Customer reviews can be scary. You’re giving your target audience an open forum to view and voice true feelings about your business. But customer reviews can also be your greatest gift as a small business owner.
That’s because, when used properly, customer reviews can be the catalyst that propels a small business into the stratosphere. After all, who’s a better promoter than a satisfied customer? Who could better convince new prospective customers that your product or service is top-notch?
Nobody.
The question then becomes, what are you supposed to do with these reviews? Without the proper know-how and application, your reviews will sit online collecting digital dust.
In this article, we’ll show you how to use online reviews to your advantage and turn them into a promotional arm of your small business.
Why do you need customer reviews?
Before we dive into our six ways to use your online reviews, let’s touch for a moment on why they’re necessary in the first place.
Customer reviews can provide a small business with two very important elements to any successful marketing campaign.
- User-generated content
- Social proof
User-generated content is fairly straightforward as a concept — it’s content generated by your users. Think about how many ads you see in a day. You tend to block them out because there are so many.
We’re constantly being inundated with marketing messaging crafted painstakingly by experts and pushed out along our frequent channels. Because of that, society has developed an innate distrust of marketers.
That’s why user-generated content is so vital. When people see content created by their peers — people with the same pain points as them — they’re more likely to believe what it says.
That’s why 9 out of 10 shoppers read reviews before purchasing.
Then there’s social proof. It’s a theory in psychology that people are influenced into taking specific actions by watching the actions of others. If they see your satisfied customers posting their experiences, they’re more likely to buy from you.
As you can see, you’ll want to incorporate user reviews into your marketing for several reasons. Now that you know the why, let’s get into how.
Six ways to use reviews for promotional purposes
Let’s break down six strategies to help you use your reviews to promote your business.
1. Add customer reviews to your product pages
Your product page is an important part of your website.
This e-commerce hotspot needs:
- To be visually appealing
- To be optimized for search using SEO best practices
- High-quality images of your products
- Video demos of your products
- Well-written descriptive copy
- Links to other related products
Plus, much more.
But one thing that your product pages absolutely need is reviews. This is true no matter what you’re selling. You can go about this one of two ways. Either allow users to leave reviews on the page or feature positive reviews you’ve found on other platforms.
Why should you do this?
Because it’s what people want to see, and it’s the fastest way to get customers to trust in you and the quality of whatever you’re selling.
A massive 79% of shoppers say that they put as much trust in online product reviews as they do in personal recommendations from family and friends. That makes reviews on your product page an opportunity you can’t pass up.
That’s why BriteCo, a jewellery insurance company, uses a slider with reviews from satisfied customers to build trust in their services each time a new web visitor (and potential client) lands on their homepage.
2. Utilize social media data
One place where you’re likely to find many customer reviews is on social media. And it might not appear on your social channels. People might tweet about your product using a specific hashtag or share your product listing with their followers along with a short review.
This is great, and it’s prime user-generated content. But the usefulness of social media reviews goes far beyond simply spreading the word on social channels. You can actually take these stellar service reviews and use them in your marketing campaigns.
We’ve noted above how people don’t often trust marketers anymore, and that’s not changing anytime soon. So, a great way to soften your marketing messaging and make it more palatable for your prospective customers is to include quotes from social media users preaching the praises of your products.
These quotes can be used on landing pages, your homepage, product pages, newsletters, email marketing blasts, and in print advertising, and they can even be shared on your social media profiles. For example, Hers has a special page for reviews, where they post quotes from customers who have used spironolactone for hair loss.
Just make sure you ask the person who wrote it before using it in your advertising. Typically this can be done either as a comment on their initial post or by sending them a direct message.
Because social media content can be valuable for your marketing efforts, you must ensure that people post about you. Create specific hashtags for people to use so that it’s easy to track.
You can come up with something creative using a hashtag generator or use your brand name — as it’ll be easy to remember and, at the same time, can promote your brand.
For example, StudioSuits successfully uses this strategy across its social media posts by encouraging customers to tag #studiosuits whenever they post pictures wearing their custom suits.
You can even incentivize this with giveaways. Let’s say that anyone who writes a review of your product and uses a specific hashtag will be entered into a drawing for a gift card.
That’s a perfect way to boost your social media reviews and subsequently roll them into your marketing materials.
3. Use customer reviews in brochures/billboards
Display advertising still exists. All you have to do is drive down the highway, and you’ll see that businesses are still spending big money on roadside advertising.
You also shouldn’t discount the effectiveness of a brochure. For example, if you’re running an entertainment attraction like a ropes course or a go-kart track, you’ll want to give out brochures to local hotels and motels encouraging tourists to come and check you out.
These are perfect opportunities to include quotes from online reviews. A strong line from someone about how a product or attraction helped or entertained them can go a long way toward capturing the attention of new prospects.
The best part? You can also repurpose these content assets into a digital form and expand your reach using social media marketing.
4. Use a plugin to pull reviews from 3rd party platforms
Harnessing the power of third-party reviews directly on your website isn’t just smart — it’s clever.
As we discussed earlier, online reviews serve as a form of social proof, helping to build trust with potential customers. And using the right plugin, you can streamline the process and add an extra layer of authenticity to your online presence.
There’s a reason Penn Tool Co. is ranked the best tools company for online ordering, shipping, and delivery of power tools across the United States. They offer a seamless user experience from start to finish.
For example, Penn Tool Co. collects reviews from various sources and beautifully integrates them into its website design using a simple plugin. No fuss, no muss.
As a result, when visitors scroll through their array of power tools, they’re greeted by a handful of reviews from real customers who’ve already made purchases. This information can be crucial for undecided shoppers, offering reassurance that they’re making a worthwhile investment.
The result? Higher conversions and happy customers.
5. Try affiliate marketing
One of the most effective ways to generate online reviews that pay off is through affiliate marketing.
Affiliate marketers are often people who have a sizable social media presence. Typically, they’ll review your product and promote it to their legions of followers using a specific product link.
That link can then be tracked, and the affiliate marketer makes a percentage of the sale as a commission.
Many huge companies offer affiliate marketing programs, including Amazon, Best Buy, Target, and more.
But affiliate marketing isn’t all social media platforms. You can have bloggers include reviews of your products in a blog post and provide them with a trackable link. You can then use these reviews as lead magnets to enhance the credibility of your product and attract more potential customers.
Getting your content listed in articles like this can go a long way toward pushing people into your product pages.
This form of review promotion will cost you some money, but at least you’re only paying when you make a sale. In other words, you’re not going to lose anything.
6. Use video testimonials
You can and should use video testimonials to provide social proof to your prospective customer base.
These videos are professionally shot and edited, featuring satisfied customers telling stories about how your product impacted their lives.
And since mobile e-commerce and small business sales now account for 72.9% of all online purchases, these testimonials should be featured prominently on your mobile-friendly website for best results.
You can include them on product pages, home pages, landing pages, social media, email marketing blasts, and even in their own dedicated section of your site.
So, why video?
People retain more from video than they do from text. Plus, being able actually to see and hear your satisfied customers goes a long way toward developing that trust we spoke about earlier.
Try to have more than one camera angle and cut to some B-roll footage to keep things moving and interesting. It’s also not a great idea to script your customers when they film their testimonials.
Whatever they say needs to be in their own voice and words. Prospects can sniff out any whiff of fake messaging, which torpedo everything you’re trying to accomplish.
Add some light music in the background as well to cover any pauses and prevent the testimonial from sounding awkward.
Ensure that your customers give specific information on what you’ve done to help them. If there’s a numerical figure involved, use it. Specifics will help convince someone who might be on the fence about purchasing.
What do you do with bad reviews?
We’ve discussed what you should do to capitalize on your good reviews. However, no matter how good your company is and how stellar your product might be, you’re still going to get some bad reviews here and there.
This isn’t the end of the world, and it’s to be expected.
In the end, what matters is not whether you got a bad review but how you responded to it.
You should be responding to all of your reviews wherever possible, whether they’re good or bad. But responding to good reviews is easy. You get to humbly bask in praise from your adoring public and offer them thanks.
Responding to a bad review is an art form.
First off, don’t get defensive. That’s the first way to pull someone into a fight you won’t win. Remember, when an organization argues with an individual, people are more likely to back the individual.
Instead of getting defensive and telling the reviewing customer why they’re wrong, commiserate with them. Tell the customer that you’re sorry that they had this experience and that you understand how frustrating it must be.
Let them know that you understand them and what you plan on doing to prevent issues like these from happening again. Then, publicly offer them a way to fix their problem, whether that’s providing a discount or a partial refund. Show that you’re willing to go the extra mile.
This not only shows the reviewing customer that you have integrity and a commitment to customer satisfaction, but it also shows your prospective customers this as well.
Once you’ve addressed the issue publicly, it’s time to internalize the feedback and improve on your weaknesses. After all, customer reviews unlock a treasure trove of information about what’s working and what’s not.
Maybe customers love your products but are disappointed in the time it takes to receive them in the mail and therefore leave bad reviews on your product pages. With direct access to this information, you can implement the proper solution to fix it.
For instance, if you own a small business in the healthcare industry, using a medical courier service can be a game changer in terms of stepping up your services and improving online reviews. A pharmacist can offer this type of service to ensure that critical medical supplies and equipment are delivered efficiently and on time.
Use bad customer reviews as motivation to improve your product or service for the better. Your existing customers will thank you, and your bottom line will improve. It’s a win-win.
Wrapping up
Getting reviews of your company and products might be scary, but they’re an essential part of the modern marketing game and achieving your business goals.
Follow these five helpful steps to maximize your reviews and use them to promote your small business and boost credibility.
Make sure that you create a workflow for monitoring your reviews. To accomplish this, it’s a good idea to use a mix of marketing tools, like free options from Google (read: Google Business Profile) or paid social listening tools like SproutSocial.
That’ll make your job easier when it comes time to start sharing them for optimal benefit.
Kevin J. Kessler
Kevin J. Kessler is a published author, professional wrestler, and puppeteer (not all simultaneously). He is an associate editor and senior content writer for the content marketing firm Codeless with over 16 years of experience in developing high-end optimized content.
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