How to improve your sales with customer reviews

Positive online reviews from clients act as a major motile force in today’s economy, capable of improving the sales potential of any business organization.

Whatever goods and/or services your business may have, the best kind of marketing is still getting your customers to love your products so they can recommend it to their friends and family. Naturally there will be products that customers have never tried so the first thing they would probably do is to research the product online. This is particularly the case when customers decide to go online shopping. Online reviews will play a major role in influencing their decision whether to trust your business or not. Unsurprisingly, good reviews will get more customers for your company. Statistics will even tell you that 2 out of 3 people are likely to buy your product if it has good reviews. Now you might be asking: how do I get these good online reviews in the first place to improve my sales?

Here is a step-by-step way to do just that.

Step 1: Incentivise Customers To Write Reviews

When starting up a business, it’s often the case that you will get customers who will try your services or product but will probably not write a review. Encourage them to place reviews by giving them incentives. Get creative. Offering coupons and discounts for posting on local reviews, sharing special offers on Facebook exclusively to fans, prize draws, giveaways and BOGOF offers are a few of the many methods you could employ. The goal is to motivate them to talk about your product. You can even get reviews before selling to the public if you run trials with your friends and family. Ask them to help you out by writing reviews on your e-store or wherever platform you are using for your business. After all, what are friends and family for?

Step 2: Highlight These Reviews

Once you have sufficient reviews, select the most enticing ones and display them prominently to potential customers. Successful business pages often feature landing-page testimonials and customer reviews - much like reviews on the back cover of a book. The sooner your visitors are convinced of the value of your products and services, the more likely they are to convert to paying customers. In the process, you can even use this opportunity to advertise your incentive from Step 1. These potential customers have seen other people’s reviews and decided to buy for themselves. Make them want to write a review. Sometimes they will even add to what another reviewer has said. Of course, there will be disagreements as not every review will be a positive one, but we’ll discuss that later.

Step 3: Use the Power of Social Media

You don’t need anyone to tell you that social media is a powerful tool and that some platforms are more popular than others. Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter are some of the current forerunners. ‘Social media’ gets its name for a reason: it makes people more social by facilitating easy communication with other people.

Getting your customers to post about your products on their social media accounts is, however, no easy task. It won’t happen automatically. Incentivizing is flexible in this case. You basically need to give them a reason to talk about you. For example, Starbucks may have intentionally misspelled their customer’s names. The result? They laugh about it and share their laughs with their friends on Facebook and Twitter. This gives Starbucks invaluable advertising and exposure for their drinks. There might even be the bonus of the customer adding a simple phrase or sentence stating that they enjoyed the drink.

Step 4: Use Google Map Reviews

Search engines are the starting point for most customers looking for a product or service. Since Google is undoubtedly one of the biggest search engines, this should already tell you that you will definitely need to rank your business on Google. Try using Google Adwords. They even display your star ratings when you get at least 30 reviews within the last 12 months. Not placing your reviews on Google puts you at a big disadvantage.

Step 5: Manage Your Negative Reviews

As already mentioned, not all reviews about your products will be positive. You will get bad reviews here and there but don’t worry about it. They serve as an opportunity for you to improve your products and services. If customers do not like an aspect of your business, it’s something you can work on. There is always room for improvement and you will never get to see that without these negative reviews. That is, after all, the point of reviews: to see how customers react to your offerings. Of course, that extends to getting more sales if they are positive reviews.

Negative reviews can be healthy for your reputation too especially if you are online. Don’t underestimate the intelligence of your customers. According to Vendasta, if your product only has positive reviews, customers are likely to think that they are tailored or fake. The presence of a few well-managed negative reviews serves to underline the credibility of the other positive ones.

Other Things You Can Do

While these steps are a possible format to follow, you can and should go beyond. The best way to get more customers is always to show that you care for them and what they think. Go the extra mile and thank them by replying to their comment. If it is a negative review, thank them all the more and offer solutions. Of course, you can’t please everyone, but you can always try exploring other avenues to increase customer satisfaction. The best business is always a customer-centric business.

Tags: Customer Reviews