Can customer reviews grow your e-commerce sales?

Customer reviews are important part of every e-commerce website. They can increase your conversion rates, business credibility, trustworthiness and also bring fresh, unique content to your site. The main topics in this article will be how to attract reviews from the customers and how to properly display them in your website.

What are the facts?

According to a survey conducted by PeopleClaim, 71% of customers read reviews before making a purchase. Another fact is that 63% of them are more likely to make a purchase if the product has ratings and reviews. MarketingProfs also discovered that 67% of the consumers read 6 reviews or more before they decide to make a purchase. As you can see, these numbers are quite high and indicative. 

If we have to put all of this in one sentence, we can say that the online reviews have tangible value in the decision making process of your prospective customers.

In this article we will discuss how to take the best of the customer reviews. So, if you want to increase your conversion rates and bring more value to your brand, keep on reading.

How to begin?

Attract reviews from the customers

Surely, there are a lot of ways to get the customers’ attention. Here we will talk about the most popular and used techniques.

1. Just ask them

Sometimes the simplest things are the best. What you can do is send a follow-up message and ask the customers what do they think about the product. It is the most common practice and works very well. 

Amazon emails the customers every time when they make a purchase to ask if they would like to leave a feedback. Here is one example: 

2. Give bonuses to the customers

This is another commonly used technique to get reviews. What you can do is send a follow-up message to the customers telling them that if they write a review for the purchased product, you will give them a discount for a future purchase. 

Here is a nice example on how to utilize this using OrderReviews, which automates the whole process. With this product you can create and send automatic emails to customers to review your products. The module has a lot of options and features. You can find more about it here. 

Here is an example. This is what the customer receives after completing an order:

This is what customers receive after they write a review for the purchase:

3. Give free samples

This technique became quite popular in recent years. If you have free samples to give away, you can surely increase the number of people talking about your products. Have in mind that the reviews do not necessarily have to be in your store in order to be effective. Many online bloggers can write about your products and services if you just provide them with a free sample.

In terms of reaching consumers, free samples are very powerful. Companies such as Kraft, General Mills, Procter & Gamble, and Unilever often set up a free sample stand inside a supermarket. It is just that people like free stuff, plain and simple.

4. Listen to your customers

When your customers have suggestions for your products, listen to them. This means that they like what you are offering and that if you make the changes they want, they will like your product (and you) even more. There are many positive things here:

• You create good and lasting relationship with your customers
• Your products get more attention
• You receive positive reviews
• Customers get what they want

I believe that this can get you started. It is important to find the best way for you to attract reviews. Now lets get to the next part which is about how to get the most of the reviews.

Make sure that the reviews are visible

1. Make sure that the visitors on your site can see the reviews

Good. Now you have some reviews. Make sure that they can be easily noticed. A good example is Amazon, where after the product name, you can see how many reviews are written and what is the average rating for the given product. Also, when you click on the link for the reviews, you are taken right to the ratings page. Similar approach you can find on BestBuy and Walmart.

2. Do not delete the negative reviews. Deal with them.

This can only turnout bad in the future. Try to contact the customer and ask him/her how can you improve your product. You may not think of this as a big deal, but most of the customers like the personal approach and often change their reviews. 

As soon as you discover a bad review, reach out the customer. Find out what went wrong with the purchase and see if you can fix it. Common practice is to give a discount or a free gift to the unhappy customer. Most of the time this works and you can turn bad review in good.

3. Keep it real.

Customers tend to leave positive comments, so having one bad review as opposite to 7 positive ones can only help your store look real. Every person is different and you cannot expect everyone to love your products. Leaving a product with only positive comments (for example product with 250 reviews and all of them positive) looks suspicious.

In conclusion

Customer reviews are very important part of your online store. By following the steps above, you will surely bring fresh and organic content coming up to your site, and also build a good relationship with your customers. You improve your products and get more sales. It is as simple as that.

Do you have reviews on your site? Are they working for you? Let us know in the comments.