Best UK Vet 2015… and the Winner is Blacks Vets, Dudley Hospital

The Best UK Vets Award was established by Vet Help Direct to celebrate the huge value of honest online client reviews, which are an excellent way of boosting a practice’s online reputation. Every year the Award organisers look at all reviews left on VetHelpDirect.com and Any-UK-Vet.co.uk, which means that every British veterinary practice is eligible to take part and win.

The number of 4* or higher reviews is used to determine the winner. Clients are asked to review the practice based on 5 areas of care: Respect for my animal, Professionalism, Friendliness, Cleanliness and Value for Money.

THE 2015 WINNERS

Blacks Vets – Dudley 258

Blacks Vets – Oldbury 232

Streatham Hill Vets – London 109

Goddard Veterinary Group – Gidea Park 66

THE GROWTH OF REVIEWING ONLINE

In its third year of judging this Award, the VetHelpDirect.com team was impressed  by the growing number of reviews left on vet practice websites.

Susie Samuel, Owner of VetHelpDirect.com comments: “The increase in reviews left on vet websites highlights that owners are increasingly turning to the internet to give feedback on a service and show their appreciation.  This in turn demonstrates the growing significance of an online reputation for vet practices.  Pet owners are more and more looking online for service recommendations and this is why we do everything we can to make the reviewing process easier for vet practices to implement and manage. Online vet reviews are at the heart of our vet directories.”

Vet Help Direct is determined to give a fair reflection of the vet practices in their online directories.   All reviews are subject to rigorous tests of authenticity, all are checked for duplicate IP addresses, email addresses and some reviewers are asked to provide evidence that they are recent clients of the practice. 

HOW YOU CAN INCREASE YOUR CHANCES NEXT YEAR!

If you are keen to enter in 2016 but don’t yet have a VetHelpDirect.com listing, prices start at just £17.50 per month.  All listings on the VetHelpDirect.com directory come with a free widget to pop onto your website, making it even easier for clients to find where to leave you reviews. If you haven’t embedded your widget yet, just ask us to send you the widget code to pass onto your web developer.

Alternatively you should all be listed on Any-UK-Vet.co.uk and the team analyse these listings too. 

If you want to encourage your clients to leave reviews here are our tips:

  • Email your clients with a link to where they can leave a review
  • Write a Facebook post encouraging all your clients who ‘like’ the practice to write a review.  Include an easy link.
  • Create a simple poster or flyer for the waiting room so people can review while they wait
  • Ask your reception staff to prompt clients before or after their appointment – verbally or with a little reminder card.

WHAT ARE THE PRIZES?

THE OVERALL WINNER PRIZE

By winning our award you will have built up a spectacular collection of reviews from happy, loyal clients and we will provide you with a ‘Best UK Vets Award’ badge / banner for your website.

As a special prize, and to celebrate your achievement, we will help you host an award ceremony! We will:

  • Provide food, drink and cake.
  • Present an awards certificate and banner.
  • Contact up to four local publications of your choice with a press release (raising awareness of your practice within the local community and online press will help your Google ranking).
  • Send out a branded email to any clients you wish to invite.
  • As well as all that, we are giving the winning practice a team night out up to the value of £250 as a well done to all the hard working members of staff that have been so well reviewed!

THE RUNNERS UP PRIZES

Silver, Bronze and Runners Up will all receive a ‘Best UK Vets Award’ badge / banner for their websites.

PREVIOUS WINNERS

2014: Arun Veterinary Group in Pulborough, Sussex (180 positive reviews)

2013: Barton Lodge Vets in Hemel Hempstead (72 positive reviews)

TERMS AND CONDITIONS FOR WINNING PRACTICE

VetHelpDirect.com will provide a certificate and banner for the practice. We will provide £250.00 for the practice to enjoy a night out for all members of staff. We will be present for the award ceremony immediately followed by a 1hr drinks reception. We will provide nibbles, cake, cold soft drinks & bucks fizz for up to 60 guests, the practice is responsible for providing for any dietary requirements except vegetarians. The venue for the award presentation and all associated health & safety and fire regulations are the responsibility of the veterinary practice. We will send out one email to the practice’s clients as an announcement / invitation, the practice is responsible for providing client email addresses for this. We will write a press release and contact up to four local publications of the practice’s choice, we cannot guarantee the story will be published but we will chase these publications a reasonable number of times. Cleaning up is the responsibility of the practice. It is the responsibility of the practice to handle rsvps and provide us with a final number of attendees prior to the award ceremony

FOR MORE INFORMATION

For more details on building up client reviews please call 0845 4961204 or email kim@vethelpdirect.com.  For more media information please contact fritha@vethelpdirect.com or 07776 184083