With the rise of online stores, people have multiple choices between the stores to buy a product. When a single product is sold by several retailers, what matters most is the feedback about the product performance from the previous customers or in short product reviews. The first thing anyone of us does while making a purchase is to look at the product feedback from previous customers. A few of the retailers follow up with the customers seeking product reviews, whereas some other retailers avoid approaching the customers for the fear of getting negative feedback. Instead, they pay for the writing professionals and get the product reviews written by them.
Why do you need product reviews?
Most eCommerce stores don’t have any brick-and-mortar stores. Shoppers have to make purchase decisions just by looking at the product and reading the description without even touching the product in real life. Thus, product reviews are extremely helpful for the buyers to make informed decisions on purchasing:
- The product reviews motivate past customers to engage with your brand. It improves customers’ trust and loyalty toward your brand.
- Product reviews are a powerful form of social proof shared by your customers about their experience with your product. Thus, it acts as a personal recommendation for the new buyers.
- It was proven that product reviews are likely to increase sales and conversions.
- The more reviews your product gets, the better will be the ranking on search engines.
- By giving product feedback, customers are given the liberty to express their experience with your product. It improves loyalty towards your brand.
- If you give them a reason to talk about your brand, they share feedback on respective social media platforms, thus increasing your brand reach and you get free marketing through the word of mouth.
- Reviews help you improve your products and services to serve better.
The product reviews help the shoppers understand
- What kind of customer service can you provide
- How does your product solve their problem
- How good is your product in terms of quality
- How affordable is your product when compared to your competitors
- Optimum shipping times.
How can you get more product reviews?
Know the major online platforms where the shoppers look for reviews or create them and make sure that your eCommerce store is present across all those platforms. Shown below are proven ways to get more product reviews for your eCommerce products:
- Make it easy to review
- Ask for reviews
- Display the product feedback on your official website
- Use incentives to encourage customers to review
- Follow up with the existing customers
- Post your reviews on social media
- Ask the correct questions
- Don’t neglect negative reviews
- Include the details of the customer in the review
Your customers might be very busy with their lives. Value their time and make the process of reviewing simple, easy, and less time-consuming. The easier to review, the more reviews your product gets. With the rapid growth of smartphone users worldwide, you must keep the review process mobile-friendly.
You don’t get what you don’t ask for. Ask your customers for reviews at the right time. Generally, the best time to ask for reviews is right after delivering the products. But for items like skincare products, home utility products, etc, customers need some time to test the products. Hence, you have to wait a little longer before asking for reviews.
Collecting reviews is not enough. You should display both positive and negative reviews on your website. It makes you more human and encourages the buyers to leave a review as their experience is shown to the world as a part of your website.
Provide interesting rewards to the customers who give product reviews. Note that it is entirely different from bribing and purchasing the reviews. On providing incentives like a personalized thank you note, cashback, loyalty points, etc. to encourage the customers to make time and record their experience with your products.
Coping up with busy schedules, your customers might forget about sharing their feedback on your products. Following up through well-curated emails may remind them about your products and direct them to easily review on your website. Integrate a product feedback application to your website and follow up with your customers for reviews. Automate the product review process and make it as simple as possible for the customers to leave their feedback.
Millions of people utilize social media to launch their businesses, express their feedback about products, share their thoughts, etc. it is an excellent platform to collect testimonials from your customers. If they talk about your products on their social media profiles, it increases your brand reach and you get free marketing for your products. Word of mouth act as a powerful recommendation for their acquaintances and increases your sales.
Asking the right questions at the right time will help you get meaningful product feedback from the customers. Know about who your target audience is, what your customers are interested in, what are the pain points they are facing in the industry, etc align your questions in a way to let the customers express their true opinion of your products.
It is impossible to completely get rid of negative reviews. Some businesses don’t ask for reviews fearing they might get negative feedback. They tend to buy reviews and make them look original. Negative reviewing is the disappointment expressed by the customers with your product. If you try to escape from the negative reviews, you can never gain customer trust and establish a loyal brand. Listen to the negative reviews and respond to them by apologizing for the inconvenience. Work on the reasons that troubled customers and try to produce better products next time.
If possible, add the customer’s name and photo along with the product reviews, it increases the credibility of your site and also encourages other buyers to leave a review of the products they have bought. Publishing the details of the customers is one of the best ways to appreciate their effort in writing the product feedback.
Conclusion
We have put our best efforts to specify the methods through which you can get more product reviews for your store. Act on these strategies to generate more reviews and increase conversions for your products. It’s time for you to get some authentic reviews from your customers.