Why Customer Reviews Are Important & How To Get Them.

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why customer reviews are important and how to get them

Customer reviews are important, think about the last few products you brought; did you review them online first? For many people, reading product reviews has become an integral part of the buying process.

Why are product reviews so important?

Whether you have a website or an ecommerce website, having reviews or testimonials on your website can help to make your business more credible, trustworthy and will hopefully convince people to buy from you instead of your competitors.

The Nielsen Global Trust in Advertising Survey carried out during 2011 found that 70% of people trust opinions posted online. Online reviews were the second most trusted form of advertising, with ‘recommendations from people I know’ beating it to first place, this shows just how important consumers consider reviews to be.

As well as showing people that your products and services are great it will also help your SEO. People will generally use the kind of keywords and keyterms in their reviews that your target audience will be searching for when trying to find your products.

How do I get customer reviews?

Emails

Amazon has a brilliant model for gaining product reviews. If you’ve ever ordered from Amazon you’ll have noticed that a few days after you receive your product you receive an email asking you to review the product. This ensures that the majority of products sold through Amazon have reviews.

If you have an ecommerce website this can be replicated by setting up automated emails to go out to customers a few days after you estimate their order should have arrived.

 

Leaflets with orders

When you send your orders out, you should always include details of how to get in touch with customer service if the customer is unhappy. Along with your customer service information, encourage happy customers to leave you a review and make sure you tell them how to do it.

If you sent out leaflets or flyers with your orders showing customers what other products you sell or alerting them to offers, make sure you include a call to action to review their product on there as well.

 

Social Media

Many consumers take to social media, Twitter especially, to vent their frustrations or sing a business or products praise.

Monitoring social media using tools, such as Social Mention, Twitter Advanced Search and Google Alerts can help you get a good idea of how people are feeling about your brand.

This works well for your business in two ways. The first is that you can address any unhappy customers and try to sort their issue out; this also shows your business is proactive in ensuring your customers are happy.

The second is that if you see anyone singing your praises, you can thank them and ask them if they’d like to share their thoughts on your website and send them a link to a review page.

 

Customer Service & Suggestion Cards

If you offer a service which requires your customers to visit your shop, office or business, you could ask customers to leave their thoughts and any suggestions on a card.

These can then be typed out and posted on your website. It’s important to make sure you type them out instead of scanning them, as a scan won’t benefit your websites SEO.

 

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What if I get a bad review?

If you get a bad review, do what you can to contact the customer and rectify the problem but whatever you do don’t delete it, unless it’s offensive of course.

People will be suspicious if they see pages and pages of five star positive reviews. The odd average or poor review shows consumers that you’re being truthful and posting all reviews and not just deleting the poor ones, which will make your business look honest.

 

What do I do with customer reviews?

If you have an ecommerce website ideally you want reviews for each product or service.

If you haven’t got an actual product for sale on your website, showcase your testimonials and reviews on a ‘testimonials’ or ‘reviews’ page.

You may also want to do this if you’re an ecommerce website and a customer emails you or provides you with a general review about your business as a whole. For example, one of our clients, Gardening Delights, has individual reviews on each product but they also have a Testimonial page for general feedback.

Don’t think you need reviews as you’re a small business?  Here’s a post on how they help you grow as a business.

If you’re a small business based in Burntwood, Lichfield, Cannock or the West Midlands and need help with any aspect of your marketing, print or web design get in touch with us to find out how we can offer your business real benefit.

You can call us on 01543 387 047 or fill in the contact form on our website. 

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