Playbook
Google review replies drafted in ChatGPT
Direct answer
A reply to a Google review should use the customer's words and your own policy, then be posted by you. ChatGPT can shorten the tone. It must not invent a visit, a refund, or a discount. Google's help page is how replies are managed. Nothing here posts overnight. This guide has not been live-tested.
- Time to set up
- About 30 minutes to write the rules, then a few minutes a review
- Difficulty
- beginner
- Monthly cost, USD
- $0 to try, or $20 if you already pay for Plus
- Monthly cost, GBP
- £0 to try, or about £15 if you pay for Plus
- Last tested
- Not yet tested
- Updated
- 25 October 2026
The free ChatGPT plan can draft a reply until you hit the cap. Plus was listed at $20 a month before tax on 24 October 2026, about £15 at £1 = $1.33. The pricing page did not return a price in the text fetched on 25 October 2026. Reopen it before you subscribe. Replying in Google Business Profile has no separate fee in this guide.
GBP figures are a budgeting conversion at £1 = $1.33 and €1 = £0.86, rounded to the nearest pound, fixed for this edition on 24 October 2026. They are not a live rate and not a quote. Vendor list prices are usually quoted before tax.
Primary tool: ChatGPT
Who it is for
A salon, cafe, or shop owner who means to answer Google reviews and wants a draft, with the post button left in their own hands.
Questions that arrive by email are the FAQ draft. A post about work you did is the Buffer queue. A review is neither of those. It is one public paragraph, checked, then posted by hand.
If the same complaint arrives in a website chat, the Tidio guide tells the widget to stop and hand it to you.
What you need
- A Google Business Profile you control.
- Two sentences of policy: what you do about a complaint, and what you never offer in public.
- The habit of reading the review before you paste a draft.
Step by step
01
Write the public rules in your own words
On a note only you see, write what a reply may say. Thank them. If something went wrong, say you will take it up by phone or email, and give the address. Do not offer a voucher, a free service, or a refund amount unless that exact offer is already your written policy. Do not ask the customer to delete the review.
02
Copy the review they actually wrote
Open the review in Google Business Profile. Copy the star rating and the text. If there is no text, the draft can only thank them for the rating. Do not tell the model what you think they meant. A review you paraphrase from memory is how a reply answers a complaint they did not make.
03
Ask for a short draft with the rules pasted in
In ChatGPT, paste the rules and the review. Ask for under 80 words, in the first person, with no new facts about the visit. Tell it to leave a gap, marked BLANK, if a reply would require a detail you did not provide. You are not pasting a customer's phone number, a child's name, or a health note from a salon card.
04
Delete anything you would not say at the till
Read the draft aloud. Remove a discount, a blame of staff, or a detail that was not in the review. If it is thin, a shorter reply is better than a colourful one. The model is smoothing tone. You are responsible for the sentence that stays on the profile.
05
Post it yourself in Google Business Profile
Google's help page on managing reviews is the screen for the reply. Paste the draft there and press the button yourself. Do not connect a tool that replies when you are closed. A wrong public sentence is harder to unwind than a slow one. If the screen does not match the help page, stop and use the contact form.
What can go wrong
An automatic reply overnight
This guide has no scheduler and no auto-post. Buffer can queue a post about the work. It is not the reply to a review.
A voucher the policy does not mention
A public discount is an offer. If your note does not allow it, the draft must not contain it. Delete the sentence.
Arguing a fact you cannot prove
If the review is wrong, be brief and take the detail offline. Inventing a version of the visit is worse than a short reply.
UK notes
Costs, including VAT
Drafting on the free plan is £0. Plus at the 24 October 2026 list price of $20 is about £15 at the planning rate, before tax, and that figure was not re-confirmed in page text on 25 October. Replying on Google Business Profile is not given a price in this guide. VAT on a ChatGPT invoice is a software cost, separate from any goodwill gesture you choose to make offline.
Data flow
A review is already public. The customer's name on it is still personal data. Do not paste their phone number, email, or booking record into the chat. The reply you post is public too. UK GDPR still applies to how you handle the person behind the review if you then email them. PECR applies to that email if it is marketing. A reply that says 'we have emailed you' should be true.
HMRC and Making Tax Digital
Nothing in this habit is a tax record. A goodwill refund, if you later make one, belongs in your usual books, not in the public reply. This page does not decide whether a refund is due. Consumer rights are a legal question. The draft is not advice on them.
Practical orientation for a UK reader. Not tax, legal, or accounting advice.
Test log
Status: Pending first test
25 October 2026 · pending
Pending first test. The steps were compiled from Google's review-management help and have not been used on a live Business Profile.
Sources
- Manage customer reviews — Google Business Profile Help — accessed 25 October 2026
- ChatGPT pricing — accessed 24 October 2026
- ICO guide to UK GDPR — accessed 25 October 2026
Disclosure
AgentShed is independent and this playbook is not sponsored. There is no affiliate link on this page. If that changes, the link will use rel="sponsored" and a sentence beside it will say so. The verdict is not for sale.
Questions people ask
Can Buffer post the reply?
No. Buffer queues posts you wrote about the business. A review reply is typed into Google Business Profile by you. Mixing the two is how a caption answers a complaint.
What if I have nothing polite to say?
Then do not post. Silence is allowed. A draft that picks a fight is not a requirement of having a profile.
Does this remove bad reviews?
No. Google's help page is about managing reviews, including how you reply. This playbook does not claim a review will be taken down, and it does not ask the customer to delete one.
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Related playbooks
When this page is re-tested
One email when the log changes. No sequence of lessons.