How we score businesses
Every business on DFW Pros carries a score from 0 to 100. It is computed from public data on a published formula, the same one described on this page. No business can pay to raise it, and no business can pay to have it removed.
What goes into the score
7 factors, weighted as follows. Each is scored 0–100 on its own, then combined. When we have not measured a factor yet, it counts as a neutral 50 rather than a zero, and the listing says so.
Review sentiment
24%What reviewers actually say, not just the star they picked. Reviews are read for recurring themes such as punctuality, cleanup, pricing transparency and callback responsiveness, then scored on the balance of positive to negative language.
Star rating
22%Google star rating, adjusted so a 5.0 from three reviews does not outrank a 4.7 from four hundred. We pull ratings toward the category average until enough reviews exist to trust the number, then discount businesses carrying an unusual share of one and two star reviews behind a high average.
Review volume
14%How many people have weighed in, on a diminishing scale. The jump from 10 reviews to 100 counts for far more than the jump from 400 to 500.
Direction of travel
14%Whether the business is getting better or worse. We compare the ratings left over the last year against the year before it. A company on the way up and a company on the way down can sit at the same average, and that average is the last thing to move.
Recency
10%How recent the reviews are. A business that was excellent in 2019 and silent since is not the same bet as one with steady feedback this year.
Response to complaints
10%How often the owner publicly replies to reviews, weighted heavily toward the critical ones. Anyone can thank a five star review. Answering the customer who says the work went wrong is what shows you how a business responds when something goes wrong for you.
Profile completeness
6%Whether the business publishes the basics: working website, listed hours, service details, photos. Incomplete profiles are harder to verify and score lower.
Why star ratings alone are not enough
Among the 4285 businesses we score, the median Google rating is 4.9 and 76% sit at 4.8 or above. Sorting by stars puts almost everyone in a tie, which is why sentiment carries the most weight. The score reads what people actually wrote, not the star they clicked.
A business with hundreds of reviews at the top of that band can still have a recurring pattern of missed appointments, unresolved callbacks, or billing surprises in the text of those reviews. When that happens, the score reflects it and the business ranks lower than its star average would suggest.
The specifics
- Ratings are adjusted for confidence
- A rating is pulled toward a baseline of 3.8 until a business has around 25 reviews. A 5.0 from three reviews does not outrank a 4.7 from four hundred.
- Review volume has diminishing returns
- Volume is scored on a curve that flattens around 250 reviews, so a national chain cannot bury a well-reviewed independent on count alone.
- Recent feedback counts for more
- Reviews from the last 180 days receive full credit, tapering to none beyond 3 years. We use the median review age, so a single recent review cannot mask years of silence.
- Direction is measured year over year
- We compare the ratings left in the last 1 year against the year before it, and only when both periods hold at least 5 reviews. A swing of 0.5 of a star is treated as a full move. Holding steady scores in the middle, not at the bottom, because a business that has been consistently good for years is not underperforming.
- Replies to unhappy customers count for most
- Of the response score, 65% comes from replies to reviews of 3 stars or fewer. Thanking a five star review is easy. A business with no critical reviews is scored on its overall reply rate instead, not marked down for the absence.
- A high average can still hide a pattern
- Once a business has 20 reviews, we look at the shape of the histogram, not just the average. A wall of fives with a seam of ones behind it is discounted by up to 15%. Those one star reviews are usually where the watch-outs come from.
- Thin evidence means no score
- A business needs at least 5 reviews before we publish a score. Below that we do not have enough to say anything defensible.
- Missing data is not the same as bad data
- When we have not measured a factor yet, it counts as a neutral 50 out of 100 and the listing shows it as not measured. It is not scored as a zero, because we have no evidence the business did badly. It is also not dropped and the other weights rescaled, because that would quietly award the business its own average on a factor nobody checked, and would mean the listings we know the least about score the highest.
How we write the pros and watch-outs
Every claim on a listing, every strength and every caution, has to be supported by at least 2 separate reviews before it is published. One person’s experience is an anecdote, not a pattern.
Claims that fail that test are discarded rather than reworded. This is why some businesses show two strengths and others show five, and why some show no cautions at all. We do not manufacture balance, and we do not pad a page to make it look complete.
When we read reviews, we deliberately include critical ones rather than sampling the most recent. A business with two hundred glowing reviews and six complaints will have those six read.
Pages we refuse to build
A ranked list is only useful when there is a real field to rank. We do not publish a “best of” page unless we have at least 10 scored businesses in that category, or 5 for a single city. Head-to-head comparisons require both businesses to be scored and reasonably close.
If we do not have the depth, the page does not exist. There is no version of this site where a page lists two businesses and calls it a ranking.
What money cannot do
- No business can pay for a higher score or a better rank.
- No business can pay to remove a caution that its reviews support.
- If we ever sell advertising or featured placement, it will be labeled as such and excluded from the ranked list.
Businesses can ask us to correct factual errors: a wrong phone number, an outdated address, a closed location. They cannot ask us to change a rating or remove an accurate summary of what their customers wrote. Contact us to report an error.
How a business gets on a list
Every business here has a Google Business Profile, and every profile has categories the owner picked to describe their own work. We use those categories to decide which lists a business belongs on. We do not add categories a business never claimed.
Most of the time we accept any category on the profile. A general contractor who also remodels kitchens belongs on both lists, and we would rather show you every real option than only the specialists.
For a few trades we only use the main category the owner chose. A house cleaning company and a commercial janitorial company are not the same business, even though Google lets both carry the same label. When the gap between two trades is that wide, we go with the one the owner listed first.
If you run a business and you are missing from a list you should be on, or showing up on one you should not be, contact us and tell us which category. We will take a look.
Where the data comes from
Business details and reviews come from public Google Business Profiles. Review analysis is produced by software reading that review text and is reviewed against the citation rules above before publication. We do not invent details about pricing, certifications, service areas, or history.
Scores are recomputed as new reviews arrive, so a business’s position can change without anything on this page changing.
Who maintains this
Brad Williams built and maintains the DFW Pros scoring rubric, the review-analysis pipeline behind it, and the correction process for businesses that believe a listing is wrong.
Brad Williams, Editor, DFW Pros. The rankings themselves are computed from the rubric above rather than assembled by hand, so this byline claims the method and the standards, not a personal verdict on any individual business.