Asking customers for reviews is allowed and encouraged. A few specific things are not, and the penalties land on your Google Business Profile rather than on whoever sold you the hardware. Worth ten minutes.
Allowed
- Asking any customer to leave a review, in person, by email, or with a card, sign or tag.
- Making it easier to find your review page, which is the entire job of an NFC tag.
- Offering a private feedback channel so people can reach you directly. It has to be available to everybody.
Not allowed
- Offering money, discounts or free items in exchange for a review.
- Writing reviews for your own business, or asking staff, family or an agency to.
- Buying reviews.
- Selectively asking only customers you expect to be positive.
The one that catches businesses out
Some sellers pair a card with a page that asks how your visit went, and only shows the Google link to customers who rate highly. Everybody else gets a private form and never reaches Google.
This is known as review gating and Google prohibits it. Reviews have been removed and profiles penalised for it, and the business carries that risk rather than the company that sold the card.
A private feedback channel is fine and useful. It just cannot decide who is allowed to leave a public review. If a product page advertises smart routing, or that five-star customers go public, ask the seller how it works before you buy.
On review velocity
Recent guidance on local ranking emphasises steady review flow over total count: a handful every month tends to be worth more than a burst followed by silence.
That favours a fixture somebody taps every day over a card that sits in a drawer, which is a practical argument for putting a tag where the customer already stands rather than buying one card and hoping.