding.
What is review gating?
Review gating is filtering who gets asked for a public review based on their likely sentiment, typically surveying customers first and only routing the happy ones to a public review page.
It is prohibited under Google’s review policies, and deceptive review practices are also addressed by the FTC’s rule on fake and deceptive reviews.
Why is review gating treated seriously?
Review gating makes a rating unrepresentative while looking organic. The whole value of a public rating rests on it reflecting the actual distribution of customer experience, gating quietly removes the left tail.
Enforcement risk is real, and the downside is losing the review asset you spent years building.
What can you do instead of gating reviews?
The alternative to gating is an unfiltered request. Ask everyone, the same way, every time. Make it easy. Respond well to the negative ones — a thoughtful reply does more for a reader than the complaint does damage.
If a systematic pattern of unhappy customers emerges, that is operational information worth having rather than something to filter out of view.
How do you check whether your own process gates reviews?
Walk your own review request process as a customer would. Does any step ask how satisfied someone is before deciding whether to request a public review?
If a survey routes happy customers one way and unhappy customers another, that is gating, regardless of what the software vendor calls it.
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