How to Get More Google Reviews for Your Fencing Business

A new fence isn’t a decision most homeowners make on a Tuesday afternoon. It’s a few thousand dollars, it sits on the property line for the next 15-20 years, and it usually involves at least one uncomfortable conversation with a neighbor about where exactly the posts are going. So people research. They get three or four quotes, they read reviews for each company, and they take weeks to decide before anyone even sets foot on their property.

That research phase is where fence companies actually compete — long before a crew shows up, long before a quote gets compared line by line. Whoever looks most trustworthy on Google when the homeowner is narrowing down who to even call gets the shot. Everyone else doesn’t.

Why reviews matter more at the quote stage than any other stage

Fencing has one of the longest consideration cycles of any home service. Unlike a burst pipe or a dead AC unit, nobody needs a fence installed today. There’s no urgency forcing a fast decision, which means the homeowner has time to do exactly what most people do with time: compare options carefully before committing to any of them.

That comparison happens almost entirely online before a phone ever rings. A homeowner planning a fence project typically searches, scans five or six companies’ Google profiles, and mentally shortlists two or three worth calling for a quote — the rest never get contacted at all, not because they’d have done bad work, but because they never made the shortlist. Reviews are the single biggest factor in that shortlist decision, ahead of website quality, ahead of how the company’s truck looks, ahead of almost everything except maybe a direct referral.

There’s also a trust dimension specific to fencing that doesn’t show up the same way in most trades. A fence sits on a property line, which means permits, easements, and occasionally an awkward conversation with whoever’s on the other side of it. Homeowners are choosing a company to represent them in that situation, not just swing a post-hole digger — so reviews that mention professionalism, clear communication, and getting the boundary right carry extra weight here. A review that says “showed up on time and the fence looks great” helps. A review that says “handled the property line question with our neighbor without it turning into a thing” does more.

The best moment to ask

Don’t ask the moment the crew finishes and collects payment. Wait until the customer has actually lived with the fence for a few days.

A fresh fence looks finished the moment it’s built, but “finished” and “solid” aren’t the same thing yet in the customer’s head. Gates need to swing right after they’ve been opened and closed a dozen times, posts need to feel steady after the ground settles a little, and the customer needs a few days of just looking at it from their kitchen window before the “this was worth it” feeling really sets in. Ask on install day and you get a review about a nice-looking fence. Ask a few days later, after a final walkthrough confirms everything’s tight and working, and you get a review from someone who’s actually confirmed they made the right call — which reads as more credible to the next homeowner comparing quotes.

Example request text

A few days after final walkthrough and payment:

Hi Renee, this is Colton from Perimeter Fence Co — hope the new fence has held up well this week and the gate’s swinging the way it should. If you have a minute, we’d really appreciate a quick Google review: [link]

After a project that involved a shared property-line conversation with a neighbor:

Hey Marcus, thanks again for working with us on the fence line — glad we could get that squared away with your neighbor without any headaches. If you don’t mind, a quick Google review helps other folks in the area find us: [link]

The second one exists because that specific kind of job — where the company handled something potentially awkward smoothly — produces exactly the review that wins the next customer’s trust at the research stage. Naming it directly reminds the customer that’s worth mentioning, instead of leaving it to chance that they think to bring it up.

For more request language you can adapt, see our text message examples.

The objection: “Most of our business is referrals and repeat neighbors, not cold search”

This is common in fencing more than most trades — a lot of companies genuinely do get a big share of work from word of mouth in a neighborhood after one good fence goes up and three neighbors notice. It’s a fair point, and it’s also missing something.

A referral isn’t a done deal. When a neighbor says “call Colton, he did ours,” most people still pull up the company on Google before calling — not because they distrust the referral, but because it’s a habit at this point, and a fence is expensive enough that a quick gut-check feels reasonable even after a personal recommendation. If that search turns up six reviews from two years ago, the warm lead gets a little colder. If it turns up forty recent reviews with a strong rating, the referral gets confirmed instantly and the call happens without hesitation.

So a thin review profile doesn’t just cost you cold search traffic. It quietly taxes the referrals you’re already getting — some percentage of warm leads talk themselves out of calling, or call a competitor “just to compare,” because the online presence didn’t back up what their neighbor told them. You never see that lost call in your numbers, because it never became a lead you could track. It just didn’t happen.

What this looks like without manual follow-up

A fence company doing a handful of large jobs a week doesn’t have the same volume problem a lawn care company does — but the jobs are spread out enough, and the crews busy enough, that a manual “text everyone a few days after their walkthrough” system tends to slip. Someone gets missed, someone gets asked too early, and the review that would’ve mentioned the neighbor situation never gets asked for at all because nobody wrote it down to follow up.

Review River automates the timing: a 5-touch sequence (2 texts, 3 personalized photo emails with the customer’s name on the image) triggers off job completion and spaces itself out automatically, so the right customer gets asked at the right moment without anyone on your team tracking it by hand. For the mechanics of why sequencing and timing matter this much, see our complete guide to getting more Google reviews.

Fence projects often run alongside other exterior work — a gutter replacement before a fall storm season, or landscape lighting installed once the new fence line is set. The same review-timing principles apply to both; see our guides for gutter installation and outdoor lighting.

The bottom line

Fence companies win or lose most of their business before a quote ever gets discussed — at the research stage, where reviews decide who even gets a call. Ask a few days after the walkthrough, once the customer has confirmed the fence is solid, and don’t assume a strong referral network makes your review count optional. It doesn’t. It just makes the cost of skipping reviews harder to see.

Want to see this running automatically on your own customer list? Review River’s 14-day trial lets you watch the requests go out before you pay a dollar — no contract, nothing for you to set up.