This guide is for course providers and their teams. Use it to choose who can leave a public review, approve or hide reviews, reply to reviewers and control where reviews and ratings appear.
Start in the Admin dashboard. Course Owners and System Admins can manage reviews. The profile visibility setting near the end of this guide needs a System Admin. If Reviews is missing from the menu, ask your System Admin to check your access. They can contact Cademy if the feature is not available on your account.
To create a Feedback form, see Set Up a Feedback Form for Your Courses. To ask participants for feedback, see Request Feedback from Course Participants. To read, correct or export every answer, see Read and Manage Form Responses.
What a public review contains
A feedback response is the set of answers one person sends through a Feedback form. It can include a public review, which is collected by the form’s Public Review block:
Overall rating: 1 to 5 stars. It is required whenever the block is shown to the person.
Your public review: optional written text.
Show my name on the public review: this box starts ticked. Left ticked, the review shows the person’s full name. Unticked, it shows their first name and last initial, such as “Alex M.”.
Breakdown ratings: six optional ratings, if you added them to the block: Material Covered, Facilitator, Organiser, Resources Provided, Location/Delivery and Communication.
Publishing a review does not publish the person’s other answers. Unticking the name box changes the public name only. It does not make the review private, and your team can still see who sent the response.
Verified on a review means Cademy matched it to a course registration. It does not mean Cademy checked what the review says or confirmed that the person attended. Other reviews show Unverified. Reviews imported from Google Maps or Facebook show neither label.
To add or remove the Public Review block or its breakdown ratings, see Set Up a Feedback Form for Your Courses.
Choose who can review and whether approval is needed
Example account Feedback & Reviews defaults. Save applies changes on this settings page.
Example course Who can leave a review choices, including Account default.
Open Settings > Feedback & Reviews to choose the account defaults.
Under Publish public reviews, choose Automatically, as soon as they are submitted, After I approve them or Never. Turn on Only attendees can leave reviews if a person must have a registration for a course to use Add Review on that course’s page.
Select Save. Check for Feedback & Reviews settings saved.
For a course-specific choice, open Courses > choose the course > Edit Course > Settings > Feedback & Reviews.
Set Publish public reviews and Who can leave a review, or keep Account default for either option. Select Save for the course. Each option follows its account default separately.
Example course publication choices. The selected approval rule is an example.
Publication option | What happens |
Automatically | Cademy makes a new review public as soon as the participant submits it. |
After I approve them | You must open the review and select Publish Review before other people can see it. |
Never | The Public Review block is not shown to participants. Other feedback questions remain. |
With Never, Add Review is hidden and the Public Review block is left off the form for new submissions. A participant’s personal feedback link can still collect the form’s other questions, so keep other questions on the form. If an automatic publication fails, the feedback stays saved with its review awaiting approval.
Choose Only attendees if a person must have an Active or Completed registration for the course to use Add Review on its public page. They do not need to be marked as attended. A visitor who is not logged in does not see Add Review on such a course. It appears after they log in with the account linked to their booking. This rule does not apply to Add Review on your provider Reviews page.
Choose Anyone to let people without a booking review the course too. They must still log in.
Changing Publish public reviews affects new submissions. It does not publish reviews already awaiting approval or hide reviews that are already public. For those reviews, use Publish Review or Hide.
Publish, hide or republish a review
Example review statuses in a Feedback form’s Responses tab. The main Reviews page also lets you find and manage reviews.
Open Reviews from the Admin dashboard’s left-hand menu.
Under Responses, choose With a Public Review. Use search and the course, facilitator, rating, source or date filters to find the review. Under Review Status, choose Awaiting Approval for reviews waiting to be published.
Open a response to read its feedback and review.
Select Publish Review to make a waiting review public, then check for Review published. Select Hide on a published review and check for Review hidden to remove it from public view.
Reviews initially shows All Responses, including feedback with no public review. Choosing Without a Public Review disables Review Status; those responses have no review to publish or hide. The Source filter offers Feedback Link, Add Review, Imported and Lesson.
Hiding a review removes it from your public pages. It does not delete the review or the participant’s other feedback. Your team can still read both.
To show a review your team hid publicly again, open it and select Publish Review. Publish and Hide also appear beside each review in the Reviews list.
Example response opened from a Feedback form, showing a published review and Hide.
Where to find reviews and feedback
See reviews for a course: go to Courses, open the course and select Reviews.
Read one participant’s feedback: open the course, select Registrants and open the participant’s registration. Expand Feedback & Review.
Read everyone’s answers to a feedback form: go to Forms, open the form and select Responses. See Read and Manage Form Responses.
Reply to a review publicly or privately
Example published review with Add Public Reply and Reply Privately.
Open Reviews and select a review.
For a published review, select Add Public Reply, enter your reply and select Post Reply. Check for Reply posted and the reply below the review. To change it, select Edit Reply, edit the text and select Post Reply again.
For a private conversation, select Reply Privately. Cademy opens an Inbox conversation with that person, creating one if needed. Write your message in that conversation and select Send. Opening the conversation alone does not send a message.
A public reply cannot be blank, so you can edit a posted reply but not clear it from this box. Private sending also depends on account emailing being enabled; if Cademy reports that emailing is disabled, contact Cademy Support.
Public reply: everyone who can see the review can read your reply below it. Publish the review first if it is waiting for approval or hidden.
Private reply: opens a conversation with the reviewer in Inbox. It does not appear below the public review.
Imported reviews: Cademy may only have the reviewer’s name. A private reply is available only if there is a Contact record or an existing Inbox conversation for that person.
To add new feedback to Inbox automatically, turn on Add Responses To Inbox under Forms > the Feedback form > Settings and select Save. The team notification and participant confirmation emails have separate settings there. See Set Up a Feedback Form for Your Courses for the full form settings.
Delete a response and its review
Deleting a response permanently deletes that person’s answers and takes its public review off your public pages. To remove only the public review and keep the answers, use Hide instead.
Open Reviews and open the response.
In the Response section, open the three-dot menu and select Delete Response….
Select Delete to confirm. Check for Response deleted.
If the form is still available, the participant’s personal link can accept feedback again after you delete their response. Deleting feedback does not block that participant from submitting another response. See Read and Manage Form Responses.
Download reviews as a spreadsheet
Use a CSV export to analyse reviews in Excel, Google Sheets or another spreadsheet app.
Open Reviews. Under Responses, choose With a Public Review if you want only responses containing a review.
Use the filters to choose which responses to download. Typing a name or email in the search box does not limit the download to that person.
Select Export. The export starts immediately.
When the file is ready, select Download CSV.
For example, to download published reviews for one course, select With a Public Review, that Course and Review Status > Published before Export. The download includes matching rows on every page. Clear Filters clears the filters but leaves the search text; that search still does not restrict the export.
Which responses are included: all responses matching your filters, including those on other pages of the table. The search box does not narrow the export.
What the file contains: standard response details, the form, Course, Course Date and Facilitators, and the public-review details, including status and public reply. It has no Lesson column and does not contain your custom answers or internal notes.
To download answers to your questions: open Forms > your Feedback form > Responses and export there. See Read and Manage Form Responses.
To download review details from different forms: export from Reviews.
Ratings and scores: exported as numbers.
Columns: Cademy chooses which columns to include. You cannot choose different columns or schedule repeat exports here.
A System Admin can find generated files under Settings > Exports.
Choose where public reviews appear
Public reviews can appear on your provider profile, Minisite and course pages. Ratings can also appear on course and provider cards, including cards you display on your own website.
Only published reviews are shown publicly. Your Minisite has a Reviews page that lists them, and a course page shows its reviews where you add a Reviews section.
How ratings are calculated
Course rating: the average of the overall star ratings in that course’s published reviews, shown with the number of reviews. It appears once the course has one published review.
Provider rating: an average across your account’s published reviews. It can also include review totals that Cademy holds for your business from Google Maps or Facebook.
Hidden reviews and reviews awaiting approval are not counted.
Add Reviews to a course page
Example course Description editor with Course Sections and Reviews in the slash menu.
A System Admin or Course Owner can add this section to show the course’s rating and reviews. Add Review appears for visitors who are allowed to review the course. Show All appears when the course has at least two reviews.
Open Courses > choose the course > Edit Course.
In the course description, click an empty line where you want reviews to appear and type /.
Choose Course Sections > Reviews.
Select Save.
After saving, open the public course page and check the Reviews section. The editor shows a placeholder rather than the live reviews. Course-editor changes can also save when you move between sections, so make only the changes you intend.
Show reviews from your other courses too
Example Reviews Settings. Select Done here, then Save in the course editor.
In the course editor, click the Reviews section, then open Section settings.
Under Maximum other course reviews shown, enter a number from 1 to 50.
Turn on Include reviews from other courses.
Select Done in Reviews Settings, then Save in the course editor.
These reviews appear in a separate Other Course Reviews area. The number you choose limits that area only, not reviews for this course.
Remove Reviews from a course page
Example Delete section control on the course’s Reviews section.
Open Courses > choose the course > Edit Course.
Click the Reviews section and choose Delete section from its toolbar.
Select Save.
This removes the section from that course page. It does not delete your saved reviews or turn off feedback requests.
Hide ratings and reviews on the provider profile
In this example, the site address shown is a demonstration address.
Only a System Admin can change this setting.
Hide Public Reviews does not hide every course’s Reviews section. A section already added to a course page can still show that course’s reviews. The table below shows the main effects. It is not a complete list.
Select Profile in the Admin dashboard’s left-hand menu.
Scroll to the bottom of the page and open the Reviews section.
Under Review Visibility, switch on Hide Public Reviews.
The setting saves immediately. Check for Review visibility updated; you do not need the page’s Save Changes button for this switch. For the other settings on this page, see Update Your Business Profile and Minisite.
When Hide Public Reviews is on | What happens |
Provider profile and Minisite | The Reviews page is removed and the star rating beside your business name is hidden. |
Course and provider cards | Star ratings are hidden on course and provider cards, including cards displayed on your own website. |
Provider details on course pages | Your provider rating is no longer shown with your business name on course pages. |
Existing course Reviews sections | A Reviews section already on a course page can still show that course’s rating, reviews and Add Review. It no longer shows reviews from your other courses. |
New courses | Cademy does not add a Reviews section by default while reviews are hidden. |
Review submission | Hiding reviews does not stop people submitting feedback. Their feedback links and an existing course Reviews section can still work. |
Stored reviews | Nothing is deleted. Existing reviews remain stored. |
Switch Hide Public Reviews off again to restore those displays, subject to each review’s publication status and each course’s page sections.
If you also want to hide the Reviews section on an existing course page, open Courses > choose the course > Edit Course, click its Reviews section, select Delete section and save.
Frequently asked questions
Why is a review not visible after submission?
It may be awaiting approval, hidden, or on a page that does not show reviews. Open Reviews, choose With a Public Review and inspect its Review Status. Then check the course’s Reviews section or the profile visibility setting. A submission confirmation does not mean the review is public.
Does Never remove existing reviews?
No. It prevents public reviews in new submissions. Hide an existing review to remove it from public view. Changing to automatic publication does not automatically publish older waiting reviews.
Can somebody review a course without a booking?
Yes, if Who can leave a review is Anyone. They must still log in. Only attendees instead requires an Active or Completed registration for the course; it does not require recorded attendance.
Does Verified prove attendance?
No. It means Cademy matched the review to a course registration. It does not prove attendance or confirm the truth of the written review. Imported Google Maps and Facebook reviews do not show the Verified or Unverified badge.
Why is Reply Privately missing for an imported review?
Cademy may only have the reviewer’s name. A linked Contact or an existing Inbox conversation is needed for a private reply. You can still reply publicly after publishing the review.
Does Hide Public Reviews hide every course review?
No. A Reviews section already added to a course page can still show that course’s reviews. Remove that section separately if you want it off the page. Stored reviews and feedback requests are not deleted.
Does removing a Reviews section stop feedback requests?
No. It changes the course page’s layout. Request settings are separate, and reviews remain stored.
Can I export reviews or use integrations?
Use Export in Reviews for a spreadsheet. If your account includes API Access, a developer can use the Cademy Public API to read published reviews; see Create and Manage API Keys. A new Cademy review cannot trigger a Zapier action: there is no Review Submitted trigger.