4 great ways to make your product and service reviews even better

It’s 2016 and any eCommerce business owner knows that product reviews can make or break businesses. Customers are increasingly turning towards online reviews as a resource to seriously research and evaluate the products they are interested in before committing to buy. A 5 star review brings consumers flocking and a series of 1 star reviews is a major red flag.

And of course, the review system isn’t just relevant for products; service owners can be just as easily influenced by crowd opinions. Sites like booking.com and tripadvisor.com are central resources for travelers (and even locals) looking for restaurants, bars, hotels and more (tripadvisor is now the 190^th global site according to their metrics on Alexa, while booking.com ranks 109^th).

Ultimately reviews give customers the confidence they need to feel comfortable buying services or products. So clearly they are crucial. But in an increasingly crowded marketplace with bored and dissatisfied customers proliferating, what can we actually do to make reviews better? Some of the steps are fairly straightforward. Here are some ideas.

Ask your customers directly

It might sound incredibly obvious, but the best way to get your customers to leave reviews is to actually go ahead and ask them directly. Follow up emails and automated post-purchase requests are a great way to do this, but it is also good to throw personal details into the reminder and make it memorable. A funny and visually striking prompt email is likely to get a far better response than a short email of boring text.

Keep reviewing your reviews

Sites can quickly get clogged up with spam reviews, while many customers will write reviews that need a speedy response. So it is imperative that you monitor your reviews frequently. And if you see some seriously negative reviews – don’t panic. With great customer care, even dissatisfied customers can be transformed into your most loyal brand ambassadors (provided you respond promptly).

Offer your customers something

Take a minute to think about things from your customer’s perspective; it’s a busy day at the office and they are getting nagged via email to write a review of a product when they just don’t have time. They are probably wondering “what’s in it for me”. First of all, make the process a quick one. Web users are easily bored or frustrated and you certainly don’t want them to give up before they actually publish their thoughts. But simplicity alone isn’t enough. Try offering vouchers, prizes or rewards for customers who complete a review.

Try voice reviews

Most websites use traditional text-based platforms for their reviews. A simple way to improve yours is to introduce a different medium. Text is problematic because it is so ambiguous and impersonal. It is worth trying out voice reviews to let your customers interact with each other in a much more personal way and actually hear each other’s voices as if they were having a conversation, or talking face-to-face.

Heyoya is a unique comment and reviews platform that brings voice to e-publishers and e-stores, improving sales and user engagement by allowing readers to express themselves beyond the medium of text. Heyoya is a game changer for websites and is proven to increase brand affinity and the quality of user-generated content.

 For more information about Heyoya, or to start using Heyoya for free today, click here.