B2B Online Reviews: 5 Steps to Boosting Your Visibility

Standing out in the B2B landscape is getting harder, much harder. 

Industries are becoming more and more saturated with everyone offering similar products and services, while AI and other big technological shifts are demanding constant innovation for B2B businesses to stay switched on and relevant.

Plus, with customers having so much information and so many choices in today’s market, it makes it even harder for businesses to stand out and really make their mark.

That said, there are ways to help you improve your brand’s visibility online – and online reviews play a huge part in this, especially for B2B businesses. 

We’re going to be looking at five important and actionable steps to enhance your B2B brand’s online presence using reviews. 

Summary on B2B Online Reviews

• Importance of Reviews: Establishes trust and credibility in high-stakes B2B markets.
• Steps for Visibility
  1. Ask for feedback and reviews after interactions
  2. Select a relevant review platform for your niche (e.g., G2, Capterra, LinkedIn).
  3. Monitor and respond constructively
  4. Actively promote positive reviews on websites and marketing material.
  5. Analyze feedback to improve offerings
• Best Practices: Make review submission easy, request reviews at optimal times, and consider offering incentives (the right way!).

The Importance of B2B Online Reviews 

We can all agree that online reviews have become one of the most important assets for B2B businesses because they directly impact credibility and trustworthiness. 

Unlike B2C markets, where purchases are often impulsive, B2B transactions typically involve higher stakes and longer sales cycles. Prospective clients rely heavily on reviews to make informed decisions, ensuring they choose reliable partners. In fact, 95% of consumers consider online reviews before purchasing.

Why? Because reviews highlight genuine experiences from other businesses. They provide social proof that reassures potential clients that your services or products deliver on their promises. Simply put, if you have plenty of great reviews, businesses are more likely to buy from you; by comparison, if you have several negative reviews – you get the idea.

In other words, reviews influence purchase decisions in the B2B world. Making reviews an integral part of your marketing strategy is key to succeeding.

There are several benefits that B2B reviews bring to the table, three of which are:

Gaining Valuable Feedback

Whether the reviews are good or bad, your customer’s feedback is essential to improve your products or services. 

Reviews offer direct insights into what your clients think of your brand, and in turn, what areas need improving. The simple act of reading your customers’ reviews can help you identify common pain points and areas to rework and improve. You want your offerings to evolve based on your customers’ needs and expectations – so keep an eye on your reviews, the good and the bad!

Find out how to gather reviews for your website.

Increasing Online Visibility

Reviews can significantly enhance your brand’s online presence. When clients leave reviews, they often include keywords relevant to your business, which can help boost your search engine (SEO) rankings.

For example, positive reviews on platforms like Google My Business mentioning specific services or product features – such as “responsive customer service” or “innovative solutions” – can help improve your visibility when potential clients search for related terms. 

User-generated content from reviews can boost your SEO efforts by creating fresh, relevant content that search engines enjoy. Additionally, the more reviews you have, the more your brand appears in search results, increasing visibility and attracting more traffic to your website.

Boosting Website Conversions

Potential clients are more likely to engage with a business that has positive feedback from other customers. That should come as no surprise. 

Positive reviews act as powerful testimonials and encourage businesses to opt for you over your competitors. By placing your positive reviews front and center, customers are more likely to convert, whether it’s filling out a contact form, signing up for a demo, or making a purchase. 

5 Steps to Boosting Your B2B Brand’s Visibility With Online Reviews

Yes, reviews are one of the best ways to nudge customers further down the sales funnel, but the real benefits come when more people can see them. Let’s look at 5 ways to help get your B2B brand’s reviews seen by more people online. 

Encourage Happy Customers to Leave Reviews

Asking customers or clients to leave (positive) reviews is essential for building a strong review presence. Timing is crucial too, ask for reviews shortly after a positive interaction or successful project completion (more on this later). Good methods include personalized emails, follow-up messages or simply asking them! 

Make sure the review process is easy and convenient by providing direct links to review sites and clear instructions. 

If you feel like getting reviews is a pain point in business for you, you’re not alone. Industry experts from B2B SaaS, but also from other more traditional fields have stated that constantly collecting reviews isn’t an easy task.

Choose the Right Platforms for Your Reviews

Identify key review platforms that are relevant to B2B brands, such as LinkedIn, G2, Capterra, and industry-specific sites. Being present on multiple platforms increases your reach and credibility. 

Optimize your profiles on these platforms by completing all information fields, using professional images, and regularly updating your content. This ensures that your brand appears professional and trustworthy to potential clients.

Monitor and Respond to Your Reviews

It’s good practice to keep tabs on your reviews and respond to them, good or bad. Try to do this as soon as they come in – acknowledge positive feedback with gratitude and address negative reviews with a constructive, solution-focused approach. Do not retaliate with aggression, even if the review is false or malicious.

Try to turn negative feedback into an opportunity for improvement and show you’re willing to make things right with your customers. In any case, always try to look for an amicable solution. 

Promote Your Reviews

Positive reviews are gold dust in today’s market, especially considering 31% of respondents in a recent 2024 survey aged 16 to 24 years had used a customer review to research products online. Basically, this means you’re going to want to display them loud and proud here, there and everywhere

You might want to think about: 

• Featuring testimonials and reviews prominently on landing pages
• Adapting them to marketing material
• Incorporate them into case studies and success stories

Promoting your reviews not only helps boost your brand’s visibility but also builds trust with potential clients who see firsthand the positive experiences of others.

Analyze Review Feedback to Make Improvements

As more reviews come in, make sure to analyze them to see what you can uncover. Look for recurring themes or specific issues mentioned by customers, for example, if multiple reviews highlight a particular feature that needs improvement or consistently praise a specific aspect of your service, take note.

Use this feedback to improve your products, services, and your customers’ experience. Showing you care and are willing to make improvements will only put you in better stead in front of your customers and ultimately strengthen your relationships with your customers.

Best Practices for Requesting Reviews from B2B Customers

Gathering reviews from your B2B customers can be challenging, but following best practices can significantly increase your success rate. Here are some strategies to help you request reviews effectively.

Make it Easy for Customers to Leave a Review

Asking someone to leave a review is a big ask, so your first port call should be to make it as easy as possible for them. To do this, ensure your review submission process is straightforward and user-friendly. It’s also important to provide clear instructions and direct links to review platforms. 

You could also consider using email templates or in-app prompts to guide customers through the process. The easier you make it for customers to leave a review, the more likely they are to do so.

In essence, the easier it is to leave reviews, the more likely your customers will do so.

Time Your Review Requests

Timing is everything when asking for reviews. 

If you can, try to request reviews soon after a positive interaction. This could be a successful completion of a project or after receiving positive feedback from a customer. There are several ways to do this, but one of the easiest ways is to use our review automation process to make your life 10x easier!

Offer an Incentive

Who doesn’t love an incentive?

By offering customers something in return, they’re more likely to leave a review. Consider providing things like store or product discounts, credits, or exclusive access to new features or services as a token of appreciation for their time and effort. Make sure that the incentives you’re offering are relevant and valuable to your customers, otherwise, they might not find much use for it.

However, keep in mind that paying for reviews is a no-no, and can cause you to get sued by the FTC, and damage your credibility in the eyes of potential new customers.

Promoting B2B Customer Reviews on Your Website

Embedding B2B Reviews with Trustmary

Embedding reviews on your website can significantly boost your brand’s credibility and attract potential clients. With Trustmary, adding reviews to your site is simple:

1. Sign up and collect reviews: Start by signing up for Trustmary and collecting reviews from your customers.

2. Generate embed code: Once you have reviews, log into your Trustmary account and navigate to the “Widgets” section.

3. Customize your Widget: Choose the type of widget you want to display on your website. Customize the design and layout to match your site’s aesthetics.

4. Copy the embed code: After customization, copy the generated embed code.

5. Paste the code on your website: Go to your website’s content management system (CMS) and paste the embed code in the desired location on your site.

Simple as that! Following these steps, you can easily display your customer reviews for the world to see. 

Knowing Where to Place Reviews

The next step is knowing where to place them. Sure, having your reviews on your website is great, but the key is knowing where to place them and have them pop up to maximize their impact.

A few of the best places are: 

• Your landing pages: This is where most, if not all of your customers will make their buying decision. Be sure to place reviews near call-to-action buttons to reinforce trust at this late purchase stage.

• Your product and/or service pages: If customers are looking through your products and services, feature a positive review on the same page to nudge them along the buying funnel – just make sure they’re specific to the products or services they’re looking at.

• Your home page: Your home page is essentially the front page of your website. So, featuring a selection of top reviews is only going to give your customers an even better first impression of your brand.

• Finally, your testimonials page: Alongside your glistening testimonials, double down with a few reviews to hammer home how much your customers admire your work.

Want to know more ways to place and publish reviews? Check out our guide on highlighting reviews in key areas.

Next Steps

Focusing on online reviews can really elevate your B2B brand’s visibility and trust. Customers care so much about trust and authenticity in today’s market, and will always be on the lookout for positive reviews to reaffirm their buying decisions. 

Encourage your happy customers to leave reviews, pick the right platforms, and actively promote and respond to the feedback you get (even if it’s negative)!

Tools like Trustmary can make the process of creating an online survey and sending it a breeze, helping you gather and showcase genuine customer experiences loud and proud.

Start building a solid B2B review strategy now, and watch as it boosts your credibility and attracts more clients to your business.

Further Reading:

• Actionable Guide to Measuring and Analyzing Customer Satisfaction in 2024
• How to Get More Reviews From Your Customers
• How to Add Google Reviews to Website (for Dummies)

Boosting Your B2B Brand’s Visibility FAQs