SolarQuotes general manager Trevor Glen has urged solar installers to build trust with customers through real reviews, as new analysis shows a rise in searches related to buying fake testimonials.
Speaking at the Smart Energy South Australia 2026 event in Adelaide on Tuesday, Trevor said SolarQuotes regularly rejected offers from companies to create fake reviews and urged installers to do the same to avoid attracting the wrong attention from increasingly skeptical customers and the ACCC.
“We ourselves are offered the opportunity to buy fake reviews. Don’t use these services – don’t do it,” Trevor told the audience gathered at the Adelaide Convention Centre.
Why are fake reviews increasing?
Google search analysis by AnyBusiness.com.au found that searches for the term “buy fake reviews” have increased by 1,268% over the past year, with 21,000 people typing the term into the search bar in the last month alone.
Customers are also increasingly aware of the problem: searches for “fake business reviews” increased by 1,026% year-on-year to 68,000 searches per month. This data includes searches for all types of companies, not just solar companies.
So-called “review farms” are paid to generate large numbers of fake opinions from employees or AI chatbots and spread falsehoods on online review sites.
Mary Tamvakologos, managing director at AnyBusiness.com.au, says fake reviews are becoming a major trust issue for businesses of all stripes.
“We’re at a point where thousands of people are actively looking for ways to buy fake reviews every month, and even more people are trying to figure out whether the reviews they’re reading are real. This is a trust issue for every business…buying reviews is one of the biggest mistakes a business can make. Platforms like Google are constantly improving their systems for detecting suspicious review activity, and companies caught manipulating reviews risk being removed, losing customer trust, and in some cases theirs Business profiles will be restricted,” she said.
Real review responses build trust
SolarQuotes general manager Trevor Glen speaks at the Adelaide Convention Center on Tuesday.
“Fake or unanswered reviews are one of the top three reasons why installers’ applications to join the SolarQuotes network are rejected during the verification process,” Trevor told assembled Smart Energy attendees. SolarQuotes also takes a comprehensive approach to filter out fake testimonials from our proprietary solar installer and product reviews portal.
Trevor added that being authentic and responsive to customer feedback is an opportunity to build trust and urged installers to respond to every review, especially the bad ones – calmly and professionally, of course.
“Respond to every single review. It doesn’t matter if it’s a bad review or a good review. If it’s a good review, you can say, ‘Thank you, we really appreciate you being a customer.’ If you get a bad review, “Look, we made a mistake” – be honest, be transparent,” he said.
To see how installers respond to negative experiences, readers can filter SolarQuotes reviews to include only 1-star reviews.
Trevor said it was a good idea to encourage customers to leave a review after the work was done. But encouraging family and employees to leave reviews is a no-go, and proving that an installer offered customers money to remove a bad review is an instant deal-breaker during the SolarQuotes review process.
Fake images and fake claims
Responding to real reviews is one of the six visible signals installers can use to build trust with customers and pass the SolarQuotes review process, Trevor said. The others are:
- Follow up – Answer customer calls, provide quick responses, keep customers informed and stay in touch once deposit has been paid.
- Show real work – Use real photos of your work on your website, not AI images and stock photos of workers wearing hard hats, which most plumbers don’t actually wear on the job;
- Making honest claims – Only make claims you can back up, don’t inflate job numbers, or say your company has been around for 20 years with an easily verifiable two-year-old ABN.
- Trustworthy handling of money – Ask for a reasonable deposit of around 10%, including clear unit pricing and a plain language guarantee.
- Have a verifiable presence – Maintain a real, verifiable address, a proper business email address, an easy-to-find license and ABN, and a consistent name across all platforms.
Installers should avoid posting what we call “Harry Hard Hat” stock images on their website – show your real work instead.
How do you spot a fake review?
Here are some red flags the SolarQuotes team should look out for when reviewing reviews:
- A large number of reviews with few details – lots of one-word answers are a red flag.
- Significant number of reviews published all at once – how many installs did this company do in a day?
- Completely exaggerated praise – a high-quality solar system can make people happy, but it shouldn’t be one of the best moments in a reviewer’s life.
Fake reviews are often a glowing five-star verdict, but watch out for the opposite too. Fake negative reviews are also a problem – whether they’re paid for by a company looking to undermine a competitor or by a vengeful customer creating multiple profiles.
For real solar reviews from real Australian homeowners, search SolarQuotes’ installer, solar panel, home battery, home electric vehicle charger, hot water heat pump and air conditioner reviews portal.
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