Facebook recommendation requests by text
Facebook replaced star reviews with recommendations: a customer is asked whether they recommend the business, and writes a short note. Asking a customer for one is permitted.
Asking only the customers who seemed pleased is not. Facebook treats it as deceptive, Google prohibits it outright and enforces that as of April 2026, and the FTC takes the same view. So the request Textstr sends is the same for every customer.
How the request works
Asked once, after the visit
One request per customer, timed to the end of the conversation and sent inside your opening hours. Nobody gets chased.
The same message for everyone
No survey first, no branching on the answer. The link points at your Page and the customer writes what they think.
A private route offered alongside, not instead
The text carries a way to reply straight to you, shown to everyone next to the recommendation link rather than swapped in when a customer seems unhappy.
What you can see
Who was asked, who opened the link, and who has already been asked.
Recommendations and reviews are not the same thing
Worth knowing before you compare tools. A Facebook recommendation is a yes or no plus a comment, not a star rating, and the Page shows the proportion who recommend you. Some vendors still describe Facebook in star rating language, which tells you how recently they looked.
Recommendations also only appear on Pages with the reviews tab enabled, which is a Page setting rather than anything a texting tool controls.
Frequently asked questions
Can I ask customers to recommend my business on Facebook?
Yes. Asking is permitted. What is not permitted is asking selectively based on how satisfied a customer appears, or offering anything in exchange.
Is Facebook review gating against the rules?
Yes. Filtering who gets asked is treated as deceptive across the major platforms, and Google now actively enforces against it. A tool that offers to route unhappy customers away from the public review is offering you a problem.
Why text rather than email for this?
Because the request has to arrive while the visit is still fresh and in a channel the customer actually opens. If your business already answers customers by text, you are already in that channel.
Can I reply to recommendations from Textstr?
Replying to a recommendation happens on your Facebook Page. Textstr's job here is the asking, and keeping track of who has been asked.
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