E-commerce has evolved manifold and it is now a part and parcel of our lives. And product and seller reviews are now an integral part of your store. In fact no matter you want them or not, they are sure to crop up now and then may be via search engine or emails or even vocal ones during a chit-chat with your friend.

Even in brick and mortar business model, in olden days when brand didn't existed, we simply used to reply on neighbors or parents feedback. And we used to have our fixed shops for grocery, vegetables, jewelry and so on. Very recently when, I was browsing for a product and went to check for reviews, found none and simply closed that website as I was suspicious about product being genuine. In spite of the fact that product was way cheaper at that online store. So customer could very much be influenced by the review factor.

In the upcoming lines, we are simply talking on how to get more authentic reviews and how it could boost your online business.

Understand Customer Psychology

Let’s quickly understand what runs in our brains while we browse through websites and how we finalize a purchase. There are many factors which influence a customer’s decision before making a purchase so let’s get started –

1. Customer does get influenced by reviews and ratings provided for the product

2. Customer decision to finalize a purchase depends on whether the site has reviews and ratings or not

3. On an average , for the reviews provided customer usually reads at least six of them , starting from one star reviews to decide “why product is not worth buying”

4. Most of the customers after reading the reviews start believing and trusting them. Basically they don’t want to take risks of being con

5. For customer it doesn't matter whether the individual who provided the review is a real or fake.

So we know how reviews influence human brain, as an online store owner what you could do? If it is a start-up business, unless you sell you won’t be able to get reviews, so how to get reviews from consumers. But online reviews also offer some “brownie points” to the owner

Brownie Points

The relationship

Make customer feel like king and you are a service man. You need to build trust, gain confidence and match their expectations, no matter how you achieve it. Bad name could ruin your business, and even single instance is more than enough to do that. I remember an incident; I got this online deal of a newly opened SPA in our neighborhood. Before buying the deal, looked out on their Facebook page for reviews and feedback and got a positive response, so I booked it. When I scheduled my visit and was in the process of getting treatment, power went off and I was like half done. I was really shocked with the sudden power outage and they said, it would take two hours to get power back. They asked me come after two hours, I refused for the simple reason I had a small kid to manage, and I said you refund my amount as I won’t be able to come back or else would have to post a bad feedback about your store. And, listening that he simply refunded my amount, so that’s the “affect of bad reputation” makes sure to avoid it.

Neutral Viewpoint

The customer reading review also relies on those for simple reason as they are provided by somebody like them, and there is no gain game here. They rely because people providing reviews also have hard earned money and don’t want to simple waste it.

Build Reliability

As mentioned in an earlier incident, where I chose not to buy from the site as it didn't had any reviews , I went back to my original site [even though they were offering at a higher price] because I trusted their services and products. When I finalized my purchased, I was relaxed for simple reason that they are reliable. So once you build that trustworthiness and reliability with customer, competitors wouldn't harm you and you could get your customers coming back again and again.

The Tough Part of getting Reviews from Customers

Make Review Form easy

No human wants to spend their time in something which is lengthy and at the same time not offering anything in return to them. Just think of it – would you fill a review form if given a choice?

So make them crisp and quick with some punch lines – could you spare 10 seconds of your life and fill in the feedback form. So once purchase is made – Do you want to set a reminder regarding review of the product?

Emails

Once the product is delivered, schedule a mail to the customer say after a week of its delivery, asking how the experience was. Would they like to share it with the world? Build email campaigns and target the customer who have been not frequent enough, but make sure to be kind and gentle with them.

Rewards

Now let’s face the reality, unless you see some advantage to a thing, you won’t take it up. So to target more reviews some rewards are to be offered. Say that for each four honest reviews you get 5 points and once you have 100 points, you can redeem them. Or for writing a review you get additional 5 % off in your next purchase. So come up with some innovative ideas and execute them.

Lucky Draw

A lucky draw is another way to gain more reviews, a campaign saying that top ten review contributors would be eligible for a lucky draw and showcase the prizes to be won. A lucky draw can run over a quarter or may be for a year as well. You need to look for statistics and plan it out on how and best it fits your model

Finally Hit the Jackpot

So, we have an idea now what consumer thinks and how he acts, we know the means of getting it right and the possible ways of executing and making it a success. What is left out – just a plan of action for your business on paper and you are all set! Wish you all the best with the implementation.

By the way, we've already implemented and you can read/write review on any product @PriceTree