Are you a new seller who has recently started selling stuff online? Or Are you an experienced seller who has recently launched a new product online? Whatever the case may be, the only way potential customers get convinced that they have to invest in your products is through social proof.
One way is through recommendations from known sources called ‘word-of-mouth’ marketing tactic which spreads like wildfire if your products are of great quality. The other way that social proof is obtained is through common seller customers who have purchased the products sold by a merchant and have had the experience of using it personally, this method is the most common one used online, especially at marketplaces. Given below are 5 methods to boost genuine customer reviews for your products online.
Incentives-Based Reviews
If sellers want positive responses from their customers who have used the purchased products, they need to devise compelling methods of inducing buyers to give genuine product reviews. Target marketing is when the seller is looking to increase his customer base by alluring new customers through trusted ones. The adage “It takes one to know one” rings true for online reviews of customers.
Usually, many customers do not take the trouble of giving a positive review to the seller if all goes well. The situation is quite the opposite of negative reviews. Sellers should come up with incentives to lure customers into writing genuinely positive reviews. For example, the schemes they need to implement will include limited discount coupons on their next purchase, or freebies for every 5-star review that they post, or a lucky draw contest for all positive reviewers, a personal call or email to give them exclusive deals from the seller etc. It is a win-win in which the customer gets good deals while the seller gets genuine positive reviews in addition to making sales.
Social Media Initiatives
Social media has become the way of life these days. Anybody who shies away from being vocal in person is usually comfortable on social media to voice their opinions through reviews and opinions. Social media has a wider reach than any other form of marketing and anything published on social media accounts like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram etc. becomes news.
What sellers need to do is determine which customers might have something positive to say about their products and might promote their products through direct links to their product page or use the hyperlinks to the product page on their blogs. Even general surveys carried out anonymously in order to know the customers’ sentiments towards your products will help perceive their opinions in advance. This opinion can then be used to personally target each customer for a review request or sentiment analysis tools like Tweetstats, Facebook Insights, Social Mention, etc. can be used to spot positive reviewers and target them for genuine reviews.
Personalised Emails
Which customer does not like personalized attention from his seller? Especially, if you are selling through multi-channel retailing at online marketplaces, to be a cut above the rest of the sellers who may be competitors for the same suite of products that are offered by you. Most e-commerce marketplaces have a messaging service included in the seller account. Even though these messages are being monitored, the service can be taken advantage of by sellers to reach out to their customers and request for product reviews.
Either after the product has been delivered or on the next reorder from the customer for the same product, the seller can send a personalized email thanking the customer for their patronage while requesting for their review. By asking for their valuable suggestions to improve your products or services and by offering some irresistible incentives as mentioned in this article, the customer would be more than happy to oblige for a positive review.
Convert Positive Customer Responses to Good Reviews
Many sellers initiate the feedback part after the product has been delivered to the customers. They send newsletters via email or text links and ask customers to fill up a questionnaire with either a yes or a no type of response.
The advantages of this method are that the customers do not have to take the trouble and the time out to type in the details since they just have to opt for yes or no, and the seller can use their responses and complete an automated review from the client where the positive responses are highlighted by combining the question and the customer response. For example, if the seller puts up a question like Do you think the product purchased by you will be useful to you in the long run? If the customer response is “Yes” then you could selectively pick the answer and write an automated positive review where you mention that customer XYZ agrees that the product will be useful to her/him in the long run. Picking only the positives like picking fresh roses from the garden always lets you make a beautiful bouquet called positive reviews for boosting the demand for your products.
Expand your Review Horizons
Just receiving positive reviews on one e-marketplace limits the reach of your products and the benefits it has to offer to customers. The viewership of the reviews determines positivism among the customers of the current portal, but there should be a way of spreading the world to a larger number of customers who are either on a lookout for the same product or a better seller selling a particular product. Reviews about a seller’s products must be visible on multiple platforms and on sites dedicated to only reviews. For example, Mouthshut.com is a review-based site that offers transparency and encourages the freedom of opinion among reviewers for the better good. Since it is visible universally and many reviewers genuinely believe what is showcased here, it gives sellers an opportunity to grab the best reviews and highlight them while personally responding to customers and changing their negative opinions to positive ones through clarification. Even links referencing to positive reviews can be shared on e-marketplaces or forums to spread the good word about the sellers and their products.
Conclusion
To conclude, it can be said that these five techniques help spread true positives about the sellers and their products, it lies with the seller to offer genuine products at great prices to their customers that would induce them to self-generate positive reviews at the end of the day. Positive reviews are always intangible assets and the sellers venture in procuring the same is worthwhile the efforts.