Google Review Tracking

TL;DR: I’ve created an automated solution for tracking Google reviews using AWS services. The best part? You can implement it yourself! Check out the full code and setup instructions on GitHub: google-review-email-processor

A small business owner came to me with a tricky problem: he needed a way to track which customers had left reviews for his business and which hadn’t. His goal was simple—avoid bothering customers who had already left a review with additional requests. Straightforward, right? Not quite.

The Initial Game Plan: APIs and Dead Ends

I started by checking out the APIs Google offers. I mean, that’s where all the reviews live, so it made sense, right?

Google Maps API: Looked promising, but it only gives a handful of reviews. No dice.
Google Business API: This is application only. I applied and got rejected. Bummer.

I even toyed with the idea of web scraping, but quickly decided it wasn’t a good idea. Too expensive, too fiddly to maintain, and let’s be real – Google probably wouldn’t be too thrilled about it.

The Lightbulb Moment: Email to the Rescue!

Just when I was about to throw in the towel, ping – an email notification for a new review popped up. And that’s when it hit me.

Google sends out an email every single time someone leaves a review for your business. And guess what? They have all the data I needed:

A snippet of the review
The reviewer’s name
The star rating

Bingo! I had found my data source.

The Solution: Putting the Pieces Together

Email Forwarding Magic: Set up a rule to bounce those Google review notifications over to an AWS SES address.
AWS SES: Receives the email and stores it to S3.
Lambda Function:
- Listen for new emails on S3.
- Parse the reviewer name, review snippet, and rating.
- Do a fuzzy match on the CRM to mark the customer as having left a review.

And just like that, I had an automated system keeping the CRM up-to-date with all the review info.

Why I Love This Solution

Wallet-Friendly: AWS SES and Lambda costs near nothing. The S3 bucket is configured to delete emails after 1 day, so the storage costs are minimal.
No Polling Necessary: Google will notify us when new reviews are submitted. No need to constantly check for new reviews.
Hands-Off: Once it’s set up, it should just do its thing. Set it and forget it!
Scalable: It should work for any size business, given Lambda’s ability to scale.
Plays Nice: I’m not stepping on any toes or breaking any rules. It’s all above board.

Implement It Yourself: The GitHub Repo

GitHub Repository: google-review-email-processor

What’s in the repo: