The Importance of a Good Review Solicitation & Management Strategy
What are Online Reviews?
Online reviews are essentially the updated version of word of mouth marketing. Online reviews are star ratings and/or written notes that give potential clients a first-hand look at feedback from customers who sought out the same service or product.
97% of online shoppers read online reviews and many will only make a move if the product has earned at least four out of five stars. When it comes to star ratings, the number of reviews and the subtle prompt to follow your brand can mean the difference between window shoppers and loyal customers.
But isn’t it only unhappy customers who leave reviews? Not at all. Think back to a time that you received truly awesome service. The customer service, the product and / or the delivery speed blew you away, prompting you to want to leave a glowing review for that business. Even if you didn’t leave a review, you likely told family and friends about the brand, product or service. After that, they probably told someone else who then googled the product, read the reviews and then decided to purchase.
Because consumers feel they can trust the word of others (known as social proof), they feel comfortable spending their hard-earned dollars on businesses with reviews. With so many people relying on reviews to research products and services, an online review acquisition and management strategy is therefore essential for building and marketing a positive online reputation.
The Importance of Online Reviews
Contributes to Increased Revenue
Online reviews are the bridge between you and your customers. When used correctly, reviews can increase overall revenue as more new customers are attracted to your product or service. Studies show that revenue increases as star ratings increase. According to Invespcro.com, a one-star increase on a popular review site like Yelp can yield a 5% to 9% increase in revenue. Not only that, but they will spend more money too—up to 31% more. Loyalty increases, revenues increase, and those satisfied customers may, in turn, become positive reviewers themselves.
Boost SEO Rankings
Online reviews boost SEO rankings, improving the visibility of your site and brand. The more positive review content linked to your business, the more highly ranked your site will become and the more recognition your brand will receive. As positive reviews grow and your business builds rock solid credibility, your site and your Google My Business page will also show up in more organic search results.
Creates a Valuable Forum
Online reviews build up a valuable forum between you and your clients. With review management, you can address positive reviews by thanking the customer and quickly remedy negative reviews by responding to the concern. This puts a face to your brand, making you and your business that much more real. No one likes getting negative reviews, but they do happen and they can be useful for identifying areas that need to be acknowledged and fixed.
Gather Product Research Information
Online reviews are also ideal for gathering product research information that can be used to ensure total success with the next product launch. Product feedback via reviews provides solid information about how the product is being received by the consumer and what, if any, changes need to be made going forward.
Why Businesses Don’t Have More Reviews
There are several reasons why businesses don’t have (m)any reviews:
They don’t ask for reviews
They are only using one method to try to get reviews from their customers
They don’t have any tools to help automate the review acquisition process
They are intimidated by the process of managing and responding to reviews
Customers are unable to easily leave reviews
All of the above issues can be easily remedied using a great review acquisition system and a solid review marketing strategy.
Using Review Acquisition and Management Tools
Review acquisition and management tools are designed to remove the guesswork and time spent requesting and reminding consumers to leave a review. And once the reviews come in, many of these tools also have the ability to market your positive reviews online through social media platforms as well as on your site. Review marketing tools are essential for shaping the image that your brand projects by taking positive customer feedback and expanding it to touch on every facet of your marketing plan.
Key features of a great review acquisition and management service:
Review Acquisition – using widgets and landing pages as well as email and text review requests, your company can become visible on trusted sites like Google and Facebook as well as industry relevant directories
Review Monitoring – reviews are monitored and can be responded to simply and quickly, with regular notifications to your team’s inbox.
Review Marketing – reviews are streamed on social media and featured on your website for the greatest visibility.
Review Reporting– Reporting allows you to see how much your acquisition and management campaigns are benefitting your brand.
Creating a Review Management System
Properly managing and marketing customer reviews is an easy way to boost your company’s visibility, increase brand awareness and get new customers at the same time. You’ll also get a clear picture on where reviews are coming from, what other trusted review sites could be added to the campaign and how to stay steps ahead of the competition. With automated reports, targeted email drip campaigns and notifications for new reviews found online, your review management campaign keeps you in control. With a review management system, you will gain, manage and market reviews, all in one place.
Marketing Your Reviews to the World
Where to Market Reviews:
On highly visible and high traffic pages like your home page and product pages. Including reviews on highly visible pages makes it easy to showcase shiny happy reviews from satisfied customers.
On Social Media Channels – consumers research products and services on social media. Including reviews on social media increases the likelihood of followers and also boosts engagement.
In Email Drip Campaigns – email marketing is another highly effective marketing strategy and one of the best avenues for ROI, since every dollar spent means $44 earned. Also, customer feedback that is clearly visible in an email encourages recipients to visit and explore your site.
Using client reviews for marketing is a powerful way to get the word out about your business. Using a review management campaign, you can resolve any issues as they pop up, thank happy customers, and leverage reviews as part of your overall marketing strategy. Boost your brand recognition even further while letting your customer’s words do the work for you.
How IdeaZone can help
Whether you’re starting out with one review or have a collection of reviews circulating around the web that you’ve been struggling to wrangle, the online marketing experts at IdeaZone will make the most of the limitless potential of your online reviews. By creating a custom campaign designed to acquire, organize, report and market customer feedback, you’ll be able to easily manage and control your brand’s reputation. Using tried and true review acquisition, management and marketing methods, trust us to take the guesswork out of the who, what, when, where and why of making your customer’s reviews work for you.
Review Management Client Successes
For a company who offers online training – from 2 to 49 online reviews in 4 months.
For a private school – from 1 to 27 reviews in 4 months.
For a new restaurant – from 0 to 43 reviews in 3 months.
